Simple green removed color case hardened finish

I figured I’d give everyone a heads up. I recently picked up a H&R 158 Topper in 410. The price was really right. The gun was really dirty, the barrel had some rust but the receiver was in good shape. Except for the fact that I don’t think it has been cleaned in 40 years! (The gun has a manufactured date of 1967). Barrel I planned on re- blueing but the receiver just really needed a good cleaning. The gun oil looks more like shellac than oil! Well I did what I’ve done a thousand times with multiple guns. I have a Lyman ultrasonic cleaner that I fill with simple green and run it for a couple cycles. I have used this combination on multiple guns from Makarov’s, Ruger’s, Smith & Wessons, etc! Never a problem! Well not this time! I ran the receiver through 3 cycles ( 12 minutes) and low and behold it completely removed all the color case hardened finish! The receiver looks like I bead blasted it! Not really a big deal as this is an inexpensive single shot shotgun. I just blued the receiver. I sure am glad it wasn’t some high dollar case hardened antique Winchester receiver! Never had anything like this happen before. No idea why it happened. I’ve used simple green on everything! Anyway just figured I’d give y’all a heads up to be careful what ya use simple green on!

Apparently an applied finish that mimics the look of color case hardening.

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Originally Posted by JimB..

Apparently an applied finish that mimics the look of color case hardening.

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I tend to agree. There are finishes available that mimic CCH. However. I have owned a couple of H&Rs similar to what the OP is posting about and have discovered that those finishes are not at all durable.

Bottom line is, use the absolutely mildest means possible on the H&Rs unless you're fine with losing the CCH finish.

Four Ought steel wool is my friend for this.
It has never hurt the faux case finish on the four Toppers that we have.


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The Evap-O-rust product will remove blueing in an ultrasonic cleaner. Learned that the hard way!

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Deviating from the Gold Standard often leads to dismay ( jes' sayin' ) :popcorn:

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Originally Posted by Barry54

The Evap-O-rust product will remove blueing in an ultrasonic cleaner. Learned that the hard way!

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Yes, even without an ultrasonic cleaner. Love the stuff, but don’t use it on guns.

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Originally Posted by pietro

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Deviating from the Gold Standard often leads to dismay ( jes' sayin' ) :popcorn:

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What are you hinting at? There are as many cleaning products and processes as there are shooters, what’s your Gold Standard?
Always interested to learn what folks are trying.

Greetings,

There are several "flavors" of Simple Green.

I wrote to them mentioning what metals and finishes I wanted to clean.

They replied with a specific formula available at Grainger.

By memory, I recall it is "Simple Green Extreme". Approved by Boeing for cleaning aircraft parts.

Cheers,

Dave

OK first off to the faux finish I find that highly unlikely considering this H&R topper was manufactured in 1967 it’s not like they had Sara code or anything like that back then! As for some special heavy duty simple Green know this is your basic simple Green you can walk into Annie Wally world and buy! Nothing special nothing heavy duty Plano basic simple Green! As I stated my OP I’ve clean several guns including receivers on an H&R partner that was manufactured much later than this one. For some reason unbeknownst to me this managed to completely remove the finish off the receiver and all associated parts including the blowing that’s on the bolt that holds the stock to the receiver. Not really looking Francis just trying to give everyone a heads up to be careful what you use it on.

Cheap faux finishes have abounded on el-cheapo hardware store-grade guns since forever. No telling what H&R used at any given time in the 60's-70's. I'll never forget when, as a kid on a mission to find someone to repair a gun I inherited, I walked in on an old gunsmith in PA "re-color case hardening" a handful of old Stevens single shot shotguns with an oxy-acetylene torch. He went on to show me how he did more subtle case colors with the torch and some cold blue solution. Nothing saying a guy at H&R in the 1960's could'nt have said to his boss, "Hey I know a way to color these receivers pretty cheaply. We can save 'X' dollars per unit, it looks ok, and the gullible gun buyers will never know. All we need is a guy with a torch and a bottle of cold blue. Whatcha think? Hit 'em with a shot of clear lacquer and it'll stay nice for a long time, or until somebody hits it with some kind of harsh solvent or cleaner."

Got in hundreds of single barrels with faux finish on them, just dipped them in muriatic acid, light polish, and hot blued them at the end of the day, by turning up the temp on the salts tank to prevent them turning purple. About 90% blued well, a few still turned red. Cheap steel with a lot of carbon and nickel, from junk scrap in the cheap alloy mix.

Regarding Evape-O-Rust.
I picked up a rotor for my Little Dandy powder measure a few years back. As they are "blued",
but this one was lightly rusted. Being as anal as I am, I dropped the rotor in the Evapo-O-Rust over night. It did remove the light rust, but also all of the bluing. Be careful out there.

Guessing it was one of the faux CC using cyanide.

Well, bluing is a form of rust.

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Originally Posted by Barry54

The Evap-O-rust product will remove blueing in an ultrasonic cleaner. Learned that the hard way!

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It does not need the ultrasonic cleaner for that since bluing is rust . I left a blue PPK with 100% finish laying in the front seat of a car one day when I went to get lunch . When they handed me my sack I set it in the same seat with the PPK and proceeded to drive the two miles roughly back to work . When I got there I noticed that the Bojangles vinegar slaw had leaked slightly into the bag that was now setting on my now 95% blued PPK. Two miles was all it took for the vinegar to remove the bluing to bare metal when I wiped it off.

Simple Green will etch aluminum too. Don't wash your airplane with it!

I use the simple green precision cleaner in my ultra sonic cleaners mixed 20-1 this is the lightest mix ratio they recommend. Great for removing cutting oils and crude from machining. Also as a pre clean to finishing. I have cleaned blued tooling in it ( aloris tool holders, boring heads) with no damage. One thing to remember is most case hardened surfaces have a coat of lacquer or shellac to protect / preserve them. The colors on a true heat pack case are very thin ( .015 or so) on a chemically done is even thinner. The other is on the chemically done the material remains soft or as its finished the heat pack case hardens the surface around .030 deep This gives a more durable finish.

Over time exposed to sunlight case colors will fade. So a aggressive cleaner may do it much faster.

I had a buddy turn his shotgun barrel white by having orange juice leak onto it. Took the bluing off right now.

I always dilute Simple Green when using it in my untrasonic. It works well for cleaning black powder revolver cylinders while I cleaning the barrel and frame the traditional way .

Had same thing happen with dollar store "purple power". Must be the effect of caustic (low pH) on the H&R CC???

I would imagine that there are complexing agents in most of these new cleaners that will pick ferric and ferrous ions off metal surfaces without dissolving the base metal. Of course, bluing and the oxidation colors formed by color hardening processes are forms of iron oxide, or rust, and this would go away just as easily as surface rust of any other kind.

I remember when Ballistol came on the market over here, some guy on the old Shooter’s site thought so much of it that he stored his Colt Single Actions in ziplock Baggies, slathered in the stuff. Next time he checked them, his mint finishes were 75%, his 50% finishes were 25% and his 25% finishes were gray metal. An expensive lesson.

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Originally Posted by vintovka

Had same thing happen with dollar store "purple power". Must be the effect of caustic (low pH) on the H&R CC???

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Caustic is high pH, Acidic is low pH.
Not saying caustic won't damage a firearm, but even a weak acid like the vinegar or citric acid will remove bluing (both relatively mild acids, but "low" pH).

Concentrated simple green is mildly caustic/alkaline according to online reference. (8.5-9.5)

All the Biofriendly solutions will do pretty much the same thing. I've used most of them to remove lasered powdercoating from yeti type cups. Shines stainless up well. Now evaporust is a bit different, if you have an old solution that has some residual grease or oil in it, you can get a nice black finish on steel..... and it wears well....

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I wonder if this is one way to achieve a French Grey finish. I remember reading somewhere that one technique used was to color case harden the part and then buff the colors off with 4-0 steel wool.

The original Simple Green is relatively corrosive. The aircraft version is much better in not being corrosive.

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Originally Posted by BK7saum

Caustic is high pH, Acidic is low pH.
Not saying caustic won't damage a firearm, but even a weak acid like the vinegar or citric acid will remove bluing (both relatively mild acids, but "low" pH).

Concentrated simple green is mildly caustic/alkaline according to online reference. (8.5-9.5)

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Orange juice does a bang up job. Takes bluing off pronto. I had one friend whose bottle leaked into his day pack and stripped the bluing off his kit gun, another had a spill in the back seat of the car and it really made a mess of his Remington 1100.