Has anyone ever refinished an old recurve bow, I'm not really wanting to refinish as much as just touch up on it, can you rub tru oil on them, its got some cracks in the finish an some rub marks, if it was a rifle stock I'd just rub it down with 4 Ought steel wool and rub some coats of Tru-Oil on it but I'm sure these old bear recurves have a sprayed on shalac on them.
Chris
If it is a glass laminated bow the oil won't have anything to get into.
When I redid my wing I used very fine grit sandpaper... 600 maybe and went with the line of the bow just enough to take off the top of the old finish. Then put some spray Varathane satin on it. I think for the nonglass areas I used 400 first then 600 and kept the strokes inline with the bow. Worked okay, well, nice on the riser but the limbs still showed lines.
Ok, thanks, guess I can give it a light sanding an just spray it. How'd the satin look?? good I'm sure, don't need the bright glossy to catch the sun light.
car wax with a light compound on the fiberglass parts. i do a 36' fiberglass boat the same way. glass will not take varnish well.
The satin made it look... dusty? That is about the best way I can describe it.
On the glass parts I did it very thin, just enough to make the riser match the limbs and maybe not even that much. Varathane is not flexible so I didn't want to make it crack and peel.
I am sure (assuming the cracks you are talking about are not running lengthwise, that could be the fiberglass cracking... bad thing) the cracks you see are the finish from the factory cracking. So, that should give you an idea of what any finish will do. Hence, the reason I really just fogged the limbs.