Sandpaper question

[Char-Gar]

Two sandpaper questions.

1. With a new stock and bare wood, what is the final grade/grit of sandpaper used before the finish is appplied.

2. In a prior sandpaper grading system, there were such numbers as 4/0, 8/0 etc. What these grades in the current grit number system?

Thanks for any help you can give.

[Rico1950]

I've gone as high as 800 grit on some stocks, but that may be extreme. 600 should do fine as the final sandpaper.
As far as the old numbers, 4/0, 8/0 I'm sure if you did a search on the internet somebody posted the corresponding new numbers with the old grading system.

[waksupi]

I have done quite a few exhibition grade stocks. 320 will be fine, if you do a good job.

[onondaga]

320 is fine for even the most special job on the wood. sanding a filler coat with 320 is fine also. I finish with Birchwood Casey Tru-Oil and believe it to be the best. I suggest you read up and learn how to "whisker" before you use a filler if you want the finest finish. I hand rub over lapping areas each till they are warm and chirping from rubbing till I move to the next area. I sand after a build of 4 coats with 320. The next coats are the most difficult. A tack rag is extremely important to remove debris from sanding or it will just go into the finish . Use care sanding curved areas to not thin the finish. Most stocks completely fill with 10 - 15 coats, After the last coat, I use a damp piece of sweatshirt with fine powdered pumice or rotten-stone to remove the shine gently to an eggshell finish. The wet pumice between the last several coats gives the smoothest, deepest finish. If you want a shine, still do the pumice step, but then let finish completely set for 1-2 weeks and then wax the stock. I like the old hard to rub Johnson's Paste Wax. It is a strong wax and can be rebuffed many times before needing more wax. The eggshell finish holds the wax very well. I have finished $10,000 shotguns with this technique and always get smiles. If the stock has checkering use a toothbrush to really scrub in the slightest amount of Tru-Oil in hard and don't fill in the checkering cuts. You should do that at the beginning of each coat. Clean your hands immediately with mineral spirits or WD40 then soap and water after each coat.

A local clandestine group of blood sport, gambling, circle shooters got wind of my stock finishing years ago and kept me busy at $150.00 per finish on their mega-buck shotguns until I retired and I am still turning away work from them.

[fecmech]

If you want to make life easy on your hands use nitrile gloves. When you are done with a coat of finish, wipe them off with some mineral spirits and a rag before you take them off and you won't have to even wash your hands!

[buck1]

I like 400.

[onondaga]

I wonder If you have really tried the nitrile gloves and hand rubbing a finish with Tru-Oil boiled linseed oil. I have. You cannot feel the heat develop along with the tackiness developing while you rub then when you have the heat and the tackiness, moving along on the stock to the next area, fresh drops of Tru-Oil on the wood don't disperse to the wood and glove any where near as smoothly as with skin and the gloves leave marks then pull partially set oil away. Gloves just pull away from the hand and chatter when you rub the oil with proper pressure to build the heat in the oil necessary for a hand rubbed finish. If you don't rub Tru-Oil till it warms and gets tacky a brittle poor finish will result and usually it runs also. Hands really work better. Mineral spirits is not a skin irritant for me and leaves hands soft also. I have hand rubbed three mahogany kayaks besides hundreds of stocks and my hands have been fine. WD40 does irritate my hands, however, but some people it does not.

For an easy finish you can slop on a thick finish of Tru-Oil with a brush, a sponge or a rag, sand out the runs and hand rub one coat and get a better than factory finish if you are good with sand paper and don't cut any wood while sanding. A true deep finish is a lot different and gloves will not do it. It boils down to what you want, how much you are willing to pay or how much work you are willing to do. . Nearly all factory finishes are sprayed urethane now. Patching a scrape on urethane is always visible and can't be buffed or feather rubbed in invisibly like Tru-Oil can. Urethane doesn't bond to itself like Tru-oil does. Many people really don't know what a hand rubbed finish means and don't have the experience to evaluate or even identify one other than to say a nice finish looks different than what I have seen, but pretty. A 100% filled 20 coat hand rubbed finish is not for sale anymore by me, it is a lot of work. and If I had the desire to do it again it would be $300.00 now and be worth it to someone that knows wood finishing on gun stocks.

[waksupi]

Onandaga, you are cheap at that price. For an exhibition grade finish, I charge $750.

[fecmech]

Onandaga- You are probably right I had not thought about the dragging. I don't go that far when I'm finishing and I use a tung oil/urethane mix by Pro Custom oil. I just rub till it starts to drag and then let it dry and sand between coats. I like the gloss finish and the Pro custom gives that and it's very durable. Here is a couple pics of a Browning 525 I did for a friend.

BTW I'm in your neck of the woods, just to the north in Gasport.

[onondaga]

1995 I stopped the stock work. $750.00 Huh, if that is what it will bring now. I am really not surprised. I was able to keep my price that low at the time because I refused any disassemble/reassemble with no exceptions and only did the wood work. They didn't care about that either, they loved the work.

[onondaga]

The fill and shine on your work looks complete. I hope you try the method I described with Tru-Oil 20 coats then eggshell finish and wax. I bet you would like it and it doesn't show scratches as much as an ultra gloss like you picture. You do have to strip the wax before touch-ups but that is OLD NORMAL and there is nothing tricky about it. The big plus is that you can do invisible touch-ups on Tru-Oil and not on urethane.

So you are in the WNY area--Hope you stay away from the blood circle shooters that drop and scrape their shotguns running away from their flagitious crime scenes.

Gary

[fecmech]

Onandaga--The Pro custom is tung oil and urethane, you can touch it up just as easily as tru oil. One of my first stocks was tru oil, I've done about five since with the Pro custom mix and I like it better. The tung oil seems to bring out the grain a little better and it can be softened just like tru oil, if a person is so inclined. My friend wanted a high gloss on this gun so that's what he got. Must be a different world on the left coast, no matter how good you are around here I think there would be a very long time between $750 finish jobs!

[waksupi]

Yep, there is a long time between doing exhibition grade finishes. I only did one this year. Most guys just want a good seal on the stock, and aren't all that worried about aesthetics.
Here is one I finished a few years ago. I did the design layout, and rough out work on this. It then went to another part of the shop for inletting and function work, then came back to me for final shaping, and finish.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JpquPs_NSKo

[JIMinPHX]

If you are going to wear gloves when doing something like that, my recommendation is thin white cotton waiter's/coin collector's gloves with surgical gloves over them. the surgical gloves give you pretty good feel & the thin layer of cotton keeps your hands from sweating up inside them for at least half an hour.

[Just1Mor]

I have used 400 grit papers and when your putting on the first couple (5) coats take some of the sanding dust and rub it in to the stock. fills in the little holes that you cant see until the final finishing takes place. for buffing use a wax/polimer type of material i cant recall the name i use but came out very nice and very tuff.