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Refinishing My Hawken


Splitear

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A winter project that I’ve been wanting to get to is refinishing my Thompson Center Hawken. I bought this gun as a .45 caliber. Since then, I have swapped the barrel for a .50, browned with buckhorn sights.

My goal is to strip the factory finish, stain to a dark walnut (unless I like the color after the finish is removed), steam out as many indents as I can, finish the stock with Tung Oil and beeswax, and the further patina the brass with some fouled patches. I’m also planning on sanding and reshaping the cheek piece a little.

Today I removed all of the hardware, applied the citrus varnish remover and sanded the bluing off of the tang. I’ll see where it’s at in another 24 hours and determine if I need another coat of remover. It will hopefully turn out as nice as I’m envisioning.  

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Edited by Splitear
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  • Splitear changed the title to Refinishing My Hawken

So, finish is stripped, and I decided to leave the battle scars, I like the character. Sanded it lightly to remove any rough spots. I did a light stain with “dark walnut”. Now it’s got a couple of coats of tung oil. Will get a light sanding and a coat of tung oil over the next 3-4 days. Then I’ll do a coat of beeswax paste. I’m pretty happy with it so far. I wanted an “antique” look, and it’s going on that direction. I’m just glad the shine is off of it. 

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Edited by Splitear
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So, after messing with it, I was actually pretty happy with the color. I slapped a couple of coats of beeswax on it and put it back together. I’m very happy. I might have liked it to be a little darker, but I feel like it’s more of a deep red now vs the orange that it was before. Additionally, I like the low sheen matte finish, and it feels really nice to hold. Now I’m just waiting on the browning solution for the tang.

Here are some before and after photos. IMG_2236.jpeg.c1936c78a78f484419802f2fc6570606.jpegIMG_2282.jpeg.1e3628e3a07eaddcce84f92c7655b7b7.jpegIMG_2237.jpeg.1bc3ccbbca71d1451df06d5a6d0f71b2.jpegIMG_2283.jpeg.1808402cdce8f9134382fbf74fd5c65f.jpegIMG_2239.jpeg.285e73f695575d62e9d9f42741458d4d.jpegIMG_2280.jpeg.4275c95290bae2562df97ff0fa9f1c9a.jpegIMG_2281.jpeg.e2794db8d752bd3b229136f6cbdb9fbf.jpeg

 

Edited by Splitear
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