Curly white oak finish help

[Gravedigger]

I just order a Kibler southern mountain rifle in curly white oak.

Looking for some suggestions for finishing ang bringing out the curl.

[P.W.Berkuta]

Curly white oak --- I did not know he was working with oak

[Scota4570]

Do you mean Ash?? 

I would not use Oak for a gunstock, ... again.  Oak is very porous.  It is heavy.  It tends to chip.   It will require lots of filling.  Blocking it off between coats will likely cut down below the stain and create white streaks.  I have not used AF on Oak but bet it would come out black. 

[Hunterdude]

Mr Kibler has recently made it known that he has procured a sawmill and truck to haul logs....I wonder if this means he will be offering "More" premium wood types in addition to curly maple?

[Gravedigger]

Do you mean Ash?? 

I would not use Oak for a gunstock, ... again.  Oak is very porous.  It is heavy.  It tends to chip.   It will require lots of filling.  Blocking it off between coats will likely cut down below the stain and create white streaks.  I have not used AF on Oak but bet it would come out black.

curly White Oak 

He does not have any Ash now

https://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=54880.msg548978#msg548978

[Jim Evans]

Do you have any photo to share ?
Just would like to see it.

Now see you other post, thanks

[Mad Monk]

Do you mean Ash?? 

I would not use Oak for a gunstock, ... again.  Oak is very porous.  It is heavy.  It tends to chip.   It will require lots of filling.  Blocking it off between coats will likely cut down below the stain and create white streaks.  I have not used AF on Oak but bet it would come out black.

When I played with a strong AF on oak I ended up with what looked like curly charcoal!

[Gravedigger]

Do you have any photo to share ?
Just would like to see it.

Now see you other post, thanks

Ordered

[Scott Bumpus]

Ask Jim kibler to send some scrap from that stock. You will want to test diff stains

[Gravedigger]

Ask Jim kibler to send some scrap from that stock. You will want to test diff stains

I asked and he is sending some pieces

[Mad Monk]

You might want to look at https://woodandshp.com
Look for How to Darken Oak Furniture with Ammonia Fuming.

This is ow the old furniture factories darkened oak wood furniture before applying the finish.  Seen in adds as "Golden Oak".  Also worked on other light colored woods and is great on cherry wood to give an aged wood look.  The ammonia reacts with the tannic acid in the wood.  The stain color lasts a very long time. most of the old Sears Golden Oak furniture still has the stain color.  Has not faded nor turned darker.

[Mad Monk]

Forgot to mention.  I used two large trash bags to make a fuming hood.  Hung the bags off a beam in the cellar.  Gun stock hangs in the middle of the bags.  A dish with household ammonia cleaner on the floor and then a small desk far to circulate the ammonia fumes around inside of the bag.  Uniform exposure all over the stock. 

[Jim Kibler]

Yeah, we bought a handful of curly white oak boards.  It is a bit unusual for a stock wood, but should work out okay.  It's heavy, dense and has some neat figure.  As others have mentioned, I don't think you want to use iron nitrate.  It will go black.  You could use some dye stains, but there might be some other options as well.

All the best,
Jim

[Gravedigger]

Here some white oak I installed on landing for a staircase. Stained

[Gravedigger]

Curly maple
Part of a bathroom vanity done with dyes. Dark dye first then sanded. Reddish dye then sanded. Then yellow dye.

[WadePatton]

Heavy for sure, BUT highly rot resistant, great for boat building. 

[Levy]

I haven't built a ML in over 30 years and needed to get back into it.  I finished an SMR a month before hunting season that I stocked in oak.  I don't know what species it was.  I reclaimed 3 planks from a pushed-up refuse pile in the woods.  They'd been used in a logging operation to keep the trucks from getting stuck in the mud.  On a whim, I cut some gunstock blanks from one of them.  I didn't want to waste any good stock wood on my first build after such an absence.  The full stock blank that I used had some spalting in the toe, so I wanted it to be black.  I coated it twice with AF and heated it each time.  Sure enough, I got what I wanted, black.  I put a couple of coats of Permalyn on the stock after rubbing it back some with steel wool.  Next, I mixed some powdered charcoal with some of the finish and rubbed that in all over the outside of the stock and let it dry.  I rubbed that back to my satisfaction and the added a couple more coats of finish.  It's my personal squirrel hunting rifle and it suites me (a little rough around the edges).  It's really not as ugly as you might think.  I'll post some pictures of it after I study up on how to do it.  James Levy

[alacran]

White oak is totally different from red oak. I would not use red oak for building anything other than kitchen cabinets or interior furniture.
White oak is hard, it is heavy, it is far stronger than red oak and its grain structure is not so porous as red oak. It is not easy to inlet, however with Mr. Kibler's machining, that would be a non-issue.
Mad Monk is correct about the use of ammonia fumes to darken oak. However, it is most effective on red oak due to its porosity.
Aniline stains work better than most other stains.

[rich pierce]

I like white oak for wooden forms for making buttplates and nosecaps from sheet brass. Terrific strong wood. It works better than hickory and is  more split resistant than ash. I would use it for certain builds, especially an early colonial musket.

[RMann]

Wow Gravedigger, neat choice of wood, and I have thought of the same, and am surprised Jim K took advantage of the availability of some curly white oak, and opened that choice to his customers.  For some of us that love wood, and working with different kinds of wood, this is just another spark to inspire.  I remember the first time I saw a Kibler S Mt rifle in curly ash.  Amazing, and when I go to the lumber yard, regardless of what I'm buying, I look through the 8/4 boards of ash and white oak, as well as sugar maple and walnut.  I recognize the superiority of maple, and the curl puts it over the top, but variety still pushes my interest and motivation.  Yes, white oak is heavy (like hard maple) but in a slim S Mt. rifle, the difference is negligible.  If you are concerned mainly with weight, choose something moderate,  like walnut.  But maple, white oak, and ash are all similar in weight, and with Jim's shaping/inletting, and the style of a S. Mt rifle, you won't struggle with the challenge of carving a ring-porous hardwood.  In finishing, I would investigate any ash stocks you like, and try the same on some scrap.  I look forward to see your results!  I think your challenge is to balance the excessive "zebra striping" yet let the golden highlights and rays  shine.  Sorry so long...... R Mann

[flinchrocket]

Vinegar and iron might work good. I don’t have white oak scraps to try.

[Jim Kibler]

Vinegar and iron might work good. I don’t have white oak scraps to try.

That will go BLACK.

[Mauser06]

I used iron nitrate on a butternut longbox call. It turned about the same maroon-ish colors you see in maple.  Didn't have any other stain without digging through boxes when I moved so I tried it since it was handy. 

Not sure how far off white oak is from white walnut (butternut)   

[WadePatton]

I used iron nitrate on a butternut longbox call. It turned about the same maroon-ish colors you see in maple.  Didn't have any other stain without digging through boxes when I moved so I tried it since it was handy. 

Not sure how far off white oak is from white walnut (butternut)   

It's way way way off. Butternut starts to rot before it hits the ground in my woods.  White oak lays there for 10 years just to lose the sap wood.  Butternut is much more like Walnut, but that black walnut is far more rot resistant. There's a canker in the butternut around here, it never gets too big and sometimes I don't find it before it falls over, I've started marking it.

Any iron nitrate on white oak will give black black.  Rub it back all day.  Now you have gray.   Just as Jim said above.

[P.W.Berkuta]

I made a fireplace mantle out of quarter sawn white oak plank and it was a beauty but HEAVY - VERY HEAVY-. I'll stick with maple, cherry, or walnut