Walnut gunstock

[Peter Ward]

How to achieve a "traditional oiled finish" on the beautiful walnut stock of a fine grade double barrel shotgun ? I have stripped the wood back to base with turps and 1200 paper and fine steel wool. My inclination is to boiled linseed oil but I have been warned that it is subject to washing out when carried in the rain so I need to add some durability improver ( ! ) I do not want polyeurethanes etc. Are there "hardners" and/or "driers" etc that should / can be added to the BLO ?
Any qualified advice ?

[Suresh]

Locally there is a gunstock maker. He gets his walnut from the Dargo region, apparently the pattern of summer rain makes for the best walnut.
He finishes his stocks with either Tung oil or BLO. You will not find that the BLO washes out, while curing it forms a bond with the timber. This bond is not as strong as that formed by Tung oil which is also more water resistent.
Suresh

[Eastie]

I hate oil finishes on gun stocks! It is a waste of time. It does not in any way seal the timber, which in my experience leads to rapid timber movement when subject to fluctuations in environmental conditions. Combine this with a nonfloated barrel and your in for disapointment.

On the last one I did (a new sako straight out of the box) I simply rubbed out as much oil as I could and applied two coats of shellawax cream (yes Neil - I know it should only be used on raw timber - but it has worked ) and mechanically buffed it. That was over a year ago and the finish is still fine.

If you want to use oil you could try equal parts satin poly, linseed oil & tung oil. This is a marked improvement (imho) than the typical oils used. If you’re not into experimenting then go for one of the off-the-shelf gun stock finishes available from most gun dealers.

Hope this helps
Eastie

PS - Don't use steel wool on raw timber. I also recall reading in a finishing book (can't remember which one) that tung is one of the more hyrdoscopic oils around, thus the addition of polyurethanes in most commercial mixes.

[Peter Ward]

I think Eastie is right for rifles..shotties are a different matter. The problem with the poly. based finishes is that they always look like a "skin" whereas the oil finish produces the deep lustre within the wood , is my observation.

So now , is tung oil more or less hygroscopic than the BLO ? I seem now to have 2 opposed opinions.
The famous English gunmakers are reputed to be very secretive about their stock oils but I suspect that within this forum there just might be "the man" ?

[Eastie]

Peter - you're right - I was thinking in terms of rifles. Either way you don't want too much timber movement due to moisture. In relation to linseed oil v's tung oil I don't know which is better, but just making comment on what I've previously read relating only to tung oil when used on it's own. Weirdly, the author claimed that from test results two coats of pure tung oil was more hydroscopic than a single coat. These sort of tests were pretty common back in the 60-80's when a lot of $'s were being pumped into researching building components/finishes and standards. If I could only find the book.
I haven't used linseed oil in this way enough to comment. Whatever way you go experiment on some scarp timber and see how it comes up.