Rust Bluing?

[WestCoastFranky]

Anyone here have experience with rust bluing?

I like to buy and resto-mod old Crosman pumpers.  Typically I look for basket case guns whose finishes are usually gone.  I strip them completely in Evaporust which takes all the bluing off.   I then use a cold blue on them followed by a gun oil.  The results look pretty good and the gun oil protects the gun, but the bluing wears off very quickly.

I have seen rust bluing videos on youtube including one guy posting a method that seems to be easy and inexpensive to try.

Does anyone have experience with this technique?

[mikeyb]

I've tried the youtube rust BLACKENING technique on small pieces like trigger parts.

Clean parts very thoroughly. Use a hydrogen peroxide and table salt solution to rust the parts. Then boil the parts in water to convert the oxide from red to black. Rub and repeat MANY TIMES to get a uniform black layer. It works, but I wouldn't try to use it on anything large like a barrel or air-tube. I "think" it would be too difficult to get a uniform finish that looked better than bottle bluing. The small parts I blackened are oiled, look good, and seem to be stable (no longer red rusting).

[Gippeto]

Have done a bit of rust bluing...it's far more durable. I "boil" small parts, and steam larger ones.

I admit biase, but I'm happy with the process. There are several solutions available, Laural Mountain Forge Barrel Brown is easy to use, the hydrogen peroxide, salt and vinegar solution works too.

https://www.gatewaytoairguns.org/GTA/index.php?topic=137226.msg1374409#msg1374409

Al

[subscriber]

[WestCoastFranky]

Thanks for the info.  I have a couple of projects that I am working on that I want the bluing to be a little more durable than the cold bluing that I have been using.

[RBQChicken]

I recently bought some Renaissance wax and now I'm wondering if it is a hard enough wax to help protect cold-blued guns.  Supposedly it's quite durable so maybe with two or three coats it would work?

[Wayne52]

Randy I have been using the Renaissance wax on all my airguns, after using it for many of my metal detecting finds I found that the stuff is pretty darned good.