Thompson "Commando" furniture and receiver

[HistorianInProgress]

I was looking at the Thompson "Commando" and saw that its furniture isn't composite but wood that's been painted black. Can any one confirm that? If it is the case then would I be able to either sand it or use some kind of paint remover to give it back its more classic look?

 

Also, does anyone know what the receiver material is? I can't seem to find an official statement on the receiver material, but did see it weighs 13 pounds which implies steel but I don't want to assume.

[TennesseeTimmy]

If its really 13 lbs, its steel. A magnet will solve the mystery.

 

The stock material has been covered before if Im not mistaken. Use the forum search function.

 

Good luck with your project. Tim

Edited October 29, 2018 by TennesseeTimmy

[Devious6]

The descriptions I've seen all list the stock material as wood.

[giantpune]

The description on AO's site says "The semi-auto "Commando", features parkerized metal and all wood stock, rear grip and horizontal forend in a durable black finish"

They're saying its wood. The finish looks a bit on the thick side like rhino lining. By the time you sand it all off, you may be into it for 40 hours. May as well buy some new furniture and save yourself the time.

 

And I'm not sure you can even parkerize non-ferrous metals (aluminum, brass, copper), can you? It would have to be steel. Most of the other steel models are blued. So yours would still look a bit different.

 

Edited October 29, 2018 by giantpune

[StooperZero]

i think they use their crappiest grain of wood for the commando parts.

 

always reminded me of what century did to the wood on all those Czech VZ-52 rifles , bastards.

[HistorianInProgress]

Thanks for all the info guys. I didn't consider the clue about parkerizing or realize how strong the coating was. If it really is so lousy though then it might end up being worth it to try and sand it.

[Devious6]

Thanks for all the info guys. I didn't consider the clue about parkerizing or realize how strong the coating was. If it really is so lousy though then it might end up being worth it to try and sand it.

 

There may also be some people here who swapped out the original wood on their AO Thompsons who would sell them at a good price. I have the original wood for my M1SB sitting don in my workbench.

[StooperZero]

with some elbow grease cheap wood can be made to look very nice.

[Merry Ploughboy]

A few years ago there was a Board member who bought a Commando and just used a regular paint stripper compound to remove the paint coating. The wood on his gun was gorgeous.

[J.F. Bell]

I made an attempt at saving the wood from mine during the rebuild. Turned out to be a bust.

 

If you can get the paint off you're left with pretty significant staining that may or may not come out with sanding. How much sanding is required varied, but to get the pieces cleaned up enough to refinish also meant sanding them noticeably undersized. The next problem involved paint bleeding into the endgrain of the wood. The one after that involved the Commando stocks themselves - knots and ugly stuff everywhere and some of the strangest figuring I've ever seen in what I'm guessing was pallet-grade walnut.

 

I'd give it a shot - but in the meantime I'd put a set of new wood on order.

[HistorianInProgress]

While buying a new set of wood would certainly be nice, it would cost an extra $250 or so, at which point I might as well buy a regular T1 and just buy the forend (the stocks are about $150 while grips, foregrips, and forends are about $50 a piece) separate since my motivation for the T1C is to 1. Have a steel receiver that accepts drums and 2. Cost. While commandos are usually more or about the same, I've found a deal for a new one

 

And JF Bell, can you elaborate on what staining you saw? For example, was it really blotchy or was it just a deep brown walnut type color?

Edited October 30, 2018 by HistorianInProgress

[Devious6]

The new old stock, in-wrapper stock I bought for mine was $25 delivered on eBay. Forend and grip we're in the $70 total. You do have other options if you check around once you see if you are able to do anything with the original furniture or not.

[06AngusSG]

When I stripped my commando furniture I ended up with a stock that had a bondo plug and a crap grade maple grip and forend. If you want good stuff save your pennies and find vintage good stuff.

Jon

[J.F. Bell]

It was a kind of general blotchiness that wouldn't come out and wouldn't reliably take a stain. Whether this was the quality of the wood or lingering traces of paint inhibiting the process I'm not certain. Once stripped the wood was almost bone-white with irregular dark concentrations. Primarily these showed up anywhere the endgrain was exposed. After a couple of rounds of cleaning to remove any chemicals I took a crack at putting on color, at which point it behaved about like birch - sucked the stain in deep some places, barely changed in others.

 

I figured I had nothing to lose in the attempt. Didn't gain anything, either.

[Oldtrooper]

You can remove oils from a stock with oven cleaner ... Pulls stuff out of the wood pretty well.