SW99 original slide finish

[Glockman4]

Picked up a cheap SW99 in .40 and I have a question about finishes. Did these pistols ever come with a really ****** coating over the Melonite on the slide, or is this a Cerakote job?

It is flaking off in certain areas and is very coarse and uneven. The weird thing is, where it is flaking looks perfectly fine underneath. The gun clearly wasn’t used much and is like new condition wise. Weird that someone would coat a slide with no wear on it, unless they didn’t like the original dull gray color. But it doesn’t look like the three other SW99’s I’ve had.


Pictures attached.

 

[3rdgenfriend]

SW99

Good find on that SW99. Did you try and remove the flakes mechanically or use a clp on it yet?

When I bought mine at my lgs (priced to sell and I researched then jumped on it within 8 hrs ), it was a .40 but came with a 9MM barrel and with 3 .40 cal mags and 2 9mm mags, and original box and docs. It's iconic (think james bond), it's a great shooter in both calibers, and a piece of S&W history in the collab with Walther.

Looking forward to hearing what that flaking is and what it can be treated with ... 3GF

 

[Ameshawki]

Mine doesn't look like that. I suspect Ceracote, and not an especially good job.

 

[Echo40]

Definitely a terrible Cerakote job, that's no factory finish I've ever seen.

 

[Glockman4]

You guys were right. Gave it an acetone bath and got the Cerakote off. Now I think I know why the guy coated it. The slide has a lot of rust marks and discoloration under heavy lighting. The weird thing is, the metal integrity looks to be fine. There is no pitting. Almost like the meloniting process wasn’t done correctly. The slide looks fine in ambient light but under a flashlight it’s rough in certain areas, mostly on the front of the slide as you can see in the pictures. My question now is, is this worth getting blasted and refinished and two, will S&W even do this if I offer to pay for it? I know they don’t warranty these anymore. I don’t want another paint job, I’d rather a re-Meloniting process.

 

[Glockman4]

Good find on that SW99. Did you try and remove the flakes mechanically or use a clp on it yet?

When I bought mine at my lgs (priced to sell and I researched then jumped on it within 8 hrs ), it was a .40 but came with a 9MM barrel and with 3 .40 cal mags and 2 9mm mags, and original box and docs. It's iconic (think james bond), it's a great shooter in both calibers, and a piece of S&W history in the collab with Walther.

Looking forward to hearing what that flaking is and what it can be treated with ... 3GF

Of all the pistols out there (and that I own/have owned)weirdly enough this is the one gives me the most nostalgia. It was the first handgun I saw on a regular weekly basis as our resource officer when I was in high school carried the .40 SW99. Saw it almost every day in the lunchroom. This was 2007-2010. I remember asking him about it and him going on at length about “the township gives us what we’re going to carry and that’s it, we have to learn to use what is handed to us” and also him saying he didn’t even care for guns that much haha. He carried his cocked in single action, as the striker indicator was visible. He was an older guy and that was his last post before he retired from the PD.

Also, my first airsoft gun growing up was one of those two tone P99’s that Cabelas used to sell. I played with that thing for years.

 

[Fastbolt]

From what we were told (I went through the armorer class for the 99's 3 times), S&W sent their slides & barrels out for batch treatment to a vendor for the Melonite QP treatment. Ditto for the earlier M&P pistols.

Yes, we were told that if the Melonite process was done incorrectly, it could result in some oxidation (rust) of the treated parts, even though they were stainless under the nitrided layer. That happened with some early M&P's.

They do their own nitrocarburizing process nowadays, which gives them more QC over it, and call it Armornite, last I looked. I couldn't presume to guess whether they would retreat your SW99 slide & barrel, using their own nitriding process. You'd have to call and ask. They may not even have anyone there who remembers working on the SW99's, or the P99's at the previous Walther America building (when they imported Walthers and did the service/repair work during their import agreement). I was told they even shipped off all of their remaining Walther parts to the then-new Walther Arms company Walther formed in the US.

I have a 2000's vintage SW9940, and a SW999C, made just before they stopped production of the regular 99's and changed over to the 990L's. I carried an issued SW9940 of the same vintage for a few years. Nice guns ... once the magazine issue was identified that was responsible for the intermittent early slide-lock (while rounds remained in the magazine) issue reported by some P99 .40 & SW9940) users.

S&W engineers identified a magazine body design condition using their high speed imaging, and Walther then worked with their magazine vendor revise the magazine body and follower in the .40's.

The original .40 mag & follower is on the right in these pics. The revised mag body is on the left. Note the flattened spot behind the mag catch window. That spot kept the rising rounds from shifting too far leftward, under recoil, to prematurely engage the slide stop lever tab and lock back the mag before the mag was empty. The color change of the follower indicated the revised shape of the follower needed to accommodate the changed mag body design. (In the Walther .40 mags they changed the shade of the blue color they used for their .40 followers.)