dulled wood finish on 1874 Quigley rifle

[SFogler]

Some brands have petroleum products mixed in the tung oil to make it dry faster. Lee Valley offers 100% pure tung oil.
http://www.leevalley.com/US/wood/page.a ... ,190,42942

My experience with gun glow was not what I expected. I had a beautiful feather crotch walnut stock on a Shiloh from the 90's that had probably been a safe queen for years and not received much attention. It would catch the light and look like fire in the wood. I put some gun glow on it and it changed the "three dimensional" look of the fire in the grain grain to a muddy "two dimensional" look. The wood is still nice but it just doesn't stand out like it used to. Kinda put the fire out. Anybody recommend a treatment short of tung oil? It doesn't reaslly need a lot of work - I would just like to see the grain again like it used to be.

[Kurt]

Here is an example what Tung oil does bringing out the figure in wood. I ordered this CPA .22 with their standard wood in the rough unfinished. After the final sanding using 600 grid paper taking the sandpaper scratches out.



Here it is with two coats of pure Tung I used first for deep penetration. Pure tung will penetrate the wood and seal it before applying a Tung blend that has several different additives for the final coat. What you see here it has three coats of low gloss Formby blend Tung oil. I don't like the high gloss wood so I use a blue paper shop towel to rub it down. I was in a hurry to use the rifle at this point before I finished it but it brings out the figure in the wood very well. This rifle now has 15 coats of Formby and it has been out in the rain a couple times and it still looks good.
If one has to redo wood that has Tung oil on it and been waxed or had linseed used it has to be fine sanded before refinishing it with oil to get the best out of it again. Tung oil is very forgiving.



Here it is before rubbing the gloss off.

[kenny s]

I've been doing this for years...the finish I use on all my customers guns is Tung Oil. I buy it from Home Depot for $20 and it works.
thing is. you have to have a clean, dry, oil free base on the wood. Lemon oil is just that...an oil it's a really good furniture polish.
(I spent 20 years as a furniture factory representative) It can be mixed with linseed oil .
so, I would recommend a little alcohol on a rag and clean it good. Let it dry,then don't touch it with your hands.

Rub the Tung oil on a rag and hard rub it in and then let it set for at least a day.maybe two. The base finish is what you will
build up on from there. Linseed works the same way. put it on light then set it aside for a day or three for the base coat.

then put as many coats on with Tung as you want, letting each dry.
Finally, hard rub it with a piece of burlap. That will give you the 'dry shine' we want.

again , let it set....
If you want to clean it really well, use a little Rotten stone on a rag with alcohol.
you can use rotten stone with linseed to clean it up as it gets dirty.....
Both of these will produce a high gloss finish if you use a good number of coats...

[b]OK A DISCLAIMER THESE OILS WILL BURN YOUR HOUSE DOWN. USE THE RAGS ONCE! THEN WET AND PUT OUTSIDE TO DRY,THEN DISCARD.
NEVER PUT THEM IN A COFFEE CAN TO REUSE...THEY WILL IGNITE ALL BY THEMSELVES!
Ken

[mrhunterken]

I guess we may never know how his rifle turned out.