Refinishing Alum Receiver

[mattd]

Think it's Alum, non-ferrous anyway. My dad's old 20g, Springfield Mod 944. Touched up the barrel with some elbow grease and Oxpho-Blu. Redid the wood. Took some acetone to the receiver to clean it up before trying the Alum-black on some small scratches and totally boned the finish. Guessing it's painted on and the acetone smeared it.

So do I disassemble, fully strip and just repaint? What kinda paint?

[RoyEllis]

Yep, it's a baked on paint if it's an aluminum rcvr....I've used Brownell's black baking laquer to refinish several .22 receivers, you could look at Duracote and Cerracote too, depends on what look you want. The Brownell's paint will very closely replicate factory finish.

[mattd]

Can of Brownell's backing lacquer = $15. Shipping = $16. Guess I need to go to Iowa anyway.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Anodizing is another possibility, but there are snags which you will find on the section on hard anodizing:

http://astro.neutral.org/anodise.shtml

Ordinary anodizing is fairly simple, but it is thin, and scratches through fairly easily. That doesn't matter too much when it is left in its natural pale grey, but would be more noticeable if you dye it black (or any other colour). The anodizing you often see on gun parts is hard anodizing, which is more demanding in cooling and stirring equipment. I suppose you could do it in the fridge if you're single.

[Isaac]

Can of Brownell's backing lacquer = $15. Shipping = $16. Guess I need to go to Iowa anyway.

I did that last spring. Decided I needed to take a drive, so off to Montezuma to Brownells I went with a list, then I decided to drop down to the Sierra factory in Missouri for bulk bullets. I also made some stops at local gun shops that I happened upon. It was a nice mini vacation. I was treated very well at both places. I think Brownells moved to the new location.

Isaac

[mattd]

I live in St Louis and my territory includes Iowa, all of MO and a bunch of others, so I get paid to drive by all kinds of gun places. Sierra always seems to be closed when I stop by tho. Going to Nashville next week, maybe Mid South has some.

[mattd]

We'll the original finish stood up to mild cleaning solvents, but acetone and fine steel wool easily took it down to the white. Is a baked on finish likely what was originally used? I would have thought it would have been a bit tougher.

Is is it possible it was just painted, I'm thinking like an engine block paint? It was a cheap gun my dad bought long ago so he could deer hunt w his buddies. Proly spent $40 on it in the 70s. I'd like to bring it back as close to original as possible for the sentimental value.

[foesgth]

A trick I learned over at Weaponsguild is to use Rustoleum hitemp paint. After you paint it, bake it in the oven for 20 min at 350. This gives a very hard finish.

[Kilroy08]

It's not aluminum. The receiver is actually some sort of pot metal with a steel insert for the breech face.

My 944 developed a crack in the receiver. Thinking it was aluminum, I had my machinist buddy try to TIG weld the crack. This resulted in a nice little chunk vaporizing. We even tried some low temp brazing rod. A regular propane torch will melt the receiver!

Consequently, I now have a Springfield 944 parts kit. One of these days, I'll get around to making a steel receiver for it.

[mattd]

First round of rustoleum high heat is on and looks really good. I'll give this a bit to dry, do another round, give it some time and bake.

[fecmech]

My 944 developed a crack in the receiver. Thinking it was aluminum, I had my machinist buddy try to TIG weld the crack. This resulted in a nice little chunk vaporizing. We even tried some low temp brazing rod. A regular propane torch will melt the receiver!
You can buy zinc braze rod at a welding supply store. If the receiver is pot metal you should be able to fill the crack.

[pietro]

First round of rustoleum high heat is on and looks really good. I'll give this a bit to dry, do another round, give it some time and bake.




It's looking good............................. :awesome:




.

[Walter Laich]

nice job. Makes me want to dig out one of my old ones and have a go at it

[mattd]

Wa waaa. Got the trigger group back together, oiled the receiver, and went to put the TG in and the paint chipped in a bunch of places. Very weak finish.

Im going to lightly heat the receiver, paint again and bake for longer, maybe 45-60 min. Not holding a lot of hope for that.

The receiver metal was polished pretty well. There were a couple scratches that I filed, and sanded, ending w 800g. It was much rougher then the factory finish. If the extra heat dosent work I might take it down to the white, sand w 220ish to rough it up and try painting again.

[Hooker53]

I went through this years ago on a Marlin model 60 and after a few tries, I just loaded up an 8" felt wheel with 555 and went to work and wound up with a receiver that looked like nickel plate. Ha. What your doing looks great if you can get the Finnish harder. Good luck and keep up the good work.

Roy
Hooker53

[Faret]

What about powder coating it? I have a mossberg 500 that needs something on it too.

[nekshot]

Nice project gun with good memories! I tried many of the things brought up and I learned the hard way to lightly take something and chamfer(relieve any build up) of paint where anything goes thru or rubs against. I like the rustolieum paint but I think that epoxy frame paint is a little better and easier to apply and real reasonable around 8.00 dollars. The midnite black or black metallic really can give a nice gun blue look, just don't freak out when applying it because it will flow together and use very light coats (many of them if needed) rather than a few heavy ones.

[nekshot]

[QUOTE=nekshot;3158350]Nice project gun with good memories! I tried many of the things brought up and I learned the hard way to lightly take something and chamfer(relieve any build up) of paint where anything goes thru or rubs against. I like the rustolieum paint but I think that epoxy frame paint is a little better and easier to apply and real reasonable around 8.00 dollars. The midnite black or black metallic really can give a nice gun blue look, just don't freak out when applying it because it will flow together and use very light coats (many of them if needed) rather than a few heavy ones.[/QUOT

I meant to add that OReily auto parts have this paint. I have Browenells Black for aluminum and the OReily gloss or flat black epoxy is better by a long shot. Don't hurry the dry time and it gets hard.

[mattd]

I tried etching primer and the black paint. Seemed more durable against chipping but even Remoil smeared the paint. So didn't get very far w it.

Just on a whim I put the Alum-Black on and it darkens right up. So it's Alum I guess. Which means I could do the Brownells baking lacquer. Or any other Alum option. But the Alum Black actually looks pretty cool. Just did one side, but it looks like the plumb brown color, or some sort of patina. Perfect for a shotgun. I need to polish up the areas more where I removed the scratches, but I might give it a go.

[bhn22]

I'm a Duracoat guy myself. Zillions of colors, and great availability. Surface prep can be as simple as scrubbing the surface to be finished with acetone and red scotchbrite. Then a quick rinse and wipedown. I pop the piece in a 200 degree oven while I mix the paint. Hang it from a wire and give it several light coats. I especially like it when the paint flashes off almost instantly. Them let it sit until it's baking time. If you don't want to bake, let it air cure the specified. I've never had a finish fail yet.

[mattd]

I've been working w the birchwood Casey aluminum black. It looks great in areas, but in most s splotchy and weak. Been trying to pinpoint what makes some areas look great and some bad, but no luck. Called brownells and they said alums-hide, so I'll take nekshots advice and try the frame paint w some chamfer on the pin holes if I don't get any further w the aluminum black.

I previously redid the wood, but it came out too light. So took it back down while it's apart, stained it and am redoing w tongue oil finish now.

[John 242]

I've used Brownells Aluma hyde II in the spray cans and had good results. You can bake it or let it air dry. I prefer to bake it at 200 degrees.

- If you can, blast the part with 120 grit aluminum oxide. The paint with stick better to a rough surface.

- THOROUGHLY degrease with TCE cleaner (I use brake cleaner) and DO NOT HANDLE THE PART WITH BARE HANDS! Any contamination will cause problems with the paint adhering to the part.

-Warm the part with a hair dryer. This will ensure that any de-greaser has been evaporated and seems to help with the application of the paint.

- Spray in long, even stokes to avoid runs. Don't try to completely cover the part in one pass. Take your time. If you can suspend the part on a piece of wire hanging from a fishing line swivel allowing it to turn, then life will be easier. If you get runs, re-blast (or sand) the part and start over. Aluma-Hyde will dry of the surface quickly, so you can turn/move the part with GLOVED hands.

- I bake my stuff at 200 degrees for two hours. I've heard all sorts of times and temps, but 200 for 2 seems to work well for me. You can let it air dry, but the cure is a couple of days if I recall correctly.

Good luck.

[mattd]

Here it is. Good from afar, and far from good. No indication of what choke it is, but it measures .588ish. So depending where you look could be full or slightly less. Plan is to use it for turkey season in a few weeks. So I needed to get it back together for patterning.

So I just painted w the high temp paint again and gave it 48 hours before touching it. Putting the trigger group back together chipped a lot of paint so I tapped everything up and hit it again. And you can see the dimples from the previous chips. Maybe a project for next winter or sooner. Can't imagine the paints gonna hold up to much.