Slow Rust Bluing... a journey... First blue done!

[Sugarbug]

Up late finishing the wood tonight. Using Birchwood Casey's stock refinishing kit. Working very well. The Sears Roebuck stock is turning it very dark, but I'm liking it. The Birchwood Casey says kit says to dilute with water 1:1, but I'm not sure it mixes very well. Sometimes it would look like I was just spreading water on. Each piece got two coats of stain and I'm on the 4th coat of Tru-Oil. I'll so at least two more on each. Then the shine and conditioner will go on.

What do you think?

 

[Sugarbug]

Finished stocks. Bottom one is the Winchester 94.

 

[Goatwhiskers]

Wood is coming along. I suggest that you rub down with 4/0 steel wool between coats till the pores are full, then a couple of finishing coats. There are other methods of achieving pore fill, but that's mine. Be sure to wipe down with a rag after steel wooling, don't want any wool residue in the finish. I'm waiting to see how the blue job turns out. The lever action appears to be a Winchester branded for Sears, and as I'm sure you know the post-64 Win 94 is made of something called "graphitic steel" which was factory blued by plating with iron which was then blued. When the finish wears off or rusts off the plating is gone too. This type of steel is somewhere between difficult and impossible to hot caustic blue. Of course we don't know when yours was produced. Not aware that anyone has rust or even cold blued one of these, so I'm curious. You might get some useful advice from the tech guys at Brownells. GW

 

[Sugarbug]

Wood is coming along. I suggest that you rub down with 4/0 steel wool between coats till the pores are full, then a couple of finishing coats. There are other methods of achieving pore fill, but that's mine. Be sure to wipe down with a rag after steel wooling, don't want any wool residue in the finish. I'm waiting to see how the blue job turns out. The lever action appears to be a Winchester branded for Sears, and as I'm sure you know the post-64 Win 94 is made of something called "graphitic steel" which was factory blued by plating with iron which was then blued. When the finish wears off or rusts off the plating is gone too. This type of steel is somewhere between difficult and impossible to hot caustic blue. Of course we don't know when yours was produced. Not aware that anyone has rust or even cold blued one of these, so I'm curious. You might get some useful advice from the tech guys at Brownells. GW

You're right... i need to finish filling the pores... but at 1 am last night, i was just done. Used the oven on warm to speed the drying process to about 30a mins between coats.

The winchester 94 was made in 78... i did not know about the steel. That is interesting. I'll try and do some research this evening to see if slow rust bluing will even work on that type of steel. Thank you, sir, for the info.

 

[4sooth]

This is coming along nicely!! Almost time for some before/after pictures!!

 

[Sugarbug]

This is coming along nicely!! Almost time for some before/after pictures!!

I think the effect will be greater if I wait until each is completely done. The revolvers will probably be done first. Refinishing the cylinders is going to be tricky, though...

 

[MrFelixx]

That Sears Roebuck stock is looking sweet! I love the dark color and the grain...reminds me of the "tiger-stripe" grain I see in some of the high-end Paul Reed Smith guitars I lust over from time-to-time.
Really coming along nicely, sugarbug. Wish my dad could see what they're going to turn out like.
Keep the pics coming!

 

[Sugarbug]

That Sears Roebuck stock is looking sweet! I love the dark color and the grain...reminds me of the "tiger-stripe" grain I see in some of the high-end Paul Reed Smith guitars I lust over from time-to-time.
Really coming along nicely, sugarbug. Wish my dad could see what they're going to turn out like.
Keep the pics coming!

This week was busy with studying so I didn't make much headway. I'm on about 11 coats of oil and the grains still aren't fully filled... Ugh! And my lab puppy got ahold of the sears Roebuck hand guard and chewed it. Unfortunate, but not truly that important. Especially when you consider my Winchester 94 hand guard was sitting right next to it.

 

[Sugarbug]

Here we go... more pictures from today.



Cylinders getting ready for some rust/blu remover. I was pleased with the results from the Birchwood Casey stuff. Revealed a lot of small pitting, but most was removed. Dremel came in handy here.


Resurfaced the cylinder face. Quite a bit of pitting. It's blackpowder, so it's to be expected.


One cylinder doneish.


Getting ready to do one pistol barrel. Degreased.


Same, other side.


After rust/blu remover.


Hard to tell, but did some wet sanding on the barrel. Cleaned up a lot more, but I may draw file it later.


For comparison.


This is Senor Douchebag. All the PB Blaster, Kroil, heat, etc could not get this screw out. Eventually the top snapped in half. 4sooth brought me some tools to get it out. Screw is out and threads are intact.


Brass-O makes life much easier.


This is my sexy lady. Didn't realize this picture was blurry until I put it on the computer. I apologize. I don't think I will do anymore to this receiver before I begin rust bluing. A lot of elbow grease.


Projects as they stand today.

Stocks are coming along well... still haven't gotten the pores completely filled. On coat 13 at this point. I'm applying with synthetic cleaning patches. Maybe I'm applying to thinly, but I don't think so. Taking F'ing forever!

Having a blast though. Interesting tidbit: the spam cans make EXCELLENT tubs for parts cleaning. I drop my parts in there with some acetone and let them soak. I've done this several times for hours at a time and the green paint is perfect. So if you have extra spam cans, excellent candidates for parts cleaning!

 

[Sugarbug]

Anyone got any extra tricks to fill in the grain on the stocks? I'm rubbing gently with 0000 steel wool between coats and wiping of with some microfiber towels, but they're still not closed up all the way. Coats around 15 or so.

 

[Sugarbug]

These will be first up for the slow rust bluing. Lots and lots of pitting. Not making any beauty queens here, but the shotgun will actually be functional when it's all over. The most minor pitting between all the pieces as well.

Decided not to draw file the pistol barrel as it has some pretty deep pitting and it won't be a shooter when I'm done anyways. There are caverns of pitting in the bore.

Each piece will probably soak in gasoline overnight and then get a final bath in acetone. Pikington's was nice enough to include a small direction booklet with the solution. Soaking overnight in a cheap degreaser (gasoline) is pretty important, especially when deep penetrating oils were used as they seep into the imperfections in welds and will seep back out during the bluing process preventing the rust from forming in spots.

I broke down and bought a bench grinder and have been using the coarse and fine (.005") wire brushes. I need to get a .003" wheel to aid with the carding process, but they're not as common as one would hope.

The journey continues...

ETA: the pieces look a little worse in the photo than they are. I boosted the clarity to add a little definition to the lines and spots, but it also exaggerated them a bit.

 

[Gus McCrae]

Very cool project sugarbug.

 

[Sugarbug]

Finaly Bluing...

Alright, so here are the pieces before being soaked in gasoline for two days and their final degreasing with acetone:



As you can see, we're not going for museum grade beauty here. Thought about draw filing the pistol barrel, but that pitting is pretty deep and I don't feel the end result (something I won't shoot) would be worth the effort.

Everything you see here was cleaned up by hand, then I used rust/blue remover to get the more stubborn rust and finish off. It took quite a lot of time and elbow grease to do it that way. I have since gotten a Craftsman variable speed 6" grinder/buffer. What was taking hours, now takes minutes. The coarse brush works well at getting serious rust off quickly, but you have to be careful not to let it sit at any one spot for too long; it is rough enough to start really scratching the metal. Then I switched to a fine wire brush for smoothing it out a little and for hitting spots where I had to let it work longer than the coarse brush would allow.

After that, these parts sat in gasoline for 2 days. It's important to soak old parts-- especially if high-penetrating oil (like kroil or PB blaster was used). These high-penetrating oils work into imperfetions in seams and welds and will come out during the blue process and prevent rust from forming (kind of the point of the whole thing).

After the gasoline soak, they were wiped down one more time with acetone. During the final acetone wipe, I was wearing gloves. Any further contact with the metal must be done with gloves on or the oils from your hands will "protect" the metal from rusting properly.

So, after it was all ready, I rigged this up:





The dowels allow me to rotate the barrel and cylinders without touching the metal. The receiver and trigger guard are a little trickier and I'm just sure to let the solution dry onto the metal before touching that part. (remember, gloves always on).



This is what I used. That's Pilkington's Slow Rust solution. It is NOT cheap. A 4oz bottle is almost $40 on Brownell's. Fortunately, a little bit goes a long, long way. For the application I wasn't sure if I wanted to use the synthetic patches or the gauze. I decided to start with the patches (synthetic because the cotton ones get fibers everywhere) and they seem to be working perfectly. I was also worried about the absorbancy of the gauze. Very expensive solution already, and if I have to get the gauze saturated enough to stop absorbing it... But the patches are working very well, so no worries there.

The distilled water is used after the the metal has been treated and allowed to rust for 3 hours. Bring it to a boil and put the parts in for 10 minutes. This will turn all the red rust to a velvety, black oxide. It is important to use good water clean of any impurities or they will bond with the metal.

So, once the rig is set up, all of the surfaces of the parts are coated with the solution on a small piece of the patch (I cut each one into 4 pieces). Also, I use a new piece of patch for each part. If one happened to not have been fully cleaned, I don't want to contaminate the other parts by using the same patch.

To apply the solution to the patch, simply place it on the top of the bottle, hold it with your finger and tip the bottle over. VERY IMPORTANT: blot the patch onto a clean cloth or paper towel. It doesn't matter how little you think you have on the patch, it is too much and it will run when you put it on the metal.

Apply in long, smooth strokes. Try to minimize overlap and do not go back; you're doing a lot of applications (6+) and it will be adequately covered during the next one. Be sure to get all of the surface area.

Once they have all been coated, wait one hour and reapply the solution (THIS IS FOR THE FIRST COAT ONLY). After the second application, wait 3 hours until the metal has gone from a blue-gray to a red rust (...this didn't happen exactly on my first coat, but after boiling I did get the velvety black oxide... so ).

After waiting three hours, I placed all the parts pieces of hangar to hold them off the pot bottom, and placed them in boiling distilled water for 10 minutes.

Upon removing them from the water, I immediately dried them off using a blow dryer. They dry quickly because the metal is so hot, but if you let the water sit on it and evaporate off, it will cause spots. Force it off using a hair dryer, reversed vacuum, or air compressor. Be careful if using an air compressor. Some spray a fine mist of oil which will make you have to degrease the parts all over again before the next cycle.

The boiling stops oxidation and turns the rust into a velvety, black oxide. Now you "card" this off. I just used 0000 steel wool to gently get it all off, but it is recommended you use a 6" wire brush with .003" fibers rotating at 600-800 rpm. I have tried to find one locally, but have had no luck. The "fine" brushes are .005" and too coarse for this process. Also, my variable speed doesn't spin at less than 2000 rpm so it would likely be too fast and pull the finish off as I go.

Once all the black velvet is removed, the parts are once again ready to begin the next application. Remember to be wearing clean gloves during all of this. Try to think like a doctor: don't open doors or handle other things with your gloved hands; that will just put the oils from whatever you've touched onto the gloves. I try to be careful, but wipe them with acetone to be sure.

Results after one cycle:


Trigger guard turned out the best, I think. 1 cycle down. Only another 20+ hours of work left to do.


For each following iteration, you will coat once, wait 3 hours, boil for 10 minutes, then card. Each cycle should take a total of about 4-5 hours (less if you're only working on a single piece).

On iteration 3 or 4 you can start letting it rust longer than 3 hours to build up the blue faster, but be careful not to let it sit too long. It will cause pitting.

 

[Sugarbug]

This is 3 cycles except for the barrel which has had 4. They recommend at least 6.

Been letting it sit for 4 or 5 hours, but I'm still not getting the amount of red rust I'm thinking I should. Also, hasn't really begun taking on the deep blue tone. Unsure if that comes later or if I'm just not getting the rust I need before boiling.

 

[Gus McCrae]

This is 3 cycles except for the barrel which has had 4. They recommend at least 6.

Been letting it sit for 4 or 5 hours, but I'm still not getting the amount of red rust I'm thinking I should. Also, hasn't really begun taking on the deep blue tone. Unsure if that comes later or if I'm just not getting the rust I need before boiling.

A part of the deep blue is from how fine the metal is polished before the bluing starts.

 

[Sugarbug]

A part of the deep blue is from how fine the metal is polished before the bluing starts.

Yeah, jake just told me about this. Took it all down to that white, but didn't focus on polishing. Good thing these are practice pieces.

 

[Jasarii]

awesome job. Thanks for sharing Sugarbug.