What Is Teh Best To Clean A Wood Stock

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Got a surplus rifle coming my way - what is the best way to make clean the wooden stock?
In the past I accept just used gun oil, which takes off some of the storage clay and does not damage the stock.
Non interested in any kind of restauration, just the right way to get them clean and ready for the gun range once more...
I utilise Lemon Oil Piece of furniture polish and 0000 (Actress Fine) steel wool.
It will take all the erstwhile grit & grime off without harming the remaining factory wood finish in the slightest.
Information technology's fabricated for fine furnature afterall.

Unlike gun oil, it is harmless to forest, or woods finish.
(In otherwords, DO Not utilize gun oil on wood, menses.)

rc
If gun oil gets by the stop and into the wood fibers,it near certainly volition impairment the stock.
If it'south just cosmoline on the finish, it will come off pretty easily with rags or at most a quick wash with hot soapy water (and a very prompt and complete drying). If in that location's no finish the cosmoline may have penetrated into the wood and will be leaching out for ages. At that place are a number of fixes for that, none of them particularly piece of cake or satisfactory.
I have had proficient results with this:
http://semproducts.com/images/flyer_files/30%20FAMILY.pdf
I have bought it at Bail Auto Supply merely Sem told me many professional auto supply outlets carry their products.
Surplusrifle.com has alot of articles and an entire second dedicated to just that question.
I just use the Orange Pledge spray and a rag with some proficient ole' elbow grease for my stocks. If your going to be removing cosmoline, or grime, buildup, etc, I would reccomend looking at a more heavy-duty solution as stated above, like steel wool or cleaner specifically made for what you demand to remove.
Don't employ Dawn Power Dissolver if you lot only want to clean information technology. That's the stuff I use to STRIP stocks. Works great for that, only the cease will get bye-bye.
If it's cosomoline soaked, I showtime take off all the metal and make clean them off with paint thinner.
I then have a cloth that'south soaked in the stuff and give a brief scrubbing of the forest.
Then, have a cheapie towel, wrap it effectually the stock, embrace that bit in a trash bag and toss the unabridged burrito in the trunk on a hot day.
Oh, that and shoot it a lot.

The final 1 seems to have done the play tricks for me, although I tin can honestly say that my Mosin was 'sweating' for well-nigh the kickoff thousand rounds.
What kind of end is currently on the forest?
Surplus = armed services upshot = what finish?
All the surplus rifles I've handled had some stain put on the white walnut outerwood used to cut the material toll, any further finishing was done by the user with gun oil or the surroundings. Usually floor wax. That would become stripped when their Start Line Leader smelled it in the field.

Wood military stocks don't go much of anything except a wipe downwards with the aforementioned rag the activeness was wiped down with. The grime is also known as patina, and I question if it should be removed at all if that is the way information technology came into possession. Removing patina on a rare collector firearm is a guaranteed manner to lower the value.

If you know for a fact it's just another shooter like a 100,000 others, all the same, be conscientious. Forest stains can be removed past a lot of stuff, the original dark stain and dull await can be quickly ruined when the result is a vivid yellow with gloss. Not military at all.
Gun oil won't hurt the wood, though it might darken information technology if information technology soaks in, but fifty-fifty that'southward unlikely. If the stock is 1 of those nighttime, cosmoline soaked monsters, there are lots of articles around on how to remove the cosmo and re-oil with something a little more than pleasant to handle. If it'due south a mosin with a shellaced stock so just don't worry nigh it, no lemon oil or heaven knows what needed.
Stock "maintenance" is something for the owner to enjoy, not something that actually protects the stock. Near guns in the U.s. live in safes 99% of the fourth dimension and would practice just fine as raw forest.
I just cannot agree.
I have repaired fashion as well many one-time Winchester stocks that were oil soaked from years of owners squirting sewing machine oil in the activity and continuing them in a corner for the oil to bleed down into the stock and ruin the woods.

Cosmoline doesn't get a chance to penetrate much deeper and so it did when the gun was dipped in information technology because it is too thick once it cools.

Gun oil only keeps following the grain downward deep within and will eventually soften the wood and ruin information technology.

rc
Not polymerizing oils may darken with age, but they won't soften the wood. You're going to have to come up with something scientific before I'll believe that one. It sounds like the examples you lot've seen take been grossly over oiled in whatsoever instance, I don't think I've always used so much oil on an activity that it would run down and soak into the stock in whatsoever kind of quantity.
Most of the lemon oils and like stuff that you are recommending are footling more than light mineral oil (ie gun oil/sewing machine oil) with a little citrus aroma added and if y'all're actually lucky a bit of paraffin wax. Such products are designed to proceed height of a cured stop and fill lite scratches with oil and wax, thus temporarily improving the appearance. They exercise zilch for the longevity of the cured finish.
Y'all did not say which surplus rifle? Nearly were treated with BLO at the factory equally far as I know. What they got later on that in the field is whatsoever ones gauge? I'd look until you get it and and then mail pictures and what it feels similar. There are a few optional means to go here, depending on what information technology was "maintained" with?
BLO, Tung oil, shellac, all accept been used on mil-surps. You need to know the original finish to make up one's mind on how to clean the woods. Most use BLO equally the original stop. To make clean those use a 50/50 mix of BLO and turpentine with some 000 steel/brass wool to scrub them down. Then finish off with a few coats of BLO.
What is BLO? Boiled Linseed oil?
Yes, BLO is boiled linseed oil...madcratebuilder hitting information technology on the boom. Y'all have to know a trivial flake whats on the stock beginning. I've cleaned some milsurps that weren't to bad with Irish potato's Soap, then Tung Oil, Tung Oil likewise cleans every bit you rub it in. If its got cosmoline on it y'all have to go with something else first.....lots of methods for that as some have suggested...then y'all get into wether you want to just stip everything down an refinish an how....lots of info here for that to. I'one thousand going with rcmodel on non putting oil on wood, I've read too many threads from guys who refinish that will tell yous it harms the grains in the woods. No scientific documents to back it.....
Naphtha, volition non harm the woods and evaporates very fast, you lot take to soak the wood, which means in a full stock, a dandy quanity. But yous can reuse it also.
Finding a vessel that will permit the stock submerge in the liquid, might be a problem with some stocks.
Plain gasoline works well too, and is a lot cheaper.

Soak all the wood parts over night, and so wipe with absorptive rags until dry to the touch, yous may accept to repeat, to go the oil out to the surface where it tin can be removed by wiping, then WHEN YOUR SURE THE VAPORS ARE GONE,use a pilus dryer or heat gun to bring more than oil to the surface, and remove with a solvent dampened rag.

It may take 6-eight cycles, only you lot tin become the wood back to it's natural land before the finish was applied, so you tin sand and use your favorite terminate.
Not to sound like the THR fire marshall, but proceed in mind when using products such as Naptha and Gasoline, these are extremely combustible and will produce flammable vapors. Use in a well ventilated area; certainly no place where you may take a source of combustion such equally your water heater, furnace, store heater, etc. And no smoking, either.
Boiled linseed oil can likewise spontaneously ignite, including rags.

Then, I know yous've heard this a million times over, merely simply a reminder to make sure everyone gets through the procedure in i slice.

Last edited: Nov 28, 2010
Is a drastic clean actually needed? Whenever someone starts mentioning sanding and steel wool. I gets a trivial nervioso.. The most I do to surplus guns is rub them down with wax and or petroleum jelly, both of which protect, especially shellac a la mosin-nagant.
Using 0000 steel wool isn't "desperate" cleaning. Mil-surps often take a thick layer of crud on them and steel wool is a very good way to remove information technology(with a cleaner). If information technology is cosmoline soaked I just apply odorless mineral spirits. Information technology is flammable merely considerably less so than gasoline.
"once it cools" beingness the operative phrase. A lot of the unfinished cosmo'd rifles were apparently stored in less than ideal conditions and did get hot enough to get gooey. Multiply that past decades in some armory in Turkey, Yugoslavia or wherever and you accept some serious infiltration of the grain.
What would you employ on a classic Enfield "Jungle Carbine", which has the yellow stock and looks 'bone dry out'?
There are probably one or ii very similar #5s at "Joesalter", which is where my start came from.