I have an old English shotgun that has a beautiful stock, which I would like re-oil. I smoothed it out with fine steel wool, and raised the dents with a rag and hot iron.I did not remove the entire finish, but the color did get a bit lighter and the wood is very smooth now. I purchased some Pinkertons oil (tinted red/brown) along with some rottenstone. I would like to build up the oil finish again....Should I use the rottenstone right away, or for just the final finish? Do any of you have any advise for me on how I should proceed with this project? Any advise on how I should do this would be greatly appreciated!

Do a search on here for any posts on stock finishing by either Customstox or jeffeoso. Both of these guys have tons and tons of practical experience with all kinds of wood and finishes. Their advice will be top rate and they have already done all the R&D for you.

I will offer one bit of advice though...put the steel wool away and don’t take it out again. You will end up with tiny pieces of it embedded in the wood and the finish if you’re not really, really careful.

I let the oil dry then rub it with rottenstone, clean it and do it again for as many coats of oil that you want. Rottenstone helps polish the wood.

Just be aware that Rottenstone/pumice will dull the hell out of checkering tools so if checkering is in the plan you might want to forego using them in the finish.

My Dad used to use boiled linseed oil and pumice , then rottenstone on antique furnature applied with an old piece of carpet. With lots of rubbing, he acheived a really nice satin finish.

Thanks fellas, so do you mix the rottenstone with the oil and rub it in like that? I understand that the rottenstone is a powder, so I guess that I must mix it....is this correct?

quote:

Originally posted by Wolfgar:
Thanks fellas, so do you mix the rottenstone with the oil and rub it in like that? I understand that the rottenstone is a powder, so I guess that I must mix it....is this correct?

Mix a small amount of rottonstone with the tungoil and make a thick paste and use it like that.


Do you want to use it to "fill" in the grain or polish the finished surface?

If you want to fill in the grain, rub it in the pours of the wood and let it dry. Then go back and wet sand with 600gr paper until you're down to the wood. 2 or 3 applications will do it.

If you just want polish the finished surface with it. Make the same paste and start polishing with it. when finished take a clean rag and wipe it all off.


Terry

One other thing, I would remove ALL of the old finish before I refinished anything.

Terry

Thanks TC,
I am afraid to remove the whole finish, because I don't want to screw-up the checkering....there is still some finish left, but I did remove alot of it. The finish looks dull and much lighter than before, but you can still see that some is still there. Do you think that this is OK? I thought that I could just build up the coats on top of what is already there. It is nice and clean and smooth.
I did not take off the metal, and did not touch the checkering, so I am afraid to use sandpaper to take the whole finish off.
Hey, thanks again!!!!!!!!!

There are much better finishes than linseed oil. If you have the option it would be good to switch. I use a polymer modified tung oil, but there is a large selection that will do a good job. Linseed oil never really dries hard, is not very water repellent and it can and does absorb dirt and oils. Linspeed is the same critter that has been "refined" differently. I would not use rottenstone as you finish. It has been used for filling pores but there are far better ways to do it, including a Birchwood Casey product.

You can use a finish remover on your stock, in fact it is better than sanding.