Centaur 1

DC, those sure are some great looking knives and leatherwork that you have on your website. Any chance that you go by the name Hipshot on RFC? Check out this link.

http://www.rimfirecentral.com/forums...d.php?t=183031

Centaur 1

OK, I get the hint, scrap the "fake" suppressor. Actually I'd classify it as non-functioning, everything visible is exactly what our guys are using in the middle east, the inconel baffles were left out of this one.

If I do away with the black rifle idea, what colors would you recomend. I want to give it the two tone look sort of like what the laminated stocks have. What about black/green, grey/green, geen/orange or even black/grey?

statjunk

Didn't want to say anything but I'm glad you got away from the black rifle thing. All the work you put into that stock would be wasted had you dyed it black. That little stock as some nice grain.

I like grey/blue combo I saw once. I have no idea how you'd match the pattern of a laminate.

Tom

skb2706

I sure wish the stock on my 10/22 was figured like that. Mine is straight as it gets with no detail at all. That one you have there is deserving of a nice finish.

This one should have been 'deck lumber'. You gotta love a $450 scope on a rifle that cost me $106.

DC KNIVES

I agree with the others, save that stock, mine was very straight grained and dinged up as well.I think a nice walnut stain would look good.Dave

DC KNIVES

Thank you for the compliment and no I am DC KNIVES there too, but I did use Hipshot's tutorial to do my rifle.Dave

Centaur 1

Something like this maybe?

Centaur 1

I did a lot of shaping today. The bottom edge of the butt stock had the general shape, but it wasn't very straight. Now mind you that I don't have a wood shop, all the work is done by hand. I actually used a utility knife to whittle the edge straight. Once it was fairly straight I used my palm sander to smooth the edge. At this point the stock still had more of an oval cross section, so I used coarse sandpaper in the sander and used lots of elbow grease to give it a teardrop cross section. Now I know that you can't expect much precision where it isn't required when the gun only sold for $149 brand new, but the butt plate never fit precisely against the stock. Well that might be acceptable on a production gun, but not on one that I'm putting so much work into. I had to put it on and take it off a dozen or so times before I got it to match up. I would match up one side and then the other would be off, it started to get quite tedious when I got an idea. I broke out the dremel again and I hollowed out the wood so that I only had to sand the edges. It actually worked great and it didn't take me long after that to get the plate to line up with the wood. Then all I had to do was sand the sides of the buttplate to match the new contour of the stock. I think that's enough for today. And now the pics.

Centaur 1

I've also been doing a lot of thinking about the final color after reading all of your comments. I guess that I did luck out with a nice piece of wood. I really want to make my first attempt at dyeing versus staining, it's really supposed to bring out the grain. So this is my plan, I'm going to use a dark brown and a medium brown. First dye it with the dark brown, then sand using 400 grit and a sanding block. In theory this will remove the dye from the denser part of the grain, then dye the whole stock with the medium brown. Then finish it with Danish oil. I'm shooting for a look like in this picture from Boyds stocks.

Centaur 1

I had joined a woodworking forum to try and gain some knowledge on wood finishing. I was warned that birch has a tendency to have a blotchy finish when dyeing or staining. When you mix your dye you have a choice between using water or denatured alcohol. Most woodworkers seem to prefer using alcohol, it dries quicker and doesn't raise the grain like water does. Water on the other hand is more colorfast, dries slower, and you have to pre-raise the grain. Most pros also have their own spraying equipment, and when it comes to dyeing wood it's really recommended to spray, I don't have a sprayer.

Today I bought a couple of different dye colors and I made a very small 2 ounce sample of both. I used RIT powdered dye in dark brown and cocoa brown. I didn't have any birch samples to practice on but I had a couple of pieces of poplar. I ruled out using the dark brown because it lacked any warmth, it was almost black. The cocoa brown on the other hand has a very warm reddish tone to it, and it looks good, so cocoa brown it is. Lets just say that what happened next was the reason for not having any pictures today. The alcohol dye dries so quickly that some people have trouble blending overlapping areas, that should have set off a warning in my head when I read that, but I was just anxious to get started, and I used the wipe on method.

Well it's getting late and my arms are really tired from all the sanding that I've done this evening. Tomorrow I'm going to buy a preval sprayer and mix some dye with distilled water. It's nice to know that my original plan to use black dye is still in my back pocket, hopefully I won't have to use it.