Over polishing!! You guys are making this much harder than it need be. If you talk to the best commercial color case hardening guys, like Doug Turnbull, they will tell you to just do a perfect polish to what a worn piece of 400 wet or dry will give you. The action of hardening will not be improved by more polishing. Mark Silver, who is building unaged pieces with traditional finish techniques, intentionally leaves some scratches on the surface of the lock to avoid the piece looking too sterile. Another advantage of Not polishing too much is that the action on cold blues, etc. is considerably more even than it is on very highly polished pieces where the liquid tends to puddle and not coat evenly.
This of course applies mostly to American work. If you're doing British work, take out the scratches but there is no need to go past worn 400 on the outside of the lock if it's going to get pack hardened.
Tom
Tom,
Thanks! That's what I was looking for. I got the frizzen polished and was thinking it was too polished. I've not looked closely enough at rifles with polished locks (in person), and have not been around that many other than at the CLA show. I couldn't really remember how far they had been polished, if scratches were evident, etc. I really only intended to blue this lock and had a feeling I went way beyond what is necessary (or appropriate).
Heat blue a high polish is kinda nice, though 320 will give a nice muted color in most cases but heat bluing a frizzen is not possible. 220-320 is plenty for rust blue. Hot tank caustic blue I like 400 or better.
Much of this is going to depend on what the polisher is trying to accomplish.
I prefer over polished to under polished.
I have actually polished quite a few various parts for hardening and engraving, mostly Shiloh Sharps actions. Used to be in my job description. Still is I guess though I don't have a "job" now and seldom polish a brass suppository gun part.
I have found that 600 grit does very well for color case hardening. With the steel wool and chrome polish (Turnbull uses/used this, I have one of his instruction tapes someplace around here) to erase the scratches.
Color hardening needs a better finish than most bluing for give vivid colors. But engravers often don't like them that bright. Dull polish will not give the color or the color definition that a better polish will. But since 600 followed by steel wool and Simichrome is near a mirror there is no reason for more polishing. Though I have been known to us 1500 or 2000 for some specialty project.
This is also dependent on if you are going for the best color or for the look of some original factory gun. Most factory guns were done to 320 or so for bluing, smoother for color hardening.
So if you are RESTORING a Winchester for example it must be polished to whatever the factory used to do, along with the marks running the right direction in all the right places. Going past this, or running the marks the wrong way will result in the wrong appearance and the restoration is not good as a result. It takes experience to accurately reproduce the old factory finishes, however, once the "how" is learned its not that tough.
But I don't restore old factory guns. I make stuff to suit me. So I high polish, 600, parts for color hardening.
If you think you over polished just lightly polish again with 400 or whatever to bring the polish to the level you want. The actual finish is no more important, maybe even less so, than maintaining good edges.
Dan
