Parkerizing

[jdfoxinc]

I just dropped off my P17 at the Colo. School of Trades. This and several.other firearms were in a fire. They quit teaching parkerizing several years ago. They will return the rifle in the white. I need to know of any parkerizing service you gents may know of.

[ShooterAZ]

I used Shuff's once, and he did a really good job.

http://shuffsparkerizing.com/services/parkerizing/

[lancem]

It really isn't that hard to do yourself. Did this in the garage with a PID controlled hot plate.
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[Uncle Grinch]

I’ve had good service from these guys...

https://craftguard.com/forms-%26-pricing

[TCLouis]

Nothing especially to do with Parkerizing, but if it was in a fire are you still going to use it as a "shooter"?
How hot did it get or just rust damage?

[jdfoxinc]

Thanks for the info. The school will do metallurgy testing.

LANCEM
What do you use for your chemicals? I understand it needs to be stainless steel. Action and barrel are right at 48" long.

[Moleman-]

Parkerizing is easy to do and your tank doesn't need to be SS for limited use. Standard steel will just use up some of the parkerizing solution as the tank will get parkerized. You need to heat the solution up to around 190 degrees F so as long as your container can take that heat it will work. Guys have successfully used PVC pipe with and without a water heater element at the bottom and heated up the solution in a ss turkey fryer. You can't use aluminum, copper or brass for your tank including galvanized steel since it has a zinc coating on it. My tank is SS but I've done smaller items in a drywall mud tray (seen where 3 of the big ones were ss pop riveted together and sealed with RTV) or a porcelain enamel turkey roasting pan from a yard sale which works fine as long as you don't store the solution in it as the acids will etch the porcelain coating if left in for a week or two. Surface prep is best to be abrasive blasted by some sort of media. Glass beads or aluminum oxide work well, degrease before blasting and after because you don't want to peen grease into the pores of the metal which will leach out when heated up in the park tank and use clean media to blast with. I have one blast tank, so whatever goes in there is never greasy or oily. Always degrease parts before suspending them in the park tank, and keep a cool container of water next to the tank. Occasionally gently rock the suspended parts to knock off any bubbles that have formed on them. Once your item has stopped fizzing and appears done quickly remove it from the tank and dunk it in the water until cool enough to handle with nitrile gloves on. That will stop any iron streaking from happening, cool down the barrel and let you visually inspect it for any areas that need attention such as sheltered areas that trapped gas bubbles and didn't parkerize well or areas that don't have the same surface texture from the abrasive blasting. From the water tank they can be put right back in the solution or sprayed off with some over priced water displacing oil or WD40 and eventually oiled in a day or two. If the part had a spot that you didn't like the surface finish, from the water tank they can be put back in the blasting cabinet to spot blast that area, degreased and then back in the park tank, or sprayed off with wd40 if you won't be able to get to it for a while (always degrease before and after blasting). Use the same solution and any reblasted areas will match the original finish well enough that you won't be able to tell a color difference. Been parkerizing 20 years now and the solution lasts for at least 5 years. Don't freak out if you see an oil sheen on top of the solution. Others will tell you the solution is ruined, but gently laying sheets of paper towels across the entire top surface of the solution will soak up the oil and a little solution. With the oil removed it's back to business. A little bit of the concentrate can be added in occasionally (1 ounce per gallon) if you notice that the parts are taking much longer to turn colors or they're not coming out as dark as they used to. I store the solution in 1 gallon windshield washer bottles and have them marked as parkerizing solution. The solution will be ruined if allowed to freeze. The best thing I've found to use to filter the flocking out of the solution after use is a BLEACHED red shop towel/rag. The dye in the shop towels must have iron it in as it reacts with the solution and will turn the towel and solution darker. Bleaching the towel until it's a light orange prevents that and makes it easy to recognize it so it can be reused if you hose the towel off afterwards and save it. Mark the solution levels on the bottles and refill them to that level with distilled water to replace any water that was lost due to evaporation/steam. The barrel in the pic is still slightly fizzing but you can see it v/s a cloud of bubbles so it's almost done. The finished barrels have teflon coated barrel extensions which don't parkerize. SS doesn't parkerize, and different grades and hardnesses of steel will have a different finished color to them. I've tried various suppliers of chemicals and really like the Palmetto brand. The manganese is darker and the zinc is more gray.

[lancem]

Moleman has it pretty much covered, my solution is distilled water and phosphoric acid, I've never worried about exact measurements, say 3-4 Oz to a gallon of water, heat it up toss in a couple tablespoons of powdered zinc or manganese and stir it around. Take a piece of 0000 steel wool and degrease it well and toss it in to start the solution. Once at a stable 190 degrees hang your part in the solution and in 20 minutes or so it should be done. Phosphoric acid can be had at the hardware store, it is used as a rust remover/converter. The powdered zinc and manganese are available from ebay and amazon.

[gnoahhh]

Lance knows his stuff. He did some Parkerizing for me and it came back very nice.

As for working with guns that survived fires, the rule of thumb I was always told is if it got enough to deflate the springs it was likely hot enough to draw the temper out of the rest of the stuff.

[Adam Helmer]

jdfoxinc,

JUST WHAT was the FIRE?? Where were the guns and how hot did they get? Hereabouts any guns that were in a house, barn, garage or bunker fire are used as Boat Anchors! Pull the triggers in future at your risk!

Adam

[jdfoxinc]

My store was torched after being burglarized. The guns were hanging on the partition about 5' above the floor. Anything above six feet was pretty much consumed. Any thin barreled muskets or shotguns are considered ruined.

[303Guy]

Moleman, how do you keep the mating faces, threads, chamber and bore clear?

[Greg S]

As moleman said, easy peezy. I've 'parked' a couple of 870s, and about a dozen 1911 home builds and one revolver. Just plug the bore with something and you'll be good.

As far as critical surfaces, I personally abraisive blast my slide rails and internal areas and slide interior with glass beads then change out to 80 grit garnet @ 80-90 psi for the exterior surfaces. If I was to Cera-kote, I would use garnet on interior surfaces as it will build surfaces and fit alittle looser and shoot minimums on coating thickness. It is easier to shoot mins than refit by sanding the coating down which can occurr.

Threads as in barrel and muzzle device have enough clearance that I have found no issues. Small screws ect I blast with small beads as to not profile the threads too heavily. Insure female threaded holes are blown out and clean as post treatment requires a liberal application of a moisture displacing oil which can make the sand a B I T C H to get out of the threads.

[Moleman-]

Any threads you don't want parkerized or blasted like say a M1 Garand where you want the breech end to be bright or the piston, just mask them off with electrical tape for blasting and parkerizing. Works great. Some guys don't plug their barrels, but I do. They say shooting it a few times will remove the parkerizing in the bore. Figure plugs protect the bore from getting sand blasted and it can't be as good as it never being there in the first place. So I plug the bore with wood dowels and the gas ports with toothpicks. On areas that effect headspace or barrel timing also should be masked off or not blasted heavily. On Garands, Carbines, FAL's, SR mausers ect where the barrel shoulder bears against the front of the receiver, I either hand screw in the barrel while blasting that area of the receiver or have a bad barrel that I use. It protects against any metal being removed from those mating areas. The rear of the lugs on the bolts and also the lugs in the receiver and bolt face I either don't blast or just barely blast enough to partially remove a little bit of the shine of those parts. The parkerizing quickly wears off of those bolt surfaces and the receiver/barrel shoulder surface is covered when the barrel is installed. This way you won't effect the headspace where as an over zealous blasting of these areas can effect headspace and barrel timing.