Engraving the Frizzen

[Bill Raby]

   I am engraving a gun right now and it is going pretty good. Until I got to the frizzen. It is nice and hard. I am using a Lindsay Airgraver. The carbalt graver chipped immediately. Sharpen it and it would just chip again right away. The HSS graver did nothing at all. This is the first time I have tried to engrave a frizzen. How do people manage to do it? Does it need to be annealed before engraving then hardened again when it is done? Is there some trick to it that I am missing?

[smart dog]

Hi Bill,
I anneal them first and then any of the gravers will cut well.

dave

[Ron Scott]

Dave is correct. There is no way any graver point is going to cut the hardened frizzen.

[davec2]

I always remove the frizzen that I want to engrave and paint it with some anti-scale compound that I get from Brownells.  When the coating is dry, I toss the frizzen in the fire place (if I am having a fire that night)* and just let the frizzen sit in the coals.  The next morning I dig it out of the ashes.  Always engraves beautifully after this type of anneal.  After a quick re-polish, I do the engraving and then re-heat treat the frizzen.  And when I do the heat treat, I do use the anti-scale compound again.

* If it's summer and I don't plan on having a fire in the fire place, I build a small charcoal fire in the BBQ and put the frizzen in there.

[Dphariss]

Must anneal.. Carbide might cut it but its REALLY hard Carbide is really brittle. I would just anneal. You can try degreasing and heating it well past blue into pale gray/silver and try that. Propane torch will work.

[Bill Raby]

   I kind of figured the answer would be annealing. The carbide graver is hard enough to engrave it, but it is so brittle that the tip chips off instantly.