OK, so I have tried all different ways of dealing with cosmoline. Mostly brake parts cleaner on the metal and paint thinner on wood. Then I found this article.

http://www.surplusrifle.com/shooting/cosmoline/pdf/cosmoline.pdf

Steaming huh? So went to Walmart and bought a cheapo steamer. It did not work. You need a concentrated tip to shoo tthe steam. So I returned it and bought this.

http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=10051&langId=-1&catalogId=10053&productId=100646690&N=10000003+90401

Start with one cosmoline dipped rifle. In this case, a Yugo M24/47 Mauser.

screwing up your pictures
:flipoff2:

Now start steaming. I steamed once to break everything up and then wiped it all down to get the globs off. Then I went back and steamed again. For the record, all the metal then went into a tray of Mineral Spirits to get all the crevices, etc. But the stock has always been very diffeicult to me and I don;t think I have ever gotten one to a satisfactory point like this. Moral to the story, the steamer works!!! All I need to do now is a light sanding with 400 grit on the wood (it is in the sun drying now) and I plan to put a little birchwood casey wax on it.

screwing up your pictures
:flipoff2:

Dick :flipoff2:

Looks great - thanks for the tip :smokin:

Another trick on the stock is to run it through a cycle in the dishwasher.

I also use brake parts cleaner on the metal with good results.

I have a friend that uses a deep fat fryer full of water to clean metal parts and then another fryer full of mobile 1 to lube them(he claims this gets the oil deep into the metal).

You've got the baddest dishwasher on the block if you can stuff a mauser stock in it.

Never tried a mauser, but i bet if you took the top rack out it might fit.

You are more of a man than me if you try and do that in my wife's dishwasher :flipoff2: Course, when she is done with you, you will be more of a woman.....

:laughing:

Shit man dishwashers are great for cleaning all kinds of funky stuff. Once cleaned a transfer case in a dishwasher. Granted my wife at the time went a lil apeshit, and it was in a rented apt so I didn't really care, but it worked out just fine.

They are DESIGNED to remove grease and oil from metal.:laughing:

You CAN however, fit a Mosin Nagant 44 stock in a dishwasher fairly easily. :D

When it came out, it looked very similar to your mauser.

Shit man dishwashers are great for cleaning all kinds of funky stuff. Once cleaned a transfer case in a dishwasher. Granted my wife at the time went a lil apeshit, and it was in a rented apt so I didn't really care, but it worked out just fine.

They are DESIGNED to remove grease and oil from metal.:laughing:

:laughing: word to the wise, men. j/k, dude...

On a kind of semi-related note, are these Yugoslavian Mausers pretty good shooters?