Bought a 581 that the previous owner did a poor job removing rust and bluing. I want to strip and reblue. I have some 80 grit glass bead media and the McMaster carr#4 special sauce. From the blasting i have done, the glass media leaves a rough surface on thr metal, way more than the #4. Also, I think the #4 will be too aggressive. Is there a media that will remove the rust without changing the surface finish? Walnut media? Soda? Not sure if soda works in my blast cabinet/gun.

Thanks,

Rosewood

Hmm, sounds like "what degree of ugly are you willing to accept?"

Is there any pitting? If not, and it's just surface rust, why not do it right and dress the steel down by hand with fine Swiss files, etc. (no buffing wheel please!) Yeah, it's a lot of slow work, but at least your 581 can be saved.

If it's pitted, and already messed with, then it doesn't really matter.
But, it's always nice if we can save one of the good ones!

I have blasted many guns using 100 grit aluminum oxide. It is not too aggressive but it removes old bluing and corrosion. It doesn’t affect barrel stampings, etc. By far the easiest surface prep prior to hot bluing or application of a spray and bake Teflon coating. But it does not produce a polished surface. Smaller grit sizes are not as effective, larger grit sizes are more aggressive on steel and produces a rougher surface. Brownell’s probably has it.

You can adjust the finish by grit size and/or air pressure. A low air pressure will give a finer finish with a given grit size. Start out low and work up to the finish you want. A fine blast finish looks nice. A coarse blast finish is ugly.

Note the distinction between fine and coarse. Fine is well done. Coarse is poorly done.

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protocalldesign.com

A well-done blast and blued finish is not ugly. Just not shiny bright. And enormously easier than polishing.

The frame is still polished blue. But the barrel and cylinder look almost matte black. I got to thinking, it may be just as well to bead blast with the #4 and then blue. It will look like a 3rd gen semi after I blast it before bluing. I may go ahead and get some soda media and see what it does, then move on to #4 if it isn't satisfactory. Blasting will give me a uniform finish.

I’m not an expert on bluing and have not hot blues any guns myself. That said, I do know that when rebluing a gun - prep work and polishing is everything! If I were to ever do this myself, I would take as long as it required to properly remove all defects, scars, and faults prior to bluing it. That would not just require blasting, but polishing for a fine final finishing of the metal on which your bluing results will hang. To me, if it’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right and getting the best results possible. A great bluing job is all about the prep work.

A friend of mine has a rebluing business. He often says that bluing is easy, it’s the prep work that takes years to learn to do right!

Doesn’t matter if your painting a car or doing drywall repairs to paint. The prep is what’s important and time consuming. Same for blueing.

Naval jelly and a nylon brush will remove bluing quickly and easily.
After that you could polish with fine sandpaper and get a decent look.
For myself, I prefer polished blue and would rather replace a barrel and cylinder than matt-finish a gun, but if you don't want to go that route, baking soda is pretty easy on things and if that's not enough to blend and even the finish it might be time to go a little coarser. Once you go too far, it's really hard to come back from.

BB&B,,Bead Blast & Blue
What the gunshops used to call the quicky refinishes done to guns they took in so they could turn them over and resell quickly.

Not necessarily a bad look, it can wipe and blend scratches and blend easily into the frosted look that a bead blasted finish affords. The hot blue process then reblues the gun parts and several others at the same time. An efficient method for it's purpose.

But if you use the same methods and take some care in choosing the blast media along with air pressure, you can make some surprising improvements in the looks over quickly done work using coarse matrl.

Some hand polishing done prior to the bead blast may seem counter productive, but if there are heavy dents or marks in the metal they should be taken out first. Then the blast will smoothly cover those areas and not leave the remains of the old damage underneath the beaded
finish.

Consider using the bead blast for the edge finish and hand polish bright the sides /flats.
That leaves a very nice contrast and is easy to do by masking the polished area and carefully blasting the edges afterwards with low pressure.

As already started, the prep is where the work is in any of this stuff. There is no real short cut to a nice looking job.
A coarse beadblast and blue over a beat up surface will in the end look just like that.

I know of no quality gun refinishing company that uses particle blasting to prepare their project guns for rebluing or plating. There must be a good reason why?

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Gary
SWCA 2515

So, for blued guns that have a matte finish, how did they achieve that finish?

Thanks,

Rosewood

Smith & Wesson offered matte/satin or high gloss bluing all the way back to the early M&Ps from time to time over the years. As I understand it, prep work for matte bluing included carding the surface with a 400 or coarser paper and then using a higher grit buffing compound to prepare the surface for a satin or matte blue. High gloss finishes required finer carding and very fine buffing compound to get the steel to a mirror-like surface.

There are media blasted finishes, but I don't think they are called blue. Parkerize, Duracoat, \ and Cerakote finish names come to mind.

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Gary
SWCA 2515

Years ago I decided I wanted a 1911 Target gun. This was back before it was cool. Had a nickel plated Colt 1911 as donor gun. Gunsmith was going to send it out to be denickeled. My old man was supervisor at a power plant that had their own Instrument shop. He and couple of his buddies prepped gun and blasted it with aluminum oxide. We took it to Smith who was impressed with the work. Lettering crisp, square edges, ect.
Then Smith called and was all bent out of shape. There were spots of nicel that had been feathered and not completely removed. We left it the way it was and did the BoMar thing. The gun was known as the Pinto Bean. Don’t know where it’s at but there’s only one like it. Ain’t liked them Talo edition guns since.