18th Century Stock and Metal Finishing

[82Rigger]

Chili suggested this thread, so I'm gonna start it, and ya'll can jump in with your comments.

I've only built three muzzle loaders from kits, so I'll share what I found out while finishing them.

STOCK FINISHING

On my Kentucky rifle (pictured in the other thread) I decided that I wanted to finish the wood the way a gunmaker would have done it in, say, 1775 Boston or Philadelphia.
Those were large cities, even then, but I bet there was no Sherwin Williams to go into and buy a can of walnut or cherry stain.

I built this rifle long before the internet came along, but I remembered reading a story about a settler sitting in his log cabin and finishing his gunstock using wild berries for color and soot from the fireplace to darken the color. Linseed oil was available back then.

I used holly berries for the red color because I had them growing in the yard, but I imagine any kind of red berries will work. I squeezed the innards out of a bunch of berries 'cause the red color I wanted was in the skins. Mixed the berry skins with the oil and heated on the stove until the color leached out into the oil. When I got a fairly "solid" color in the oil, I let it cool and strained it through cheesecloth to get rid of most all of the berry skins.

I don't have a fireplace, so I took a kerosene hurricane lamp and turned the wick up so that it gave off black smoke. I held a Bowie knife blade in the flame til it had a thick layer of soot on it, and just scraped the soot off the blade into the colored oil and stirred it into the oil. Did this several times until I had a deep red color, but I wish I had darkened the oil a little more...it looked darker in the can than it does on the stock.

After all the above, it's just a matter of hand rubbing the oil into the stock, letting it dry between coats, until you have a nice, blotch-free finish on the wood.

This was mostly trial and error (and guesswork), but for the first attempt I think the stock came out pretty nice. Who knows? Maybe 200 years from now, my stock will have aquired that beautiful rich patina that you see on 18th century stocks.

METAL FINISHING

18th century gun barrels were not blued...the were "browned" to ward off rust. Done properly, the resulting color is what I call a "light chocolate", and is smooth and even all over the barrel.
The brown color is actually a layer of very fine rust on the surface, which helps prevent oxygen from getting to the bare steel and rusting it further.

I dont really know how browning was done by 18th century gunmakers, but here's the way I browned my barrel:

First I degreased the barrel to remove all traces of oil or grease. Then I attached a string through the breech block screw hole so that I could hang the barrel vertically. I hung it in my bathroom from a high coat hook so that it was off the floor and nothing was touching it except the string. I placed an old rag underneath the barrel to catch any "drippings".

Then I filled an empty Windex spray bottle with vinegar and adjusted the spray to a very fine mist. I then misted the barrel all over with vinegar and then filled the bathroom with steam by running the shower hot. I steamed the bathroom twice a day.

After a couple days the barrel will have a coat of very fine red rust...not the damaging scale rust from water, but very fine...almost like dust. I rubbed the barrel with a piece of burlap to remove excess rust. I went through this cycle of misting with vinegar and steaming several times until I had an even color all over the barrel.

Then an application of oil to the barrel will change the rusted surface to a chocolate brown color.