Rusted in place . . . how to free

[TCLouis]

I have a Remington Model 51 that I am taking apart for someone.

Gun is NOT a SHOOTER so

It has been soaking in kerosene for over a year.

This last week I boiled it in water and then applied KROIL 5-6 times.

All pins have come out and I have a hand full of parts, but the magazine is rusted in place . . .

The slide and barrel will not come off with the magazine in place.

The magazine till will NOT budge after all this, any suggestions?

If all else fails, as a last resort I can heat the frame to see if that breaks the rust loose.

I have never seen so many parts in one simple gun!

[waksupi]

http://www.stovebolt.com/techtips/rust/electrolytic_derusting.htm

[floodgate]

TC:

I've had a couple of those Remington 51's, one in the scarcer(!) .32 and more recently a nickeled one in .380. It is a typical John D. Pedersen design: lovely to handle and shoot, but a nightmare to take down, let alone work on. For those who haven't worked on one, it has a skeleton breechblock carrying the breech-face, which recoils about 1/8" when fired, then locks to the frame; the block carrier moves back a bit further from the initial impulse, then hooks the breech-face out of its slot and continues back to eject and then return to feed and battery. Pedersen also did the Remington Model 10 shotgun, another tinkerer's nightmare. Seems like he had a passion for using as many fiddley little parts as possible to do a simple job; probably why his toggle-action design for Springfield lost out to Garand's stone simple and solid M1. All that aside, for the magazine, I recommend Kroil, and patience...patience...patience...

floodgate

[Bret4207]

Penetrating oil and tap, tap, tap with a brass or plastic hammer on the frame, not the magazine.

[scb]

I would try !!!carefully!!! boiling in oil. I've never boiled Kroil but if I were doing it thats what I'd try first.

[TCLouis]

I doubt one could boil Kroil for long, it lost someof its constituents just putting on the metal after I had boiled the gun in water.

the tapping method is what it to get the grip safety out.

I thin my biggest problem is there is just so much surface area for the contact/rust between the mag and mag well.

I read someplace (when I was trying to get enough info to see what parts there were to this gun) that in this and a couple of other firearms that it seemed as thought Pedersen and a contemporary were in a contest to see who could put the MOST parts in a firearm.

This one seems to have PLENTY of extra parts for a 32 auto. Too bat is will not be usable when I do finally get it completely apart.

Thanks for all of the suggestions, some I have tried some I will try differently . . .

If all else fails the owner will probably approve destroying the mag to get it out, but it is the challenge that keeps me from doing that!! Glad I am not getting paid for this, repairs would far exceed the current value!

[405]

If all else fails your thought about adding heat is probably a good one. Add enough heat to both parts without doing other damage.... not red hot!:mrgreen: Then get parts as cold as possible. Then tap tap tap

[NSP64]

you can try MouseMilk or NAPA carries an arrisol called Super Rust Breaker.

[gzig5]

You are on the right track with Kroil, but give it time to work. Douse it every other day for three weeks. If it don't come apart by then, mechanical persuasion may be required.

[EMC45]

Kroil, PB Blaster, Twister.

[waksupi]

http://www.stovebolt.com/techtips/rust/ (http://www.stovebolt.com/techtips/rust/electrolytic_derusting.htm)
electrolytic_derusting.htm (http://www.stovebolt.com/techtips/rust/electrolytic_derusting.htm)


I really suggest you look at this method. Easy and cheap. And works well.

[redneckdan]

i've found that a little heat (200 deg-ish) and then spray it with ZEP 45 works well. The heat seems to draw the penrateing oil in better.

[Trailblazer]

Waksupi, that looks like a good method! Do you think it would be a good method to remove bluing?

[fourarmed]

The electrolytic method is what you will probably end up doing. You might try a 50/50 mixture of Dexron III and acetone. I read recently about a test of penetrants, and that was said to be marginally better than Kroil.

[Ricochet]

Yes, electrolysis is going to remove bluing.

[waksupi]

Guarantee to remove blueing, as blueing is rust.

[gzig5]

I really suggest you look at this method. Easy and cheap. And works well.

I've done the electrolysis method on single parts before and it worked well, but never on an assembly. My gut tells me that the inside surfaces that are frozen together are not going to be affected much because the rust can't get out. Anyone have any experience with this?

[Ricochet]

My electrolysis experience is on larger things like old engine parts, steel wheels and such. It seems that there's something like a "line of sight" effect, and areas that are on the other side or "shaded" from the scrap electrode don't clean off as well. If penetrating oil has already worked into the joint, it'll be hard to remove and will inhibit the process inside the gap.

[MtGun44]

Sorry to jump off topic - but -----

So - that is who is responsible for the Rem model 10! The most
incredibly complex pump shotgun I ever worked on. The bolt
has to be by far the most complicated single machined part I have
ever seen on a commercial product. Some of the cuts are amazing -
I have no idea how you would duplicate some of the camming
surface shapes. The block was nearly lacework at the end. :neutral:

I can't imagine what it must have cost to make, and it is obvious
why it was only produced for a short time.

Bill

[floodgate]

Mtgun44:

Even funnier is the fact that I was GIVEN the Model 10 shotgun because the previous owner - who had gotten it with a bunch of other guns, and had never even shot it - looked up into the loading well and said "Won't work, the carrier is missing!" (He must have been raised on Winchester '97s and 12s.) It is fascinating to cycle the action, looking up into the feedway, and see that little flap swing out of the sidewall, flick the next case up in front of the bolt just as it starts to move forward, and then disappear again. As you say, it is hard to imagine how the design was developed, and even harder to understand how it could have been made at a profit. The Model 51 breechblock is another piece of Pedersen's "lacework".

floodgate

[Morgan Astorbilt]

I thought the Win '97 held the record for complicated pump shotguns with superfluous parts. Look how many they left out when they brought out the Mod. 12.
Morgan

[floodgate]

Morgan:

All I can say - having dismantled and (eventually!) succeeded in re-assembling all three is; ...get yourself a Remington Model 10 and try it for yourself.

Doug

[boommer]

I know I am getting old school here but COCO COLA will eat rust up over time it is a trick old timers did for freeing up rusted up pistons and rings were they rusted into the cylinders and things to. I have seen it work and it does. Alot of old farm tractors and heavy equipment that has sat outside for a long time seize up . once you busted them lose and pulled the piston and rod out you can pull the sleeve or bore to clean up the cylinders.

[Morgan Astorbilt]

No thanks Doug. I'm getting too old and clumsy to resume hunting small springs and things on the shop floor. It's enough keeping my cowboy action guns working, with the beating they're taking. An original Marlin 1894(made that year)in .38-40, an old L.C.Smith, and of course, the old Win. '97. These guns have had more rounds through them in the last four years, than all the preceding, which for the Marlin and Winchester, is a combined 218 yrs.
Morgan

[Ricochet]

Yet another tried and true method of derusting is to dunk the rusty parts in a diluted mixture of molasses and water and leave it to ferment for days. Gets vile smelling and nasty, and cleans the rust right up. Do it outdoors. Downwind of the house.

[TCLouis]

Do I have to try to find real molasses or will this modern stuff which is mainly corn syrup mixed with a little sorghum (to meet the law) work?

I do plan to get into it with some dry ice shrinkage next week.

[uscra112]

I've faced this problem all too many times, when trying to get apart old 2-stroke engines whose cylinders are rusted. I've tried everything. I had one that was soaked for 2 years with Kroil. No joy, even with a monster puller that was designed to pull the cylinder off the piston with six 1/2" bolts threaded into the cylinder to pull on.

Only thing that always succeeds in my 40 years experience is HEAT, and quite a bit of it. About 500 degrees F. or more weakens the rust enough that it will let go. It took two oxy acetylene rosebuds working together to heat that cylinder, but it eventually came off.

[uscra112]

Oh, and Coke works because it contains phosphoric acid. So much that at one time Coke syrup was considered a hazardous material by the EPA. (They changed the law.) Phosphoric acid is easy to buy at any place that sells supplies for masons. It's used for cleaning mortar residue off of brick. Muriatic acid also. I wouldn't subject that gun to the acids. The rust you need to break up is inside the frame, in the small spaces where the acid won't penetrate anyway. Heat is the only thing that will penetrate to the spot where the business has to be done.

[Nueces]

There's another idea I've not seen mentioned. Try buzzing the parts in an ultrasonic cleaner filled with penetrating oil. I haven't tried it, but would were I in your shoes.

Mark

[Ricochet]

I've only personally done the molasses thing with real sorghum molasses, but I'd bet the corn syrup stuff will work. It's bacteria fermenting the stuff to organic acids that does the derusting, I think. (And it probably removes blue, I haven't tried it on blued steel.)

[Harry Eales]

I would agree with Mark, an untrasonic cleaning tank will vibrate all the crap out that's been left behind by the other cleaning methods.

You may not think that's much, don't you believe it, I was scepticle the first time I saw a gun cleaned in such a tank, the cloud of muck that just exploded out of the action had to be seen to be believed.

Harry

[scrapcan]

I was really surprised at how well regular vegetable oil penetrated given a few days. I was not working on rust but on corroded brass double cap on an old GI stove. I put it in and let it set for a few dyas and it unscrewed easily. Not sure it will work in you instance with steel though.

[booneh]

when all else fails try oil of wintergreen. old navy trick.

booneh

[ra_balke]

You might soak it in vinigar for a year. Vinigar is a pretty good rust remover. Also some of the new gun bore cleaners might work, you could try M pro 7 as it chelates.... it surrounds the offending particle, and suspends it into the cleaner fluid.

Then, I would wak at it with a hammer handle..to crack and fracture the rust.

[Three44s]

Kroil saved our bacon with a rusted up 220 Cummins diesel engine last summer.

Kroil also likes HEAT!

And it also likes VIBRATION!

Silikroil runs away from heat ....... so I like regular kroil and the aerosol version in my estimation is just a bit more aggressive than the less expensive pour on version.

Three 44s

[badgeredd]

I have had good luck with using automatic transmission oil that is heated with the gun in it to about 175 degrees a few times. Seems to get more viscous and penetrates. It worked well with a 1885 Winchester Low-wall I got years ago that had rust from stem to stern. Just a thought.

[Onlymenotu]

he he years ago when I trapped ? I use to take my traps to the crick in the late fall/early spring and look for the biggest oak tree I could find then hop in the crick and hope it was the blackist, nastiest, mud there was... and the water was flowing over it... then I'd go about buring my traps in it [smilie=1:.... come back in a few months........ and nice clean rustfree traps * after you washed the mud and the muck off*.....:mrgreen: the leaves from the oak tree produced tanntic acid.... and the running water kept the air from geting to the traps,,,,,,:roll: I'm not recomending this for you gun...... but it worked wonders on my traps :drinks:[smilie=1::mrgreen:

[Molly]

I have a Remington Model 51 that I am taking apart for someone. ... This last week I boiled it in water and then applied KROIL 5-6 times.
... If all else fails, as a last resort I can heat the frame to see if that breaks the rust loose. ...

No, don't heat the frame, at least not beyond where you can handle it comfortably with your bare hands. This can gain you some penetration, but if a year's immersion in kerosene didn't penetrate, nothing much will.

Try the opposite approach: Boil in soapy water to get as much water into the microscopic seams as possible. Then pull it out of the hot pot, and rinse it off under the tap. Now put it in a plastic bag, seal, and toss it in the freezer overnight. Do this quickly, or the dry steel might start to rust some more, because the boiling detergent will really take the oil off.

Freezing water will expand, and can even crack concrete easily. It shouldn't have too much problem dislodging some rust flakes and beginning to free up the magazine (and other areas). Repeat a few times, and I'd be surprised if it doesn't do the job for you. This process (freezing) will even free up metal parts that have been epoxied together for years. Freezing (without the boiling) is also recommended by Brownell's if you forget to put any release on the metal befoe you glass bed it into the stock ... It's a pretty potent trick.

HTH,
Molly