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Refinishing & Customization
Stock Work
One of the most commonly repaired, refinished or customized components of the firearm is the stock.Not much can be done with plastic stocks when they break…and the do break! A growing trend I’ve seen is restocking of plastic stocked rifles with wood and laminate stocks.
Higher quality older and new firearms still sport wooden stocks. These can be highly figures solid woods, such as crotch walnut or curly maple, or exotic hardwoods that are visually stunning. Most firearms are built on plainer grades of walnut, maple, birch and beech, that can be stained or even gel coated and painted. I often get these older firearms in from clients that have seen decades or even generations of field time, chips, cracks, and other issues.
Sometimes the damage can be fixed without refinishing , sometimes color blending and partial refinishing does the trick. often, especially with dents and scratches a full refinish is requested. I often find it amazing after I get the stock back to bare wood that underneath the gel coated factory finish very pleasing wood grain character was hiding. Clients are frequently amazed at beauty of their "new" gunstock after the damage is repaired and careful color blending and finish coat is applied, Even ugly duckling beech stocks can be made to look respectable. See my Sometimes a Stock Can Be A Beech blog post.
Laminated wood stocks are also popular, with some of the stocks carrying the classical line of the high end custom arms of the last century or new age lines that look like they are straight out of the movies. These stocks offer a lot of flexibility for clients who need/want a specific fit or handling characteristic for their style of shooting which is hard to accommodate with a solid wood stock. I often have clients bring me brand new rifles, a Weatherby Vanguard for example, with the complaint that they don't like the balance of the rifle or more commonly they can't take the recoil of the heavy magnum chambering they selected. The same barreled action and hardware correctly bedded in a dense hardwood laminate with the correct length of pull and a quality recoil pad often results in a rifle these clients can shoot all day long without a flinch. If this is something you are interested in, drop me a line!
Other typical types of services include, installing sling swivels, recoil pads/butt plates, action bedding, refreshing checkering (or cutting new checkering on plain stocks) and making adjustments for fit and length of pull. I have has a recent influx of trap shooters, especially younger shooters, wanting to have fit adjustable recoil compensation systems on their shotguns. This is actually a wise choice! in addition to being able to adjust the felt recoil of the firearm to the recoil tolerance of the developing shooter, having the ability to adjust the fit (Length of pull, drop and cast off) allows a shooter's firearm to adapt to them as they grow. I have had several shotguns ( and rifles) come in for restocking that were bought for a young hunter in years past and were cut down to fit the smaller body and later had multiple wooden blocks glued in between the stock and recoil pad as the youth grew into an adult!
I do have very old, antique/vintage firearms come into the shop where the client says he wants the gunstock refinished and the metal reblued. In some cases, the owner is surprised when I tell him "No! Don't do that!! Some of theses classic old guns are highly collectable and can be historically or monetarily valuable. taking a firearm like this down to bare wood and metal would in most cases destroy its value.
If you are thinking about having your old gun worked on in this manner, please take the time to read my little treatise on the subject:
Metal Refinishing
Historically, the treatment of gun metal to protect it from the elements has taken many forms. For centuries, forged metal items, especially tools and knives were left with their temper colors. A "spring" temper on carbon steel leaves a pleasant mid-range blue color. Early firearms ( read really expensive decorations for only the very wealthy) were often "Fire-blued" in the same manner. The process did not require any chemistry or hight levels of heat...which is important as hight temperatures would melt out all that gold and silver inlay work and gilding! These finishes didn't offer much protection from rust or abrasion, but these items would have been fastidiously maintained by the gun-bearer (Marie Antoinette had fabulous firearms!).
With more contemporary firearms we can expect to see several different metal surface treatments: Slow Rust Bluing, Hot Caustic Bluing, Parkerizing, Nitride Coating, and Cerakote. With all of the aluminum gun components we see these days we must also include Hard Coat Anodize.
One thing we must remember is that all of these finishes can be damaged! With exposure to the elements or hard abrasives the finishes are all only microns thick. We see quite a bit of holster wear on the revolvers, and wearing away of blued surfaces by the simple act of holding them in sweaty hands.
Several tests have shown that, hands-down, Cerakote is the most durable, and I often recommend it for actively used sporting firearms that need a facelift, especially those that carry combinations of different metals in their makeup (e.g. steel barrel, aluminum receiver, plated trigger). There are colors of Cerakote available that match well with the original factory finishes. I have been working with Kentucky Gun Coatings for all Cerakote projects for several years and will facilitate this service on your firearm. I will facilitate the work for your firearm and will disassemble, repair if necessary, clean and ship the parts for bluing, and then reassemble and test the firearm for function and safety when the parts are returned to me.
Historically, some form of "Bluing" was the most widely used finishing technique. The one sure thing about bluing is that we have to accept the fact that it is basically rust! Yes Iron Oxide in some particular metallurgical state! This rusting process is typically accelerated and to some degree "controlled" by the application of a corrosive element: acids, bases, heat, salts, water...
Something that I researched and learned about 30 years ago was a more historical approach to blued finishes: Slow Rust Blueing. This approach was used by fine custom rifle-smiths and is basically the required approach on fine double guns whose barrels are soft soldered together…dropping these into hot caustic bluing tanks would be catastrophic!
This approach to bluing actually goes back to the 18th century and is most commonly seen today on older double barrel shotguns and early military arms, such as a pre-WW1 1903 Springfield. The barrels of double barrel shotguns and rifles were until recently soft soldered together and the the higher heat and caustic approaches of other bluing methods would basically destroy the firearm. This approach was used by noted rifle maker A.O Niedner back in the 1920s-1940.
The finish is different, as the process actually causes a metallurgical change at the molecular level. The finish develops through the metal’s surface giving that deep almost translucent appearance seen of fine shotguns and rifles from the past century. I use this approach on any double gun refinishing and on some older classic firearms and custom builds, even flintlock rifles. This finish penetrates the metal deeply and actually can fill pores in the metal with converted iron oxide and once oiled/waxed creates the most durable finish next to Cerakote that I know.
Hot Caustic Blueing has been the workhorse of gun bluing and from the period of Mid -WW1 to present is still the steel finish of most firearms manufacturers. The process uses a boiling (290-310 Degrees F) highly concentrated caustic combination of salts such as sodium hydroxide, potassium nitrate and other compounds to create a black oxide skin on the steel surface about 0.0001 thick.
The metal components, once oiled have a dark midnight black color to them, quite different from the deeper blues of Slow Rust Blueing. I no longer perform the Hot Caustic Blue process in-house as the chemistry is finicky and if the salts are not used and maintained continuously they tend to fail.
I am currently sending this work out to a firm that specializes in gun bluing and performs the caliber of work I expect. I will facilitate the work for your firearm and will disassemble, repair if necessary, clean and ship the parts for bluing, and then reassemble and test the firearm for function and safety when the parts are returned to me.
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