Ah dammit.... RUST!

M

Mike Irwin

Staff
I went shooting on Sunday, and got caught in the rain. I THOUGHT I got everything dried out thoroughly, but I obviously didn't...

Several of my Smith revolvers now have rust in areas (SOB!), but the REAL problems are my Browning Buckmark and to a lesser degree my 1911-A1 Milspec.

They're rusting through the parkerizing...

How the hell do I get the rust out of the parkerizing's porous surface?
 
If there is rust it needs to be sanded off or it will expand. Sand it all off asap and then consider having it refinished is the only thing I can think of because rust holds in moisture and it has to go or it'll expand fast. Sucks that your guns got rust spots. Am I correct in assuming the finish on the smith revolvers is blue?
 
Mike,
I have an old Winchester 670 that sat in the corner of my damp house for elevnty-seven years. The surface rust and pitting reall ymade a mess of it's finish. Before you go to the lengths of refinishing, you might want to try some CLP or RIG oil on them. The RIG cleand up my Winchester pretty good. The pits are still there, but the tiny surface orange is gone. The down side is that I have to keep it pretty saturated to prevent the rust from going any farther.
 
I pretty much go with RAE.
Break Free does dissolve rust somewhat. Wet, keep it wet, flush after a day or two.

RIG does a great job of prevention.

NO abrasives of any kind unless absolutely necessary.

Sam
 
What's a little water near firearms?

I'd try RIG first then go to sanding with #000 (or finer) steel wool.
How much to reparkerize if that fails?

I've never had it happen yet. But I'm one of those guys who runs down to check his safes after a bad dream.:D
 
A little water near, or on, firearms isn't a problem. IF it's in the proper format. I think what killed me, though, was the fact that the foam in the carrying case got damp. I dried it as best I could at the time, but the guns had to go back into the case for nearly 24 hours. I wrapped the guns in plastic bags, thinking that would buy me some time, but who knows, that may have made the situation worse.

The Browning and the 1911 are going to take a swim in 3-in-1 oil in an ammo can this afternoon, followed by lots of work with a tooth brush. Hopefully I can get it to the point where the rust is neutralized and won't have to worry about refinishing.

There are TWO saving graces behind this...

My Model 24 Smith wasn't affected (yes, all of my Smith revolvers are blued), nor was my new Browning Hi Power affected.
 
Try soaking them in Breakfree CLP before you try anything drastic like sanding(what do you have to lose?).

I bought a used Marlin that had some rust under the sights and a Romanian .22 that had rust in corners of the box around the trigger parts.

I soaked the spots in CLP and vigorously scrubbed with a stiff toothbrush. After a couple applications, I can't even find where the rust was.
 
Not only does the foam in guncases hold moisture, but it leeches corrosive chemicals at the same time. That stuff is bad. I left an 870 in a foam lined soft case for a month one time and had an orange shotgun. I did not make that mistake again.

I like to take a stiff nylon brush and your favorite lube scrub the heck out of the affected areas. Make sure to lube again after you are done. You may have pits but they can be lived with.

Good luck.
 
Foam cases

All the foam is bad. I let a Remington 1100 rust in a case once. Took it off with a Scotchbright pad and some CLP. Needed a couple of times to get it all.

I have read that wrapping in plastic is bad as it prevents evaporation.

It occurs to me that the best "on hold" first aid for a wet handgun would be to heat it, maybe with a hair dryer, spray it with _______ and put it in a paper bag.

Regards.
 
Eraser (the kind on the end of a pencil) will quite often take off light surface rust form blued and stainless guns... I dunno about parkerized... GENTLE rubbing... NOT TOO VIGOROUS...

and WD-40 works well sprayed into the foam of a guncase, to protect guns that may have gotten wet...
 
I don't know whether it's good for guns or not, but one of the primary uses of WD-40 is to displace water.

An old mechanics trick to start a car with a wet ignition system is to spray WD-40 in the distributor cap and on the wires. It displaces the water which was shorting out the ignition and preventing it from starting/running.

It might do the same for wet guns. Although I would think CLP would also do the same.
 
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