Stock Refinish
 

Hey Everyone,

I purchased a shooter GH 12 gauge courtesy of a member here as my first foray into hobby restoration. So far, I’ve managed to get the stock off without damaging anything and luckily there are no major issues with split stock heads / etc. Anyways, my plan is to put the stock in an acetone bath for 1-2 weeks to get the old oil/grime out of the wood, let it sit and dry out another 1-2 weeks, address some minor cracking with epoxy and a few methods of injection I have researched, then refinish with timberluxe and finally chase the checkering. I will do this for both the butt and forearm.

So a couple of questions I have.

1. What’s the consensus on the stock shield? I am inclined to leave it right where it is for my acetone bath and then very carefully apply finish around it. I’m not sure how to get. New one to stay in place if I pop the current one out.


2. There’s a “2” in the trigger guard area of the stock. Could this be a second stock? I’ve ordered a letter but that seems to be taking a bit. Just speculating in the meantime.

Of course if there’s any comments or suggestions I will take them. Unless, your going to suggest I send it to someone who makes a living at this. That’s not really what I’m trying to accomplish here. I’m just tinkering for fun.

Thank you,

The shield is held in by 2 brass brads. If you remove it , you will probably have to re-inlet it so it is flush. The "2" could represent frame size. By the way, what is the frame size as indicated by a number 1, 11/2, or 2 on the bottom of the rear barrel lug

It is a 1 frame

Ok then the "2" is the grade. 2 equals G in grade nomenclature

The 2 is the grade. This was a normal marking in the guard inletting along with the serial number.

As jim said the shield is held in with 2 brads. This is all that they were held in with at the factory. On many old stocks the shield is pushed up due to oxidation build up under the shield. When you pull them off, there will be thick green buildup under it. You could clean it up snd re-inlay it back flush if you want. Or set it in epoxy and then put the brads back in. And then sand it all flat with the wood. This is how I install them on new stocks.

I would only really recommend leaving it in place as long as it is flush with the wood after your cleaning cycle.

My only addition to the advice above would be to wait for a time after removing the wood from the acetone soak. The acetone will often remove all moisture from the wood to the extent that it shrinks and leaves grip caps, buttplates, etc. standing proud of the wood. A couple months of resting in the open will see the wood reabsorb moisture from the air and the wood will return to a more normal size.

I made the mistake of refitting these parts on a Remington 1889, that I acetone soaked once, only to find the wood regained the lost moisture and returned to the "before soak size" a few months later.

Yes, the OP said he intended on letting it sit for 2 weeks after the soak.
I have found that normally 1-2 weeks will bring things back to normal after a long soak. The buttplate fitment is a great way to check to see if things are good to go forward.

AIR, it took my 1889 much longer than two weeks to return to before-soak size. Just saying.

Thanks everyone. The acetone is quite disgusting after 24 hours, nearly the color of black tea. Should I switch this out? I was going to put a new gallon in at the 1 week mark, but that’s still 6 days away….

Buying gallon cans of acetone gets expensive, but don't cut it short. I've never had it to turn that dark. You're saving a piece of wood. Tell yourself that when you're buying the next can. :)

I have done the same thing and saved the last soak to use as the first soak on the next stock set.

Well as the saying goes nothing is easy….

After removing it from the first filth I noticed that the trigger guard screw hole was basically a gelatinous mess, at some point since 1893 someone has stripped that and then filled it with some kind of epoxy or glue. so my strategy there is to sand a 1/4” walnut dowel down in the drill press to fit in the hole and glue that in with some 2p-10 Jel.

I also had a pretty good crack open up along a grain line near the butt plate, i can’t get it to really close even in a soft jaw vice, so I’m thinking I’ll have to fill that with some died epoxy and resand the rear of the stock there flush with the butt plate. Not ideal, but I don’t think forcing it shut is really going to hold for any period of time.

All in good learning. Nothing that’s going to turn this project into a lost cause.

I buy it by the five gallon container at Lowes. I use a gallon and when it has finished, I save that and then use a new gallon. On the next stock I use the first gallon and then change out to the second gallon since that is usually not too filthy.

Well it is out of the acetone bath, and this thing swelled up like a balloon! the buttplate is a good 1/4" short on the bottom and 1/16" plus small on each side of the stock now. It seems to have lifted all of the oil staining however. Hopefully it returns to its normal size after some time to dry out.

I saw the comments about the wood shrinking after soaking. I have never seen that, but the opposite. They swell to original dimensions in my opinion after the soak and complete drying before applying finish.

Another update. It did shrink back to size thankfully. The butt plate and cap are black again. Managed to repair some chipped inletting to some degree. Took me a few batches of acraglass to get the sawdust coloring method down so the right side is far superior to the left. Also successfully filled in the gaping crack that opened up in the acetone soak near the butt plate. Put some acraglass down into the stress cracking, and used 2p-10 thin on some other fine cracks under the butt plate to shore them Up. steamed out all the dents, that was a 5 hour chore. Lightly sanded, and hit it with some water to preview the grain.

The final boss is epoxying a dowel in the trigger guard hole and resetting the screw. There was nothing but some tape jammed around the screw holding it in when I removed it.

Then it’s just a couple coats of timberluxe and out to the clays course.

At some point I will try to make a flat top checkering tool to chase the checkering, research is ongoing on that front.

Seems like it’s going to come out to be a winner

A V checkering tool is just fine. Parker were not cut with a square bottomed flat top tool.

Today’s update:

The fourth coat of timberluxe is taking well, and my suspicions were confirmed that buried under that grime and marred surface of this GH was some superb grain pattern. Quite pleased with my first attempt at a crack repair (see heel photo), and my inletting fix isn’t the worst job for my first attempt and an education from YouTube university. A couple more coats and it’s essentially done. Checkering tools are on the way, but that’s going to be a more of when we get to it job. The current checkering is not bad and the toothbrush method has kept the valleys from becoming traps for excess timberluxe.

all opinions welcome.

Looks beautiful!
I envy your skill and patience.

Appreciate the compliment, but calling me skilled in this regard is a disservice to many other more adept members on here.

The last update on this thread. SHE’S DONE. Grain not seen this clearly since someone picked it off the shelf in a likely oil lamp lit Chas Godfrey store in 1893.

This was not a disaster, although a few minor errors I would rate myself 6/7 out of 10. Much better than I had anticipated. To be frank, I had purchased this with my inner demons telling me I would not be upset if I had to call it all a wash and resale for parts. Fortunately, we are in the camp that’s set for another 100 years.

Criticism and comments welcome as this was a learning experience.

Well done, Dylan!! Looks great!

Dave