| AK Furniture Refinishing
Part II by Perro Del Diablo |
TIPS:
Wash your steel wool out in the pail of water everytime
you scrub the stock after a coating of bix - the less
burgundy crap you have in it, the better results you will
get, and the less amount of times you will have to rescrub
it.
Change the water out with clean water after 3 or so
scrubbings.
Once you get all the old finish off of the furniture,
set the wood in a cool place to dry for 2 days. Its
important to set it in a cool place, because warm, or
hot, can crack the wood.
As soon as the wood is dry, you will notice that it
feels all fuzzy, and grainy - this is because the water
raised the grain in the wood, and you will have to remove
the "whiskers" in the wood. Take a #0000 fine
steel wool pad, and scrub the wood with the steel wool.
When i say scrub, i mean take the steel wool, and run
it up and down the wood with good pressure in the direction
of the grain - it doesnt involve getting the wood wet
at all - you dont want the wood to be wet during this
stage. once the wood is smooth as a babies butt, look
at it - if there are imperfections, this is the time
to fix them.
Small dents can easily be raised by steaming them out
with an iron. To do this, break out the ironing board,
and take an old wash cloth that you dont mind messing
up, and get it wet - turn the iron on its highest setting,
and let it warm up. take an old t shirt, and lay it
across the ironing board where you will be setting the
wood - some of the old color could bleed onto your ironing
board otherwise. once the iron is hot, lay the wood
down on the t shirt, and put the wet wash cloth over
the dent / dents - carefully press the iron onto the
wet wash cloth over the top of the dent / dents that
you want to raise - do not move the iron around - it
will start hissing, and steaming like crazy - once it
quits steaming, remove the iron, and the wash cloth
- you can resteam a couple more times if you want -
please note - steaming will only raise dents, it will
not replace missing wood.
After all of the dents are raised, let the stock sit
for a hour or so, and hit it with the #0000 fine steel
wool again until the stock is smooth as a babies butt
again.
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| Now its time to color the furniture. If
youre wood is like mine, it will be a really bright weird
orange - this can be removed by sanding down to below
where the prior finish has penetrated, however, i do not
suggest doing this, because it will make your buttstock
a WHOLE LOT SMALLER than it was before, and you will not
be happy with the results. instead, pick a stain that
will be compatible with the orange. I personally prefer
Chestnut Ridge military rifle stain. It is made for walnut
stocks, but works great on everything that i have ever
done (dark, or light woods) it has a deep red tint in
multiple coats. It can be found by clicking here.
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| The small 4 oz bottle is enough to do about
10 rifles |
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| Take the bottle of stain, and shake it up
well, then take an old t shirt and put your finger into
the shirt - dab a little of the stain onto the shirt,
and then start rubbing it into the wood - redip with the
stain often as the wood soaks it up quick, and you will
notice the color changing - try to keep it uniformed in
color. Once all the wood is coated evenly, let it sit
24 hours, and then repeat the above process with the stain
- keep adding stain until it turns the desired shade.
once the desired shade is reached, let it dry for 24 hours,
and then coat it with the semi gloss polyurethane - spray
light coats on to avoid runs, and sags. I let it dry for
4 hours between coats, and once its dry, hit it with #0000
steel wool to smooth out the poly - i usually coat it
3 times with the poly - once your 3rd coat is on, you
can either leave it glossy, or knock the shine off of
it by using the #0000 steel wool.
Below are pictures of the rifle after finished with
3 coats of chestnut ridge stain, and 3 coats of poly
- much nicer that the factory finish:
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| Alot of people prefer hand rubber oil finishes
- I have a few rifles with hand rubbed oil finishes, and
truthfully, they are reserved for investment grade firearms.
Not to knock the Century SAR 1, but if i were going to
spend the trouble of hand rubbing a finish, i would put
it on a m1 Garand, or something where its important for
the finish to be original. The SAR 1 works well with the
Poly finish because its easy, its cheap, it lasts forever,
and its a whole lot easier to maintain than an oil finish
- plus, the finish that came on the rifle is not original
to my knowledge. |
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