Good evening, so I have a few questions about my S&W revo's, my ice cold safe in my garage, and my pachmayr grips.

So I have a Model 66 and 681, and also a Model 13, all have pachmayr rubber grips. My question is what is the best way to prevent any kind of rust/moisture related issues underneath the grips? Currently all the guns are spotless under the grips, I read on another forum in a very old thread that Renaissance Wax is not suggested for under Pachmayr grips because they are "real rubber". Any validity to that?

I am concerned about rust because my safe is bolted to the slab in my garage. There is no place to put it in the house or it would be there instead, so moving the safe is not a option. I live here in northern california, and we are having a very cold winter (I know the east coast is getting slammed!) and I am a little concerned about how cold the safe/guns are getting. A golden rod is not a option as I will not drill a hole in my safe and weaken the fire rating. I do have a EvaDry dehumidifier and plan on getting one of the bake-able silicon gel canisters tonight online. Thanks for anyone who reads this and responds! Pics to come eventually of my conservative, and beloved collection.

Cold air is dry air, so you're probably good for the winter. You can try a desiccant like silica oxide. Some people just use rice.

I've had good results with rust preventing lubricants, and I keep guns in a damp and dank Midwestern basement.

There was a thread in the "Lounge" section of the forum recently that had a link to a study a guy did. Just some random nerd. (probably an engineer). He wasn't trying to sell anything.

He looked at dozens of common gun "wonder lubes". And some not so wonder lubes. He was specifically focusing on rust prevention in a precise scientific way. Very interesting.

The Real Story about Gun care products

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~ S&W aficionado in training ~

Cold air is dry air???

It was 30 degrees last night and no clouds, but everything was coated with ice from the fog.

Not a true indicator of humidity.

I take the grips off and heavily oil my guns when left in the cold.

Good question OP:

IMO the best way to store your guns that have Pachmayers is to remove the stocks and keep them separate. One could argue this also holds true for the long term storage of any gun with any kind of stock (i.e. rubber, wood, plastic, etc.). I have run across several stainless steel guns over the years that have original wood stocks and rust spots underneath them. In these situations it looked like the wood stocks had never been taken off the gun as it took a lot of "careful prying" to get them off.

Moral of the story here is how much you will care for your firearms while being stored. If you put them in the safe and don't do much with them for the next 2 years (not recommended), take the grips off and store separate. On the other hand, if you take your guns out of the safe and wipe them down every so often (including under the stocks) you can leave the stocks on. One other point to be made is that you also do not want the oils from your hands to transfer onto the guns right before you put them in the safe. Oils from your person are not good for the finish of your firearm as they can attract moisture. You should do the FINAL wipe down of your revolvers with a oily rag, silicone cloth (or whatever) while wearing a pair of cloth gloves.

My recommendation is to leave the stocks off the revolvers even if you plan on doing a wipe down every 6 months. Speaking from experience what will happen is that you will get busy doing other things and your planned 2X a year wipe down of the guns will go to once a year or even less frequent.

Its all about your care and maintenance routine and how you stick to it.

All the guns in my safe (rifle and pistol) get handled/checked monthly. I will remove the grips from the 13 & 681, but my 66 is handled/shot to often to take the grips off for storage. I'm sure some of you are aware of how hard it is to find pristine prelock S&W in california, since we cant purchase them from out of state or Gunbroker/GunsAmerica. I cherish the few I have and would hate to let rust tarnish them.

For the 66 that is shot often. I would obtain a small storage box for the house and bolt it to some thing. There are all kinds on the market today. Just my two cents. I have done that myself for storage on the main floor of my home.

I'm not sure I go along with the Wax damaging real rubber, may be true...may not be true . They have to be formulated to resist the effects of gun oil and bore solvents....wax should be less harmful than these .
My thought's are, wax would be the best protection and the grips aren't that expensive to replace. I have had some Pac's on a S&W model 64 and Ruger MKII pistol, been on them for 14 years and no ill effects from wax, oil or solvents...just looked at both .
An e-mail to Pachmayr would clear up the question .
Gary

Yes, rubber grips will screw up any blued gun. I got a Colt Series 80 about 10 years ago and put some good looking rubber grips on it for shooting. It is the only gun I have ever owned that showed damage from grips after 10 years or more. I have never taken any damage from wood grips, and all my guns are stored in the same place under the same conditions. I even kept my wife's gun in a leather holster for 30 years and it's still brand new inside and out.

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Dr. B

Once the temp goes below zero, air has little ability to hold any water. Once you get past the phase change it's dry as a bone. The colder it gets, the lower it's potential is to hold H2O. That's how one style of commercial air dryer works. By way of a refrigeration cycle. Minus 40F air is some dry ### air.

__________________
~ S&W aficionado in training ~

I have even seen pitting on stainless revolvers under the rubber grips.
Probably related to the passivation issue that I am still unable to comprehend.

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-jwk-
US Army '72-'95

That may be true at that temperature.

But... the O.P. stated he's in No.California We have been going from 40's - 50's in the day to freezing at night. Moisture is pulled up during the cooling and humidity rises even after sunny day.
I left my windows open in my Jeep 2 nights ago. In the morning it was soaked inside out.. Frozen on the windshield.

We have not been down at zero and staying there. Real life.