.

I picked up a stainless Blackhaw recently. Almost
new condition, but it has some marks on the frame
that I would like to get rid of. Just on the surface, not really a "scratch". Kind of like
it just rubbed the satin off. Maybe it came up
against some metallic object, etc.

Anyway, I'm open to ideas on how to restore this
revolver to like new, if possible.

thanks kindly, Chris

Try a scotch brite pad.
They come in different degrees of coarsness kind of like steel wool. One of the rougher ones in the 00 equivalent should get you close to matching the matte finish of the frame.
Hardware and auto stores supply them.

scotchbrite pads will work, but will leave small scratches of their own. by the looks of it it really doesn't look like a scratch to much, 1st try a little car wax and elbow grease, you'll be surprised what it can do, otherwise a small amount of buffing compound on a pad

What Butch says!

If it were my gun, I think I would try to find out how that finish was applied by the gun maker, then attemt to duplicate it in fixing the scratch.
I've used all four different grades of the abrasive pads, like Scotch Brite, and each different grade has it's own finish, so using one of those pads may leave you with a bigger problem than leaving the scratch alone, like a huge mismatch in finish.
To me, it looks like the finish on the gun may have been done by bead blasting, and trying to blend a Scotch Brite pad with that finish may be a bad cure for the scratch problem.
You might go from bad to worse.
I use those pads in making knives.

Don

What DMB says rings a bell. We had this real small patch of peeling paint around the bathroom ceiling fan vent, so I take a sample to the paint store for an "exact match" and apply it. Same basic color but just ever so slightly different texture or sheen or whatever. Enough to matter. Now the only thing left to do is repaint the whole ceiling.

The scratches don't look all that bad to me, and no matter what you do, if you actually use the gun you'll get more. Then what?

I suspect that just frequent handling, taking guns in and out of cases and holsters etc, affect over time the appearance of small scratches in much the same sense as buffing them might do.

Try a rubber ink eraser, but no doubt what you do will be visible however slightly. --- John 303.

those look to me not like scratches but actually burnish marks from something like a hard stick(brush) or rounded end of a steel rod rubbing against the action.
it looks like the stainless has been bead-blasted and the rubbing has actually burnished the etched texture down ( knocked over all the tiny sharp edges that the bead-blasting made). i'm afraid any kind of abrasive will leave a very contrasting patch of different looking texture. nothing short of a new bead-blast will restore the surface astheticly.
rubber ink erasers have a fine abrasive in them and they will polish the beadblasting to a shinyer texture.

quote:

Originally posted by merlinron:
those look to me not like scratches but actually burnish marks from something like a hard stick(brush) or rounded end of a steel rod rubbing against the action.
it looks like the stainless has been bead-blasted and the rubbing has actually burnished the etched texture down ( knocked over all the tiny sharp edges that the bead-blasting made). i'm afraid any kind of abrasive will leave a very contrasting patch of different looking texture. nothing short of a new bead-blast will restore the surface astheticly.
rubber ink erasers have a fine abrasive in them and they will polish the beadblasting to a shinyer texture.

Exactly..

The finish is 400 grit belt sanded.
000 steel wool will give you a decent blend without redoing the whole frame.