Anodizing Recievers

is there not a legal issue, in taking a lower to someone who is not a gunsmith, or has the necessary license to handle firearms, and or is not a shooting range, unless you have one of those special ATT's that allow you to transport to wherever you wish ?

just wondering !
 
call up ATR they did a custom lower for wicked_police I believe and it looked amazing.

Are your lowers already annodized? If they have to get stripped then you may end up with results that may be slightly off what you are looking for.

Also stripping the upper and lower can cause tolerance issues as the dimensions will change. I don't think it will be a big issue as its not a piano, and a little slop wont hurt.

But best call ATR and see what they can do for you.
 
Ftaview said:
is there not a legal issue, in taking a lower to someone who is not a gunsmith, or has the necessary license to handle firearms, and or is not a shooting range, unless you have one of those special ATT's that allow you to transport to wherever you wish ?

just wondering !
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You are correct in that you can not take a lower to some shop and let people who are not licensed properly take possession of it, hence why I'm posting the question. ;)

GT could you elaborate on your post. I have no idea of the process involved so any insight would be helpful...and FDEish is the color. I know it won't be exact.
 
rambones said:
call up ATR they did a custom lower for wicked_police I believe and it looked amazing.

Are your lowers already annodized? If they have to get stripped then you may end up with results that may be slightly off what you are looking for.

Also stripping the upper and lower can cause tolerance issues as the dimensions will change. I don't think it will be a big issue as its not a piano, and a little slop wont hurt.

But best call ATR and see what they can do for you.
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They were my first thought...I'll call them in the AM.
 
You are correct in that you can not take a lower to some shop and let people who are not licensed properly take possession of it, hence why I'm posting the question.
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Not entirely true. This came straight from the Ont. CFO
As long as you get an statt to take it to the business (which it seems you can although I've never tried) and you stay on the premises the entire time, you CAN take your restricted to a non firearm licensed shop for them to work on it. I was surprised to hear this too and even re-confirmed this with him, but the FO who deals with business firearms licenses at the CFO told it straight to me. Although, I suppose, it wouldn't be the first time i was told something by a gov. agency that wasn't correct, I'm just relaying what i was told.
Big thing is, YOU CANNOT LEAVE THE PREMISES!!!!! Depending on what work you're having done....this might not be possible, or convenient. So, it IS better to have a licensed firearms business do it if only for the convenience of being able to leave it with them.
YMMV, lol, don't flame me if this doesn't work in real life. Again, just relaying what the Ont CFO told me.........
 
When they strip them, they etch them in acid to remove the old anodizing. This is what can screw up the tolerances on your rifle. If your upper/lower is already anodized, while not impossible to strip and re anodize to get what you want, you'd be better off just painting it the colour you want. Then you can get the exact colour you want.....and if it doesn't look good, you repaint it again.
 
*MALICE* said:
When they strip them, they etch them in acid to remove the old anodizing. This is what can screw up the tolerances on your rifle. If your upper/lower is already anodized, while not impossible to strip and re anodize to get what you want, you'd be better off just painting it the colour you want. Then you can get the exact colour you want.....and if it doesn't look good, you repaint it again.
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+1 I belive you can get far nicer results painting.

I think it would have a stronger finish as the painting will somewhat protect the anodizing too.
 
Anodizing is hard. Hard anodizing is even harder. Anodizing creates an oxidized layer on the outside that protects the surface.....and also makes it look pretty. Aluminum oxide is the media often used in sandblasting.
With anodizing you have less choice/availability of colours to choose from. With painting, you can choose any colour you can mix, as well as different effects, graphics, and patterns (digital camo).
Anodizing is waaaay more durable, however, it will wear off. If you've ever seen pictures of M4's or M16's that have been in the desert or have been used heavily, all the high spots will be shiny (bare aluminum). It will likely take a long time to wear the anodizing off from home to the range and back. Anodizing is usually between .0002"-.002" thick, depending on the type.
 
Wicked_Police's red lower actually started off as a black one, it had already gone through the ano process before we realized it was supposed to be red along with Westicle's :eek: The strip and re-ano didn't affect any tolerances that I could find upon measuring it, though there was a slight color variation in the rear of it.

That being said, I have talked to our ano guy about doing FDE, and he thinks it can be done but would cost around $1k to set up for it, so unless there's a lot of potential FDE lowers getting sold it's a bit tough to suck up that cost ;)



rambones said:
call up ATR they did a custom lower for wicked_police I believe and it looked amazing.

Are your lowers already annodized? If they have to get stripped then you may end up with results that may be slightly off what you are looking for.

Also stripping the upper and lower can cause tolerance issues as the dimensions will change. I don't think it will be a big issue as its not a piano, and a little slop wont hurt.

But best call ATR and see what they can do for you.
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My understanding is that - anodization colour is not an exact science. There are lots of trials and errors before a correct colour is obtained.
 
Yup, it's more of an art then a science, even dye lots vary from batch to batch so you need to have a sample of the same material to use as a sacrificial piece to make sure it's correctly mixed, etc :p

greentips said:
My understanding is that - anodization colour is not an exact science. There are lots of trials and errors before a correct colour is obtained.
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FDE can be done I have seen it done as an element of a camo pattern on a paintball gun, the shops that does it either uses a computerize colour matching system to mix the dyes or take a lot of trial and error to get the correct shade and even with that there will be a degree of the metal sheen that will shine thru.
 
All very interesting. I've painted so many rifles and just wanted to look into something new.

I'll definitely have to think about it...especially with the $1K cost for setting it up. ;)

Thanks for all the replies.
 
*MALICE* said:
Anodizing is waaaay more durable, however, it will wear off. If you've ever seen pictures of M4's or M16's that have been in the desert or have been used heavily, all the high spots will be shiny (bare aluminum).
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Been there and used some real ugly rifles. The last rifle I took over was in dire need of refinishing!
 
Anodizing can be done at home.

Look at all the fancy pretty paintball guns. Splashes - 3 colour fades. etc.
Dye and some current is all you need.

If you want to anodize some aluminum, checkout a paintball forum. Better chance of getting real info there
 
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