byf 43 Kar98k

[Milsurp Collector]

I saw this on Gunbroker last month. The story was "Uncle Elmer brought rifle back from WW11, after his death Mrs Elmer had boyfriend put gun in garage, been there ever since."






It wasn't very pretty, but I was very happy when I won it for only $460.

Because of bad weather and botched delivery attempts, it took about 3 weeks for UPS to deliver it. The stock was covered with some unknown black, glossy, gloppy finish



and there was a big dent in it



Not only was the upper band corroded, but there was corrosion on other parts as well





Rather than jumping to stripping the stock finish, I tried just cleaning it with solvents. Mineral spirits and denatured alcohol didn't do anything, but the finish wiped right off with lacquer thinner, revealing a walnut stock





There were several dents in the stock.



I decided to try steaming them out. I used my scünci steamer Scunci Steamer As Seen On TV - ScunciSteamer Hand Held Steam Cleaner



and the wood fibers in the large dent plumped up and went back to their original shape



Removing the barreled action from the stock showed how much finish had been lost



My goal was to remove active corrosion while preserving the remaining finish. I used things that I had used in the past:

• Kroil KanoLabs.com
• Bronze wool http://www.steelwool.biz/Bronze_Wool.htm

but I also tried some things for the first time, products recommended here and on another forum:

• Big 45 Frontier Metal Cleaner Big 45 Frontier Metal Cleaner
• Blue Wonder Gun Cleaner http://www.bluewonder.us/BlueWonderGunCleaner.html

I found all of the products to be useful, and each had advantages depending on the situation.

I used Eezox Eezox® Gun Care - Eezox Premium Synthetic Lubricants to help prevent future corrosion. For the stock, while I have been using boiled linseed oil (BLO) on top of a 100% pure tung oil base coat for my US military stocks, and I am very happy with that system, for this one I decided to try something new, just plain BLO.






Soon after I took the picture above, the rifle fell off the railing and onto the muddy ground below. Sling side down, of course ops:



The walnut stock has some tiger striping





The rifle was missing a sight hood and cleaning rod. Troy Burkhart at gunboards.com (slingblade61 Gunboard's Forums - View Profile: slingblade61) did a fantastic job providing me with an original sight hood and original unnumbered cleaning rod that closely matched the worn finish on my rifle. He is a good source if you need an original cleaning rod or sight hood.





The lower band is unnumbered, and is welded, so it is probably a replacement. Judging from the patina, it was probably replaced a long time ago




The upper band is pitted but at least it shouldn't get much worse, and I saved the remaining finish on the other side
















Auction page http://www.gunbroker.com/Auction/Vie...Item=116901406

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