Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Gunsmithing Tru oil over epoxy stock finish

Hoping to hear from Sitka, but would like to hear from others as well......

I have my Claro stock sealed with epoxy, and wet sanded smooth. I'm ready to apply Tru oil. Do I put it on heavy or very thin? Sand between coats or not?

I'm thinking Art told me to slather it on heavy and wipe off after about 10 minutes, no sanding between coats, and I can apply several coats per day.

Is that right or what should I do?

Scott

Each of us have our method for applying Tru Oil. I have heard of guys using Art's method but I prefer to put a drop on a finger and start in a small area and rub it in well until it gets a bit sticky or the area seems like it doesn't have any oil left to rub, then move to the next overlapping area, etc.. until you have the whole stock covered. Each drop usually covers an area about the size of a playing card IME...

Wait until it feels dry and do it again. Depending on your temperature and relative humidity you can do a coat a day or sometimes up to three coats..I usually sand between about every third coat, depending on how it looks and feels. Once you reach the sheen you want, which will take about 5-10 coats, let it cure for 30 days to fully cure and then polish it out or rub it out with pumice or rottenstone to get the sheen you want to finish with. Then add a coat of a good wax like Johnsons Paste Wax or Renaissance Crystalline wax and buff out.

Hi Scott,

Nice to see you are making some progress on that rifle. My project is sitting on the bench sidelined while adult responsibilities rip my hobby schedules and play time apart.

I suppose you could apply it heavy and wipe it off after some wait time, but with the epoxy sealer, I'm not sure you'd realize any benefit. It isn't going to 'soak' into anything. Tru Oil tends to tack up faster than most other 'hand oils', so that might be another consideration. It tends towards heaps of forgiveness so you aren't strictly limited here. Sheister's technique will render a fine piece of work, and hopefully you won't end up with a bit of tennis elbow when it's all said and done. You'd likely NOT sand between each coat as it's pretty thin, and I'll second Sheister's recommendation on the Renaissance wax (easier to deal with than Johnson's, but other's have disagreed).

I do like you do and have even thinned it out a little with mineral spirits on the last few coats. It will be more like pro custom oil finish at that point. That is also a great product that my smith friend (Floyd) turned me on to. I'm sure you've used that as well.

I'll second the sentiments expressed already, but will add that with epoxy already present in/on the surface and Ren Wax in the cards, the TruOil is only going to add "color" so to speak and no substantial protection against moisture intrusion so I wouldn't get too carried away with applying it.

If a guy has a bit of spar varnish and some pure tung oil or linseed oil (doesn't matter which, and found at artists supply houses not the hardware store*) he can mix up his own finishing oil. 50/50, say two tablespoons of each, and after each subsequent coat on the stock replenish to original level with straight oil until by the time he's done it's more like 75/25 oil/varnish that's going on. Apply like you would TruOil. Debatable whether it's better or not than TruOil, but is a way to use stuff you might have that would soon deserve to be thrown away if not used up, plus you don't know how long the TruOil's been setting in warehouses and dealer's shelves - none of this stuff improves with age, quite the contrary.

* There is a marked difference between the good oils found in artist supply places and regular old hardware store stuff. Don't believe me, try it yourself.

In the old days fresh oil was hard to come by and often a bit lumpy from polymerization. Thinning it made it easier to rub on... but reduced water "proofing" significantly.

The oil literally needed heat from the fingers and lots of pressure to get it spread properly. Hence a handrubbed finish was born. We now have additives to delay polymerization and driers to speed it in commercial finishes. We have no problem getting fresh oil.

So you certainly can obtain a great finish by rubbing it in. But you will spend many extra hours to develop a slower-building finish. More layers and more time per layer. And if solvents were overused the finish will not be as water "proof" as unthinned.

Slop it on, let it rest and rub dry is faster and every bit the equal of a true hand rubbed finish. Wood finish is quite likely the home of the most anachronistic craftsmen and stock finishers are worst in class!

Somehow people got the idea thinning increased penetration... it does not. Solvents leave the curing oil and travel a bit deeper, trapped behind the oil layer.

Make a sample board and cut it after the oil cures. It will be obvious.

I agree with almost everything but need to point out the reason for the oil... small surface marks are a snap to fix in Oil... not so much in epoxy.

There is usually no need to sand between coats. If you find a run the urge is to sand it off and apply another coat.

What often happens is telegraphing marks, often donuts, where an island of finish stands in a circle of missing finish for at least one layer. At that point stopping for several days and a warm, dry environment will allow the finish to cure thoroughly. Sanding wet with very fine paper will flatten neatly and subsequent coats will not telegraph the now-properly-cured oil finish.

I'm rereading the OPs original post and missed the part about wet sanding smooth... how smooth did you wet sand? I've been cautioned and found to be true that you should stop sanding at about 240-320 on a substrate to apply Truoil on. Especially with epoxy the Truoil won't chemically bond to the epoxy surface and needs a bit of "tooth" to mechanically bond to the surface. Too fine a finish can cause complications between the two finishes and possibly some shrinkage of the Truoil on the finish or other issues involved with finish movement like crazing...

I have a couple epoxy finished rifles that have needed repairs a few times after rough hunting trips where the finishes have had star cracks or other damage from me being a klutz and falling down multiple times. Usually a bit of sanding to smooth out the damaged area and an application of Truoil and you can't tell there was ever any damage. This is the advantage of having a Truoil (or other polymerized oil) finish over epoxy. Water proofing with the epoxy and a beautiful finish over the top that is easy to repair at any time.

Thanks to all. the stock wood was sanded with 320 or 400 as the final, I cant remember which I had at the time. Then it was whiskered with 400. After that I heated the stock and applied the 2-part West systems epoxy and wiped it with paper towel. After cure, I wet sanded with 600 and water.

Bob
Many years ago there was a finishing craze to produce a smooth finish with a great deal of polygonal crazing deep in the finish. Layering several different oil finish types would cause some layers to pull apart and create polygons inside a dead smooth finish.

It was done to create an antique look.

Within ten years or so we noticed the finishes had totally cured and all of the alligatoring had vanished. So that which we tried so hard to age was actually making it look like fresh oil misapplied.

I can see how that might be accomplished with substrates and cover coats that weren't compatible. It would seem that once completely cured and possibly exposed to UV, the compounds would become basically inert and not exhibit the incompatibility when uncured. It also happens when finish is not applied properly, as evidenced by my S grade Kimber 82, which had bad crazing when I received it. It was common on these particular models only from what I've been able to learn, but they changed finishing technique and went to a different finish and that stopped the problem.

I've been using Truoil over my epoxy finished rifles for quite some time and hoping there wouldn't be a problem and so far that hasn't been the issue. The one issue I have had is the epoxy itself has shrunk some over the years and has developed very fine cracks where they stock might flex, like in the grip area and a small area of the fore end. You have to have just the right light to even detect them.

Bob