Is it possible to remove nickel plating and have the pistol reblued as it originally came. I realize it can never be original again.

Yes! Anyone that does nickel plating can remove the plating by reversing the electrical polarity of the process.

You can also by a kit from Brownells and do it yourself.

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Jim
S&WCA #819

Here's one of those Midway videos.

If you attempt to remove the plating be VERY CAREFUL.
The acid used can and will eat your flesh. It will also cause rust to form rapidly unless totally neutralized before it starts to dissolve the steel.
DO NOT ATTEMPT ON ALUMINUM ALLOYS!! Poison fumes and destruction of th ealloy as well.

Brownells makes a two part liquid nickel remover with whichI have had great success. I warmed it up in the wife's old crockpot. It was reblued with no problems.

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GARY
SWCA #2897, SWHF #436

I had a very bad experience trying to have the nickel removed from a 1st model 32-20. If you have any serious pitting or scaling on your piece beware...the rustification extends below the surface of the nickel and can lead to serious metal removal in order to achieve a smooth finish. The fellow that owned the refinishing business should have had the experience and warned me off, he could have needed the business and felt he had everything under control. We were both wrong, he struggled with the piece for nearly six months before I finally had enough and demanded to have it finished. It is a mess and quite literally a polished ****, although functional and reasonably re-blued on the outside enough metal was removed in the process and even some of the screws will not completely tighten in position. Fortunately I was not out much money, however it was a decent if not ugly shooter beforehand. I should have left good enough alone, lesson learned.

I like nickel. Don't you?

Thinking I did a double dose of my meds today, 'cause I have no clue what this has to do with removing nickel plating.

I use to work in a plating shop. The nickel can be removed with acid. There should be a light coat of copper under the nickel. That also can be removed. You can then start preparing the metal for bluing.

Not all revolvers and semi-auto pistols had a 'copper' base coating before the nickel.
Most S&W we have seen DID NOT HAVE THIS, but most Colt did have the copper base.
Of course I base this info upon experience as a gunsmith starting in 1948.

OH! what do you know. WINK! best, Mike

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Mike 2796
SoFo Bunch member

I have often wondered how dalic nickel plating would work as a refinish for a scabby nickel plated gun. Dalic kits are available but somewhat expensive (the process does not use a plating tank). Has anyone tried it?

Electroless (sp?) nickel can be stripped with hydrochloric acid.

Electro-plated nickel can be easily stripped with the reverse plating as in Larry's video above.
The Sulfuric Acid solution should be about 10% acid,,90% water. Room temp.
This is a reverse plating process done with a 12V battery. not a simple dunk and soak process.
It will remove both the Nickel and any copper flash plating that may have been used to pre-plate the steel.

BUT, it can have it's problems.
Using such a simple set up, it will as it shows in the video quickly remove the vast bulk of the plating. What it often does NOT do is remove tiny specks of plating and/or flash copper plate (if it was used) that are trapped in corners, bottom of holes, down in tight areas like metal checkering, ect.
As a result, the operator may be tempted upon close examination discovering some specks of plating remaining, to run it again thru the process to remove them.
It is here that you can start to get pitting on the already stripped surfaces. They are unprotected and the process just starts to eat away at them the longer they are in there.
Also you can get things like 'channeling',,long smooth groove like impressions in the steel where gas bubbles form and line up attaching themselves together forming a line. That line carves out a slight depression in the steel. Sometimes several side by side.
Turning and agitating the parts can help avoid this.

Then when you're done you have a bowl of sulfuric acid soln to deal with ,,and you have to put the battery back in the family car.

The simple quick ways nearly always have a few drawbacks and gunparts aren't cheap to experiment on.

The cold-strip Nickel stripper products are about the best bet. They work slowly w/out acid and will not pit the metal.
They are mainly ammonium compounds in soln (ammonium persulfate?) and can be reused.