My best guess would be you'd need to strip it. But if it's not sealed up with a varnish type finish, try Purple Power or Simple Green type cleaner, works a friggin treat on grungy/oily/greasy stocks. Don't soak it, just spray it on straight, scrub it a little with a brush or car wash rag and rinse it off. Dry stock, repeat. You won't have the stock wet for more than a minute or two, won't bother a thing.

Some examples. Got these replacement stocks from Numrich's, GROSS!

washed them...

tung oil after that.

 

Three club 1922s, from the bottom of a footlocker...

washed and oil to this.

 

Before you go rinsing and scrubbing, try something like mineral spirits or lacquer thinner. Rub it on with a rag and see if that cleans it up. They'll quickly evaporate on their own, so there's no need to get the wood wet.

Simple things first before you go abusing the wood.

 

Most oil stains from overoiling the rifle like yours will come out with careful use of a heat gun. It takes some patience, but the oil will leach out to the surface with the heat gun held about 6-8" from the wood. Wipe that away while the wood is still warm and repeat. A cheap Harbor Freight heat gun works well.

 

The heat gun trick will work as well as putting the stock in an oven at low temperature if you'd don't have a heat gun. I've even know guys to put the stock in a black garbage bag and leave it on the dash inside their car during summer. The heat will draw out the oil.

 

I restored a M1 Garand stock years ago because it was so greased up you could barely see any wood grain. Sparyed it down with easy off oven cleaner, wrapped it in tin foil and paper towels and left it in the back of my car in the summer for a few weeks respraying it down every few days. After that I ran it thru the heat cycle in a dishwasher a few times the cleaned it with mineral spirts, sanded and reapplied linseed oil and man it looks so good.

 

Gentlemen,

This isn't some $75 Turkish Mauser purchased at the hardware store. This is a fairly rare stock on a fairly rare rifle.

Bubba techniques involving harsh chemicals, dishwashers, or ovens should be avoided.

 

A oven on a "low temperature" as I wrote won't hurt his fairly rare stock for his fairly rare rifle. Cooking it at a high temperature would be an entirely different thing. He can heat out some of the excess oil with zero harm to the original wood finish.

 

1922 stocks were only finished with linseed oil. As stated, over the years, a lot of oil has probably been applied to these stocks resulting in the dark coloration. I will also note that newly finished stocks left the armory fairly dark.

I agree that initially cleaning with mineral spirits (paint thinner) will remover much of the crud and surface oil. To get the deeply absorbed oil, I have used liquid cleaners like Krud Kutter. I have also wrapped in cotton rags, placed in a black garbage bag and baked in the sun for a day.

If you use a liquid cleaner, just rinse well and dry. The water may raise the grain, but you can sand that down before re-oiling with BLO.

Art

 

My advice would be to stop staring at it and shoot it. Ignore such inconsequential cosmetic stuff.

 

Thanks for the tips. I'm going to try some solvent first.

 

Just pulled the action out of the stock. Pretty much black inside. Looks like someone put a coat of varnish on the outside at some point. If I use some heat to draw out the oil and it melts the varnish, I'll have to do the whole stock to make it right. Should I just leave it alone? Mineral spirits not doing anything. Not penetrating the varnish.

 

 

 

First time the inside of this stock has seen daylight in many years.

 

Try the heat gun on the inside first to see how well it works. If nothing else, you may clean up some of the gooey stuff. I have never had a problem removing the finish using a heat gun. You just need to go slow and be careful. You mention varnish, but that rifle originally had a BLO military finish so heat should not be a problem.

 

Me, I'd just strip it and be done with it. Oil finish after that, pick your poison, mine's pure tung oil, others like linseed. Couldn't be an easier, a job that'll take you an hour, then multiple days of applying oil "coats". More time getting advice than the job would take.

 

You don't to get that hot enough to damage the finish. Heat gun or oven, you just want it hot enough for the oil to come out. I've had small amounts of oil come to the surface on old military rifle with just rifle sitting under lights in a warm room.

 

This is a Remington 513t I refinished a while back. While it wasn't as greasy as yours it was dinged and had horrible varnish on it. I stripped it, steamed it, sanded, boned and finished it with linseed oil. looks good to me.

IMG_0774 by John Hermesmeyer, on Flickr

 

I'll try the heat gun later today.

 

Used a heat gun for a bit yesterday. Oil was oozing out of the wood. Still stained pretty dark though. I'll do some every day for a while. Going to just strip what's left of the finish and put a couple coats of BLO on. i don't think the stain is going to come out

 

Acetone and whiting paste. Smear it on and let it dry and wipe it off. Repeat.

 

These oil stains are not coming out. Years of too much oil. The good news is there is no rust anywhere on the metal parts.

 

Never heard of the whiting paste trick. Where can I get some?

 

I usually gather it when I chalk my files, but it is used for glazing windows. It used to be at hardware stores. It is cheap, but not a lot of hardware stores stock it now.