stocks

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amtracs

Member
I don't know if this question belongs here.

Is it ok to linseed oil a laminated stock or will the oil loosen the glue between the lamination????????
 
Oil away. The stock has made it some 70 years or so, why would a little BLO hurt it.
 
Well yeah, some late war stocks were unfinished. Know what your oiling before you oil it, but no, BLO won't hurt it.
 
I disagree. Karbiner 98k mentions a linseed oil finish a few times as what was used on earlier K98k stocks. Is it identical to the BLO at the paint store we get now? No, but the finish they used was a linseed oil based finish and yes it did dry probably through the use of heat. As long as BLO is used sparingly, not once a month but more like every couple of years, it looks fine. Yes it does darken through oxidation but in the link to the previous thread on BLO you insinuate that the use of a large quantity of dryers in today's BLO would cause irreversible damage. William Barr makes the biggest selling brand of Boiled Linseed Oil in the United States, perhaps the world. Read their MSDS sheet on Klean Strip BLO and tell me what the dryers are.

http://www.wmbarr.com/ProductFiles/1660C (KS Boiled Linseed Oil).pdf

You can't because it's not listed. Now I have 39 years in the paint and varnish manufacturing business. I can guess that the dryer used has a high percentage of cobalt in it, very poisonous stuff, yet at the miniscule amount used, the government has no problem with Barr not listing it.


The OP asked if BLO would hurt a laminate stock. You might not think it will help it's looks but looks wasn't the question.
 
I agree with the above. I stripped a Norwegian capture and applied modern (Sunnyside) raw linseed oil. A lot of it. It only looks pumpkin pie colored, red highlights from the glue, some yellow white in the grain also.

This darkened stock has been presented before, something else was going on with it in order to turn it that color. It would be nice to get to the bottom of it. To the OP, proceed with caution, use a test area, but only if it is a shooter grade rifle. The end product for my Norwegian is not different from what I see in the reference section.
 
I also repaired a cupped laminate stock that had turned grey and splintered from sitting in a barn 50 + years. (Has a "p" on the wrist-but that's another thread) It turned out very dark but it was primarily because of the 40 years of weathering not the blo. Without the blo you would get splinters when you picked it up.

Seems to me blo is a useful tool like bronze wool or "feed and wax". It is not needed or desirable for every rifle. The art it would seem is in knowing when it is called for and when it is not.
Before
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After
ru5edyna.jpg
 
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