Refinishing the Mini 14

A couple of years ago I spotted a beat-up old Mini 14 rifle stock in the used parts junk pile at my favorite local gunstore, and I thought it might be fun to refinish it.  It was for the earlier series Mini 14 and I didn’t own one, but the stock looked like it needed me.  It was dinged up but didn’t have any gouges, and the anodized aluminum buttplate had multiple scratches.  I asked John, the guy behind the counter, what he wanted for the stock, and we were both in a quandary.  John’s brow furrowed.  He was searching for a price that wouldn’t be insulting, but I could see that he was eager to unload something that had all the earmarks of becoming a permanent resident.  There were several old timers in the shop (there always are; it’s that kind of place).  All eyes were on John and me.

“I don’t know…maybe $25?” John said.

I recoiled as if struck by an arrow.  It’s all part of the game, you know.   All the eyeballs were on me now.  It was like being in a tennis match.

“I don’t know, John,” I answered.  “I was going to offer $30, but if you gotta have $25, then $25 it is…”

Everybody laughed and I went home with a Mini 14 stock that looked as if it had been to Afghanistan.  I wished I had the foresight to grab a few “before” photos of it, but I did not.

Like I said, the stock was decrepit, but I wanted a refinishing project and now I had one.  I removed all the metalwork, I stripped the finish (you can see how to do that in our series on the Savage 340 refinish), I steamed out the dents (same story there; it’s covered in the Savage 340 stock refinish series), and then I went to work on it with 200, 320, 400, and 600 grit sandpaper.  The buttplate was hopelessly scratched all to hell, so I did the same thing with the same grades of sandpaper and I decided to leave the aluminum bare.  In one of my prior aerospace lives, I worked at company that made interior doodads for aircraft, and the approach I just described was one we frequently used for doorknobs, latches, and the other metal chotchkas you see in aircraft cabins.  That particular company was not a good place to be (my boss was a butthead), but I liked working with the crew of Armenians who handled all of our finishing work.  Whenever I had an idea about making an improvement, those guys were quick to tell me that wasn’t how they did it in the old country, and I went with their expertise (it was the right thing to do).  But I digress; that’s a story for another time.

Mini 14 stocks are birch, which is a light wood, and the question was do I want to stain the birch for a darker look, or leave it unstained for a lighter look?  I went for Door Number Two, and I think it turned out well.  I used the same approach described in the Savage 340 blog, taking care to use very light coats applied with a fresh bit of T-shirt cloth each time and waiting a day between applications.  This one has 10 coats of TruOil.  TruOil is good stuff.

I had a beautiful rifle stock, but no rifle to go with it.  One of my good buddies told me his brother had a Mini 14 that was in rough shape, so I gave the refinished Mini 14 stock to him to send to his brother.  It was a fun project and I really liked the way this one turned out.

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