Dealing with pits and spot refinish

Londonshooter

Londonshooter

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Dilly made an interesting comment in his recent German gun restoration thread about how other people's patina bugs him but his own not so much.
This gun had quite nice barrels and no major warts beyond some muzzle pits that look liked someone tried to clean up with a wire wheel. Not something I could live with.

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Short of having the barrels re-done I thought I would try a spot repair. I used Mark Lee's Brown Express 2 with about 8 to 10 cycles of heating, applying product, dowsing in cold water, then carding off the rust. It was just a trial for me and I did not go whole hog with acid etching. I might just take it back to the white and try again with acid. because without it the Damascus contrast is blurred out. But I do think it looks quite a bit improved.

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That is miles ahead of where it was! Great job. I have reblued barrels in the past and had great results. But never on damascus barrels. I’m curious to know how one would be able to do that without losing the contrast?
 
I have had some success doing this using Birchwood Casey Plum Brown. Like most things, it's a learning process, the metal must be spotlessly clean and degreased, too cool and you get a copperish hue, too hot and it comes out too dark. Of course if you REALLY overheat the metal you risk melting the solder holding your ribs or lump on and then you are in big trouble. Practice on old low value barrels, orphan barrels and old Belgian clunkers make good subjects for this. My gunsmith can do these repairs undetectably but he's been at it for more than 50 years..
 
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On this first attempt I skipped the etching step (in part because I did not have the chemicals). Also, I was a little conservative when cutting down the pitting. So how I did it followed the method recommended for browned barrels that are not laminated steel. When it is a little milder out I will try again. The instructions on how to preserve the contrast of patterned Damascus are described on his website.
https://markleesupplies.com/damascus
 
Londonshooter said:
On this first attempt I skipped the etching step (in part because I did not have the chemicals). Also, I was a little conservative when cutting down the pitting. So how I did it followed the method recommended for browned barrels that are not laminated steel. When it is a little milder out I will try again. The instructions on how to preserve the contrast of patterned Damascus are described on his website.
https://markleesupplies.com/damascus
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This site is a gold mine. Good find.
 
Damascus barrels are great hosts of character. Sad to see so many bubba'd. As nice as richly browned barrels look i for one prefer the vivid acid etched patterns
 
Looks way better. If you need some barrels to practice on before you do those over, let me know. I have a couple twist steel Belgians downstairs that you can borrow. I have plans for them that don’t include shooting.
 
dilly said:
Looks way better. If you need some barrels to practice on before you do those over, let me know. I have a couple twist steel Belgians downstairs that you can borrow. I have plans for them that don’t include shooting.
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Thanks for the offer but I think in the next go around using etchant on these barrels I will be able to do a more satisfactory job. I had used a single burner propane camp stove to carefully warm the metal and that seemed sufficient for the solution to do its job without risk of melting solder. Because the colour comes up gradually with each cycle I expect to be able to carefully blend the transition between new finish and old. Will re-post with the new result but may be a few weeks away since I need to do it outside.
Hey Beretta1963, welcome to fatherhood and congratulations!
 
Ashcroft said:
So when are you going to hang out your shingle John. There's lots of jobs in this country for someone who can refinish barrels to this standard. Well done indeed.
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I was about to ask him the same question. I've got an old SXS similar to his that I'd love to have done.....
 
bush1 said:
I was about to ask him the same question. I've got an old SXS similar to his that I'd love to have done.....
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There are a couple guys I would recommend from this forum. Dogfish858, who has done two barrel sets re-browning for me, and CJDaw who's Damascus work I have seen which is very good but has done exemplary stock work and blacking for me.
 
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