I've received m1 garands with frt hand guards that were too light. once you get the oil out of the wood I have used dark walnut stain(mimwax from lowes) it was not dark enough so I got a dark ebony stain(the same) and tried a 50/50 mix and it gave me a good result. these are not expensive stocks and I was looking to match the color and settled for about 90%. before the stain they were 3 or 4 shades to light now about 1/2 a shade off. good enugh for goverment work as we used to say.