http://www.doublegunshop.com/phiatt3.htmhttp://www.laurelmountainforge.com/finish_instruction.htmlhttp://www.outdoors.net/site/features/fe...037&V=FalseRegardless which product I use, this is my canned essay on how I begin finishing raw wood....
1) Cut your finish 1:1 with mineral spirits. Make a couple wire hangers for your wood and slop on the finish with a paint brush. (I drilled a couple holes in an overhead shoplight and hang them from that). To put it in perspective, if I could afford it, I'd submerge the whole stock in a bucket of the 1:1 for 30 minutes. But what I do is keep the stock dripping wet (shiny) for 30 minutes by continuous
application, including the inletting. No subsequent coat will ever penetrate deeper than than the first, so this is my opportunity for max penetration. When
the stock has soaked up about all it can, it will stay shiny all over for 5 minutes and I quit. I carefully dab out any puddles that might have formed in recesses in
the inletting; if allowed to dry as a build-up, they will interfere with reassembly, actually requiring some re-inletting. .
This is the the one and only time I want to oil the inletting . I doubt even that is necessary, but provided I don't get too much in there, it can't
hurt. I've only seen a couple of stocks with water damage and they both appeared to have been standing in a puddle in a duck blind and the water crept up
the butt; never seen any concrete reason to worry about "sealing" the action inletting from water. But it might have protected some of the guns my father used to pour motor oil over. I soak the end grain of the butt during this first sealing coat too, but I always come back much later and put more full strength finish under the pad. Let it dry 12 hours.
2) No doubt, there will now be shiny areas that are nearly sealed and dull areas ready to soak up more. Repeat the 50/50 saturation, avoiding the inletting.
Dry 12 hours.
3) Repeat, maybe twice more. Now you have a shiny-all-over, if somewhat gloppy, surface like a kindergartner's paint job. Reinstall the recoil pad;
it stays on for the duration.
4)Pick up your Pink Pearl eraser and 320 paper and wet sand a 4x4" area. Don't be too aggressive, you just want to barely remove the surface coat of hard finish and a
little wood dust to create some mud to fill the pores. Pause and gently wipe off the mud with a coarse paper towel. Public-restroom absorbancy is actually better that the premium absorbant stuff.You don't want to lift the mud out of the pores. As
always, be very careful about approaching the edges, since there's no metal there to keep you from rounding them over. The eraser will work well for the large areas of the stock and the sharp action edges. The recoil pad will protect the butt edge,
but be careful to do most of your sanding there one-way in the direction of wood onto rubber. If you drag too much rubber dust/oil mud back onto your
wood it can actually start to darken it. For the flutes, around the ball and grip , and a final pass or two along the top of the comb, use your fingers to back the paper....just be conscious of not dwelling in one spot or otherwise allowing your
fingers to create dishes. There will be many shiny, spots (unfilled pores) remaining, but the stock is now sealed.
5) Apply a full strength coat, dry for 12 hours and wet sand with 50/50 and 320.
6) Repeat. After the second or third cycle of full strength coat/320 wet sand, you should have a uniformly dull flat surface with no shiny (unfilled) pores. Time to begin topcoating.
