doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Trigger guard refinishing question

I could accept that.

Charcoal bluing (real charcoal bluing) can be done with very nice results but it takes a lot of labor and no small amount of practice.

Just putting the parts into a bed of coals and covering it will more often than not just leave you with an uneven colored coating of oxide. Often you'll be rewarded with a coating of scale on the steel as well where the air got at it. At times that scale can be an (almost) even blue color. Some that do the work that way look at that as their 'bluing'.

After the part(s) are in the charcoal for a while,,and it takes some experience to know when ,,it varies with the mass and shape,,they are removed one at a time and rubbed down.
A holder for each part is a near must-have to handle them through the process.

You can rub them down with burlap or canvas, or sisal(sp) rope pieces,,anything somewhat abrasive but not so much as to scratch the surface. You are burnishing the surface and color to even things out. The addition of a powdered polishing agent helps. Lime was an old standby. Some say that oil can be applied also during this stage of the process, I've never found that to work well,,but everyone has a bit of a different technique when it comes to finishing be it metal or wood..

Burnish the parts,,but remembering they are still 800+ degrees. So you will burn yourself badly if not protected.

Back into the pile of charcoal and buried as soon as you can and pull another part out. Do the same, and to the next. Around and around till the finish pleases you. Some will look done before others. Different steels mostly I'd guess. The heavier ones take longer to reheat and gain another color coating of course.
Add charcoal to the fire, don't let it get low and expose the parts to the air.
Hot work,,no getting away from the pile of charcoal especially if there's many parts to do.
Not like burying it and walking away for a couple of hours as most instructions tell you to.

That sounds like something you practice on scrap triggerguards and bits of polished metal.

I got very acceptable results from an even easier process than Kutter's.
Polish the trigger guard to 400 grit or better,degrease, coat with linseed oil, dust with hard wood ash (fine ash like talcum powder) and hang them in your gas bbq grill at 600 degrees. Remove and dust off the part, soak in oil for 24 hrs. The finish is durable and accurate in coloration for a restoration.
Easy and repeatable.

That works well,,It's another version of heat blue. A temp to give an acceptable color and something to create a zero oxygen atmosphere around the part.
Nitre does the same.

The process has been used in the arts field, likely by others. Someone told me Springfield Armory used something like it at one time,,don't know if it's true or not.
It was actually the subject of an article in a jewelry & metal arts magazine several years back as a decorative way to color steel.
A torch was an alternative way to bring the temp and color up on small pieces.

It works well, but the color just doesn't match the depth & shade of a charcoal blue (near black) that's seen on trigger guards and trigger plates, or the early charcoal blued Colts ect.
It's actually one coating of it, if done at the same temps.
Perhaps it can be used again and again on the same object to build a finish. Something to try I guess!
It would be the slow rust blueing version of it vs the quick rust version being the charcoal pit method.

The pit method is a many layered process. Charcoal (and Machine Bluing) is a buildup of layers of oxide. It's thick enough that it flakes off when it gets older and/or abused. It may flake off if the surface isn't perfectly clean before you start too!

I wouldn't doubt for a minute that some parts weren't done that way just as they can be done at high temp in nitre.
Especially handy in small shops and one-of pieces to do.
There's always more than one way to do things.

Restoration sometimes limits your choices when matching the original is all important.
But sometimes an easier to use alternative can be found and used that suits the owner just fine.

For those interested, page 43 of Schwing's Winchester M21 book gives a reasonably detailed decription of how Winchester did the "machine blueing" process on frames & small parts prior to adopting the Du-Lite caustic salts hot dip process.

Note that Schwing says that machine blueing is also known as charcoal or carbonum blueing. I don't know if he is correct on that point or not.

The results the English get on charcoal blued/blacked triggerguards & furniture are a little different & I suppose everyone had a slightly different process for the results they wanted to achieve & obviously the level of polish done prior to blueing has a significant impact on the results of any blueing process.

Kutters instructions are pretty accurate, from the links burying a piece in charcoal for 3 hours does nothing really.

The old-school Purdey way to charcoal blue was to pull the piece from the coals and burnish periodically with tow (loose flax/canvas material) and lime. This would produce a uniform and deep-gloss black.

Joe Wood - If you are going to hot blue that guard I suggest you anneal it first. The original charcoal blue would have hardened that piece and you can end up with a plum brown/red colour when initially using the hot salts method.

The process I described was from the Springfield Armory. A torch was used in the description but I improvised and used the gas grill. I figured I could get a more reliable temp from that without risk of overheating. The results I got from doing it multiple times didn't seem to improve the finish darkness. I soaked the trigger guard in ATF tranny fluid, which may be the secret to the dark blue I got from the process. I had a very popular restoration gunsmith in my area look at the work...he was amazed I did it on a grill and got the right color blue. So far the parts finish has been very durable.

Dave,
That process seems like a low risk way to go because the part is protected from O2 on the surface prior to heating. Good stuff. I'll have to give it a try on something soon.

I'm assuming you used an ATF that is regular (old type) petroleum based as opposed to synthetic?

Dave,
Can you describe or post a picture or two of the finish and color of the process you used?

Is it a dark blue, a blue like the early Colt Pythons, etc.?