Restoring my Winchester 62A

E

elbeau

Inactive
My grandfather bought this gun and eventually passed it down to my father who eventually passed it down to me.

I was a teenager at the time, so I still knew everything and I decided that the small rust spots looked too bad and had to go so I attempted to do a Birchwood Casey reblue and stock refinish on it. Being short on refinishing supplies and patience, I left some very minor pitting. Long story short is that I did a bad reblue job on the metal and although I did well on the stock, I miss the old look of the wood.

...So...

It's getting close to time for me to pass the gun on to one of my kids. Since the option of just leaving the gun in original condition went away half a lifetime ago, I want to re-refurbish it now. I've already done the metal work (very carefully this time) and have it the way I want it for rebluing. What I'd like is some advise about what to do from here.

What is the best bluing technique to make it look the most original? Is there any hope of success if I try cold bluing it again using techniques people demonstrate online like using a heat gun?

What is the best thing I can do to the stock to make it look more like the original finish? Here's a photo of someone else's 62A that looks exactly like mine did before I messed with it a lot of years ago:

http://thefiringline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=326872

Any advise will be appreciated.
 
There is a technique that will make Oxpho Blue look quite good.
My FLG uses it when he doesn't want to send stuff out for hot blue or take the time for rust blue.
It is in Brownell's overall instructions for bluing, down past the hot blue and Dicropan.
Beware of youtube instructions.

I don't know about wood finish, just bear in mind they probably did not spend hours hand rubbing Winchesters at the factory.
I knew one guy who used Birchwood Casey spray stock finish on all manner of nice trap and skeet guns and got a nice appearance. I doubt he just sprayed it on and let it set, though.
 
Thanks for the Oxpho Bluing instructions. I just read through them and they sound pretty good if I decide to do a cold blue.
 
Please post pictures when you are done!

I am a big fan of the 62A. I have my uncle's, which he bought new in 1948. In super shape, runs great no matter what I feed it, and incredibly accurate. In a decade or two, I will pass it to my nephew, who my sister named for our uncle. I expect he will pass it to his some someday.

These old takedown pump 22s are simply classic.
 
I'll definitely post some pics. I can't agree more about the 62A. It's the most fun of anything I've ever shot...good times.

Does anybody know how to put that old, original finish back onto my stock?
 
Oxpho Blue works

Oxpho Blue works better than any cold blue application I have tried. Easy to apply, forgiving of mistakes, durable, and matches all but the deepest factory blues. I have used it for refinishing and spot retouching metal damaged by salt water and the results are very good.
 
I picked up some Oxpho Blue and am planning on using it in the morning. The instructions say to soak the #00 steel wool in TCE. I sprayed them using the CRC non-chlorinated brake cleaner instead. I know that spraying them might not be as good a soaking, but do you think it's enough?

Anyways, I've got a couple 'before' pics, I'll take some more pics now that I've got the metal ready and after I'm done no matter how it turns out and I'll post them for posterity...and just to show off if it works well :D
 
This process works for me:

  • Lightly buff away rust with a stainless steel scrubbing pad and a small amount of machine or light gun oil.
  • Degrease with Krud Kutter or equivalent and hot water.
  • Dry.
  • Buff remaining rust lightly with a dry 0000 steel wool pad.
  • Degrease again with 90% isopropyl or denatured alcohol.
  • Apply Oxpho Blue, wait about 30 seconds, rub off with a dry or slightly alcohol wetted cloth.
  • Dry.
  • Lightly polish with dry 0000 steel wool.
  • Repeat the previous three steps until desirted color is achieved.
  • Apply a light coat of gun oil.

This process has been successful with removing and rebluing rusty patches up rebluing parts and barrels stripped of all finish.
 
Finished and Beautiful (imho)

So here's what I did:

1. I gave myself all the time in the world so that no part of the job was rushed. This may sound trite, but I believe that this was the key to doing it right this time compared to when I tried to do it years ago as a teenager.

2. I took apart EVERYTHING that could come apart, I set aside the wood, and I started on the metal.

3. I used Birchwood-Casey Blue and Rust Remover on all metallic surfaces, rinsed with water, let it dry a bit, then used WD-40 liberally to displace the water and keep any rust from forming while I did the rest of the metalwork.

4. All metallic surfaces that were not inscribed with serial numbers, models, etc. were sanded using 300 grit wet/dry sandpaper until there was absolutely no trace of any blemish (with one exception where there was apparent impact damage...you can see it right behind the take-down screw...it's small but deep enough that trying to fix it would make things worse. It's a character mark that will stay there). Flat surfaces were sanded with a block to keep corners sharp.

5. All metallic surfaces were sanded with 600 grit wet/dry sandpaper. Serial numbers, etc. were sanded very lightly and carefully, just to expose a good, bare surface for bluing. The metal looked pretty nice at this point.

6. All metallic surfaces were polished to a very high polish using #0000 steel wool. This was a no-no according to the instructions, but I tried it anyways and was very happy that I did.

7. Before attempting to blue any part I used non-chlorinated brake cleaner to remove any remaining WD-40 or other oils/residues from the surfaces. I also used this brake cleaner to prep the steel wool mentioned down in step #10.

8. I -tried- following the instructions which taught that you should do one heavy coat of bluing followed by a very light glazing or two to get a deeper color. This failed miserably for me...probably because of the polishing I did in step #7.

9. I -tried- the same thing as step #8 using a heat gun to heat the metal before and during the heavy coat...still failed miserably. There were a lot of blemishes and no deep color was achieved...again.

10. I followed a hint that I read about online and tried applying the Oxpho-Blue using #00 steel wool (NOTE: YOU MUST PUT SMALL AMOUNTS OF THE BLUING CHEMICAL IN A SEPARATE CONTAINER AND DIP THE STEEL WOOL IN THAT CONTAINER...if I had dipped the steel wool in the bottle itself it would have ruined the remaining chemical in the bottle in short order). One effect that was noticeable right off the bat was that the steel wool itself blued instantly, so I think that it's possible/probable that the blue that ended up on the rifle was probably a mixture of the reaction with the steel wool and the reaction with the gun's metal surfaces. I found that I could get a nice, deep blue by lightly rubbing the Oxpho-Blue onto the gun with the steel wool as long as I applied it within about 4-5 seconds of dipping the steel wool in the chemical. After those 4-5 seconds the chemical reaction was very mild so the key was to work on very small areas. The first coat would never be as deep and dark as I wanted so doing follow-up lighter coats helped darken the metal. I found that sometimes a follow-up coat would remove some of the 1st coat's bluing. If this happens, just keep doing it a few more times, eventually even the most stubborn pieces achieved a deep, rich color.

11. Once a part was finished bluing I rinsed thoroughly with water again and used WD-40 again to displace the water and stop the chemical reaction of the bluing agent. The color also appeared to deepen a little after the WD-40 was added. This completed the bluing of the metal.

12. Many years ago I had refinished the stock using Birchwood-Casey's stock refinishing kit. I've got nothing against this kit itself, but the finish looked very different and imo not as good as the original finish. I looked up some facts on the gun and found that the original finish was a simple lacquer over the walnut wood.

13. I got a chemical from Home Depot that is meant to remove old wood finishes from antique furniture and lightly rubbed this into the wood using steel wool for large surfaces and a toothbrush for the tight areas on the pump handle. It took a while but worked very well.

14. I applied four coats of a high-gloss spray lacquer to the bare wood surfaces (I did not sand because I wanted the wood grain to have a little texture to it and because there were virtually no blemishes to worry about because I had done a good job sanding it back when I did the 1st refinishing years ago).

15. I managed to drop the stock and put the first -new- blemish on the gun :eek: ...it's small but can be seen a few inches behind the hammer in the pics below. I could work it out but I don't want to start thinking of the gun as a museum piece just yet. It's still a great shooter and will continue to be used for a long time to come.

16. Reassembled the gun and began showing it off :)

I know that some people might think they could do better than me here or there or might not like the fact that I did the bluing with steel wool or something, but I don't care. This gun looks 1000 times better than it did a month ago and it is something I'm proud to pass on to one of my kids soon.

Here are some photos:




 
Here are the "Before" pics

I guess I'm presenting this a little out of order, but here are some "Before" pictures (Meaning before this restoration but long after the bad one I did as a teenager):

Before1.JPG


Before2.JPG


Before3.JPG


Before4.JPG
 
Good work

Nice restoration work. You should be proud of the results. Looks very much like my original finish Winchester 62.

My Rossi 62 clone was damaged in a flood and cleaned with Krud Kutter, hot water, steel wool, and refinished with Oxpho Blue to near new condition. Breakfree CLP adds long lasting protection and deepens the bluing color. Some pitting on the receiver could not be repaired without more damage to the Rossi.

Only suggestion is no WD40. It leaves a waxy residue that must be removed adding an extra amount of work. I use hot tap water and compressed air to dry metals. Hot water heats metal parts and that speeds drying with compressed air blowing out any trapped water.
 
Beautiful job!

thanks for posting what did and didn't work for you. It will keep me from being tempted to try things that won't work LOL
 
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