Barrel pitting

[3DTESTIFY]

Whats the best way to remove exterior barrel pitting prior to a professional hot reblue? Buffing wheel, Krokus cloth, Emory cloth, bronze wool?  What technique is used to retain the original satin blue finish? No high lustre polished blue. Thanks in advance.

[Nobade]

Remove pitting by drawfiling. Then use progressively finer grades of sandpaper to blend your file marks and to polish to the desired finish. Blast with fine glass beads at low pressure to get a nice satin. Be careful around writing so you don't wipe it out or round it off. If it is not well polished before blasting, the marks will be more apparent after it is blasted.

[Frank46]

Here is what I do. Depending on what sort of surface damage is present I may start with medium emery cloth and shoe shine the bbl. Once I'm satisfied with the surface then go to fine emery. Then 220 grit silicon carbide paper. Then 320, and usually stop at 400. My polishing rig isn't fancy. An old table saw motor 3/4 hp 3600 rpm. Change wheels each time you change polishing compound. Or when you finish with the 400 grit silicon carbide paper then bead blast at low pressure to get a satin finish. get it blued asap as clean steel loves to rust. I'm currently working on a gew 1888 commission action and all of it will be hand polished as it had fine pitting all over it. So far have the receiver and trigger guard done. Just picked up a swedish small ring (96 action) bbl on gun broker with a nice bore. Will cut and crown the 28" bbl to 24" and since its pretty well scratched may have to start with the medium emery paper to get down to clean metal. The bbl is in 8mm mauser and will make shooting standard 8mm cast boolits way easier. I once did a 1903a3 springfield by hand, the whole receiver, bbl and all the other parts and took about 4 weeks. The blue job came out great. The secret in a good blue job is the preparation of the metal that is to be blued. One little nick or scratch that you missed will be very apparent after its been blued. Hope what little info helps you out. Oh by the way, when I did the springfield even the inside surfaces had been polished. In some cases I used stones to get into the nooks and crannies, even cut down clothespins with the silicon carbide paper wrapped around the wood. Have fun. Frank

[Victor3]

 I don't know if it's the 'best' way, but for me the easiest and quickest way for a round bbl (if you don't have a lathe) is to use some wet-dry emery on top of a sponge. Grab one end of the bbl, wet the emery and run it back and forth until the pitting is removed. Repeat with finer cloth to whatever finish you like. Generally speaking, anything over 400 grit is counterproductive if you want to end up with a satin finish; the blueing process will tone the finish down more than 400 will leave on the surface.

 If you want the 'grain' to remain parallel to the length, stop after the 'back and forth' polishing. If you want it to show as going around the diameter like a lathe-turned finish, twist the bbl while applying the abrasive, doing one section at a time until the entire length is done.

 Draw-filing is fine for octagonal bbls, not for round. Using a polishing wheel is fine if you have some experience, but the surface can end up wavy and uneven if you're not careful.

[gunnut69]

Draw filling is the traditional method for removing the metal down to the bottom of the pitts.. It is more difficult than other methods but works much faster and once mastered it works better than other methods.. the simplest way to remove rust and blue is naval jelly but the pitting is still there... Blasting with different grits and types of abrasives will produce different results,.,. Glass beads are a soft finish (one I really like). If the pitts are small enough they can be removed with sandpaper. On a barrel the sandpaper is used in a shoeshine fashion and on flats it is used with a backer, I use a set of backers of various shapes made of hard rubber that work really well. I still sometimes end up making my own of wood for that special shape.. I backers aren't used edges will be rounded and flats will not be flat..and it'll show in the result.. In bluing jobs the polishing IS the work..the bluing is the easy part!

[3DTESTIFY]

Thanks gentlemen, much appreciated.