No5 MkI legends, truths or bs?

[flying pig]

Thank you very much Peter and Patrick. I've been doing the slow application with most of my rifles but have been thinking of building a small oil tub to try Peter's way, this one sounds like a good candidate to me. Can always re-bottle the remaining oil after. How warm is warm Peter? Just trying to think of a way to keep it warm in the tank.

[jrhead75]

It would appear that someone in the region forgot the good advice/best practices that the REME folks went to the time and trouble to teach them...

However they got that way, a good many No.5s have shown up here in the States varnished (or urethaned...whatever the heck that finish is), including two out of the three I have. There was quite a bit of discussion of the issue on one of the other boards some years back concerning the exact problem Peter mentions...water retention. Several posters mentioned stripping the varnish and finding a layer of spongy, rotten wood underneath the impermeable finish. I was a bit luckier...one of mine was okay, the other didn't seem to be damaged, but is still weeping some sort of machine oil.

Bottom line...if you have a shiny varnish finish, It would likely be a good idea to remove it.

[Peter Laidler]

I always remember the linseed tanks being such that you could put your hand in to, say, slosh the wood around or find a 'lost' piece but it would be getting hot. If you were wasting a bit of time by the tanks and dunked some butts in, you could see the air expanding and bubbling out, especiall from the end grain at the ends of the butts or fore-ends. Mind you, that's just where we wanted the oil to impregnate

[Ridolpho]

Flying Pig: I bought two wallpaper wetting troughs at Revy, riveted and glued them together to make a tank long enough for a forend. Cost about $10.00 and I've done 5 forends so far. Two will fit in at a time. Last ones I did two weekends ago and with the tank sitting in the direct sun the oil temp was around 100F after two hours. Obviously, this heating technique won't work after our brief summer in Alberta is over.

Ridolpho

[flying pig]

I have it all apart now and have an idea for a temporary tank I'm going to try. The bore cleaned up beautifully. I'll strip it in the next couple days and dunk it. My wife agreed to let me try her electric heating pad, so I may carefully try that for heat. Thanks for all the help

[Peter Laidler]

Why not ask Brian at BDL to send it through his phosphating tank. It'll come back like new

[flying pig]

That would be awesome but unfortunately I'm in Canada. Were some suncorited and some phosphated then?

[Peter Laidler]

Well, yes and yes........ We abandoned the old controlled corrosion method and copied the US better and more durable phosphating. But then, we painted over the phosphate with a hard satin oven baked hard paint called sunkorite. That's all I ever remember being done to our No5's

[flying pig]

I wound up redoing the bedding on it and made that fore end work. Wow what a joy to shoot offhand. Peter's stock oiling technique makes a much more enjoyable finish too. Goodbye BLO!

[Surpmil]

Could be just the lighting, but there's something about that butt that makes me think it was made out of a No4 butt. Can you post a photo or two the of the sling loop area and the relief cut for it?