What is a good rust blue for the darker blue black look. Thanks

Sam,
I am using the belguim blue from brownells. I got a tank and lid, and it works GREAT... just takes awhile...

It's jet jet on my latest barrel, close to that on the action, and the small parts are about the same

jeffe

Mark Lee Slow Rust Blue #3 is pretty blue black. In fact, I have gotten good color on parts in just three passes- more than that turns them silver grey- so the resulting rust is thin and therefore not as durable as I'd like... I did one of my friends 'garden guns'- a beater .22 Mossburg for practice and the damn thing looked fantastic- you couldn't stop looking at it... Now if I could get MY projects to turn out so well...

The Laurel Forge Browning solution is available at Brownells. You apply it exactly the same as you do other rust blue formulas, boil, then card, repeat... If you boil it will be blue if not then brown.

I think I am going to go back to Plinktons Classic American for the next project- that stuff is very durable- maybe in a lower humidity I can let the coats build more and get a really fine grain rust deep blue.

Gentlemen:

Rust blue is supposed to be black. Early on, I tried the Mark Lee stuff. It came out a very beautiful blue-black. Over the years the color thinned and eventually turned into a red color in strong light.

Any good rust blue will be black in color and it will wear like the Dickens. In Europe they don't refer to it as rust blue. It's called a blackening process. Apropos!

Go to www.abe.com and enter the authors name or a couple of key words. You want the following book.

Angier, R. H.
Firearm Blueing and Browning
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania: The Stackpole Company. Good/No Jacket. First Edition. 14cm x 22cm. An unusual specialist item. Book is bound in sl. soiled white cloth. Spine gilt lettering worn. Rear hinge starting. 151pp. Although not dated, there are references to the rear of the book to later publications from the Nineteen-Fifties and Sixties. Bookseller Inventory #001007

[ 11-01-2003, 23:05: Message edited by: Nitroman ]

The problem with the Angier's book is the collection of 'exotic' chemicals and acids necessary to brew a batch of blue... "Err, aah, yes, I'd like 500 grams of potassium chlorate and a liter of 12 molar Nitric acid to go please..."

I am disturbed to hear about your results with the Mark Lee formula as I have recently finished two rifles -a 243 Sako and a Winchester 52 Pre A (my garden gun) with this formula... Pretty now- red later??? I noticed some fading on a Winchester Pre War floorplate that I finished last year and have been shooting since- kinda faded to gray on the edges- looked like it had worn in for years though...

Roger, what do you use/recommend? I'd love to experiment with different formulas.