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re-blueing....do it your self or?

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  • blacksunshine

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    Nov 6, 2008
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    re-blueing....do it your self or?

    I attempted, poorly, to reblue an old rifle I have, looks like poo....is this something that normally people do on their own without issue? did I just totally not do something right?? or do most people have their firearms re-blued via a 3rd party and if so, any referrals in A-town?
    Target Sports
     

    Charley

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    Aug 7, 2008
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    San Antonio
    Some cold blues will do acceptable touch ups, most don't even do that well.
    Easy enough to rust blue at home. I use PVC pipe and boiling distilled water from a microwave, and get pretty good results. Smaller parts can be nitre blued using hardware store stump remover.
    PM me if you want some pics and more info.
     

    tomharkness

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    Jan 6, 2009
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    Some cold blues will do acceptable touch ups, most don't even do that well.
    Easy enough to rust blue at home. I use PVC pipe and boiling distilled water from a microwave, and get pretty good results. Smaller parts can be nitre blued using hardware store stump remover.
    PM me if you want some pics and more info.


    I would love to know (in much more detail) how you do this bluing... Please. I have read a lot, but everyone has their own way of doing it. I have a cheap Kel-Tec that I want to try the hot-bluing on and I need to know just how you do it.

    Thanks.
     

    Charley

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    Aug 7, 2008
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    San Antonio
    Rust blueing at home isn't hard. Strip you gun, polish to your taste, and degrease as well as possible, using brake cleaner or something similar. Find a container large enough to hold your piece. I use a length of PVC pipe, capped at one end, for barrels or barreled actions, or a bread pan for actions alone. I use Laurel Mountain Forge's barrel brown. It does brown, but when boiled in distilled water it turns that brown into black oxide, or blue. Follow the directions from LMF for carding.
    After I apply the solution, I let the piece sit for a day or so to get surface rust. Then the part goes into the pipe or pan, and I boil distilled water in a microwave. Pour the boiling water over the part, and let stand for about five minutes. Then pour off the water, card the piece (rub it down with a coarse cloth dampened with water) and let cool. It takes me at least three cycles to get the depth of blue I want, but I've never done more than five cycles.
     

    Charley

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    Aug 7, 2008
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    San Antonio
    Here's an example of a rifle I reblued, using the rust blueing process. It's a single shot Noble .22 LR. Finish was loooong gone. It was reblued using the process described in my previous post. Small parts were nitre blued, using the process described by Marshall Stanton from Beartooth Bullets.Beartooth Bullets > Tech Notes > Marlin Trapper Carbine!
     

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    Banjoman

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    Jan 24, 2009
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    Azle
    Cold bluing works fine for small parts or for touch-ups. I did a whole shotgun once and although it looks better than it did, it is not a professional looking job by any stretch. If you do choose cold bluing, make sure the prepped properly. Smooth and free of any oils. Once you have blued it, you can even the color out with 0000 steel wool.
     

    Charley

    Active Member
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    Aug 7, 2008
    744
    76
    San Antonio
    Cold bluing works fine for small parts or for touch-ups. I did a whole shotgun once and although it looks better than it did, it is not a professional looking job by any stretch. If you do choose cold bluing, make sure the prepped properly. Smooth and free of any oils. Once you have blued it, you can even the color out with 0000 steel wool.

    Never found a cold blue that will evenly color even a medium sized piece. Brownell's Oxpho-Blu is about the best I've found, but it has its limits! Blu-Wonder, which was so hyped a few years back is some awful looking stuff...it might protect, but it looks like SOS. For smal parts, where I might be tempted to use cold blues, I agree 100% with the writer of the link I posted about nitre-bluing... "It’s really too simple, and I can’t understand how in the world so many gallons of inferior cold-bluing solution are marketed every year when niter-bluing is so simple and so inexpensive. "

    Cheaper and better!
     

    markfh

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    Nov 2, 2008
    83
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    Houston
    I was going to try the cold blue until a friend beat me to it on his mauser. It looked terrible. We're now going to get one of my clients to make us a stainless steel tank to do some proper blueing.
     
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