Most paint instructions of model kits 'prescribe' the colors of rifle barrels as 'gun metal'. Which is for most model brands a dark grey metal color. That bothers me, after seeing a French ww1 carbine that was definitely browned, (a dark brown-red color) and reaching the point that I have to decide on how to paint a Belgian Mauser of a Carabinier figure. First a few words on browning and bluing. That is done to give a gun a nice appearance, to make it rust resistant and for hunting and military weapons of course to take the glare away. Military arms(barrels and parts) usually are (or were?) sand blasted to give it a rather rough surface in combination with a dull finish. The principal idea is that a barrel is oxidized, in a bathing tank with a salt solution. Browning, which is I think the oldest method, can be done even using table salt or vinegar. The barrel must be polished, degreased and hung in a steam box, within it a bucket of water. Wet cloth is layed upon the barrel. The salt solution is applied on it. Then the barrel is placed in a steam cabinet, then water-boiled and at the end loose rust is rubbed of with steel wool. The whole proces is repeated a couple of times, till the metal has a nearly black color. Bluing, and for modern military arms the proces known as Parkerizing are having more or a less the same basics: boiling and using solutions in a variety of salt, or phosporic acids. And probably using eloctrolytic processes too for aluminium-alloys or stainless steel. Bringing it back to the Belgian Mauser, can anyone recommend the appropriate color for the barrel? And what about the stock...some seem to be almost black, and smooth surfaced as others seem to have a more rough 'woody' appearance. Were they painted, or impregnated, waxed or something?
I had a military Belgian Mauser once - early post WW2 though (it was chambered in .30-06) - and it was blued as I recall and with natural wood 'furniture'. But then I also had a German Mauser (Mauser factory) rifle of WW2 vintage which was browned - but that had been "sporterised" and it may not have been the original finish. None of which is any help with WW1 practice.
Brown or blue is, strictly speaking, a matter of the thickness of the oxide coating, blue being the thinner. These days I think it is considered the brown is "softer" but that will depend on the method of coating. WW Greener, in The Gun and Its Development (1881) mentions only browning and, in passing, that the full process takes up to 8 days. Obviously not particularly suitable for wartime production and I imagine a quicker, hard blue coating process evolved.
I have even seen painted barrels (black) but that would not be correct for WW1 as far as I know. I would go with blued and with natural wood stocks (those darken with age, accumulated gun-oil, etc.). Photographs of WW1 vintage ams seem to show them mostly as blued but we don't know how much "conservation" has gone into their appearance before they were photographed.
Here is that passage from Greener:BROWNING.
The best method of staining barrels is by the following recipe: but one material fact must not be overlooked. A considerable difficulty exists in staining barrels of laminated steel; in such a case, therefore, the acid should not be so much diluted. 1 oz. muriate tincture of steel ; 1 oz. spirits of wine ; ¼ oz. muriate of mercury ; ¼ oz. strong nitric acid ; 1/8 oz. blue stone; 1 quart of water. These are to be well mixed, and allowed to stand a month, to amalgamate. After the oil or grease has been removed from the barrels by lime, the mixture is laid on lightly with a sponge every two hours. It should be scratched off with a steel-wire brush night and morning until the barrels are dark enough ; and then the acid is destroyed by pouring on the barrels boiling water, and continuing to rub them till nearly cool.
To stain twist barrels black and white, it is usual, after rubbing and coating with the browning mixture as above, to put them into an iron or block-tin trough, with a small quantity of logwood and sulphate of copper and sufficient water to cover the barrels. The barrels are then boiled in the water for 20 minutes or half an hour. The barrels are then taken out and allowed to cool. When cold, they are scratched off with a steel scratch-brush, and scalded by pouring a kettleful of hot water over them. They must then be rubbed down until nearly cool. The same method of troughing is required to brown them a dark brown; but when they are taken from the trough they are coated with the browning mixture as at first, and scratched off, and re-coated three or four times. They are then finished off by pouring boiling water upon them, and rubbing with soft cloth until nearly cool.
The process of browning takes from four to eight days, according to the temperature of the browning-room. If the barrels are wanted quickly, they may be scratched off as often as three times in twelve hours.
thanks for the reaction! the twist barrels: I think that's the so called Damascus pattern? There's even a recipe for damascus browner, to 'pronounce' the effect. WW Greener, merely known for his sporting guns browned a lot though the famous policer (we topiced that extensivily before) was blued. Actually blackened, the ferrosic oxide being thinly applied, the polished steel is shining through, giving that blue appearance. As for paint: the Garand stainless steel gas parts were treated with black paint. I guess a painted barrel is some collector's own tribute, doesn't sound 'normal', at least not for ww1 weapons. I have seen military stocks too which were varnished, I don't know if that was regular. Variety of materials, wear and conservation making it difficult to bring things under one name I guess.
kieffer wrote:the twist barrels: I think that's the so called Damascus pattern? There's even a recipe for damascus browner, to 'pronounce' the effect.
Yes, indeed. Made by twisting bundles/faggots of rods of iron and steel(s). The best (strongest, lightest) barrels for shotguns were made that way at that time. Greener seems to have been very familiar with the detailed production methods of half a dozen different types. Browning the barrels to show off the 'figure' (pattern) was what I think he means by "To stain twist barrels black and white".
Yes. alternate strips of iron and steel are fire-welded together into rods of 1/4 inch square. They were heated and heavily twisted, three of them were forged together into a strip of 3/4 inch wide. This was coiled in a spiral around a mandrel and then forged into a tube. The remaining proces was the same as the so called twist tube barrels. These were often made of coiled and forged strips of horse- shoe iron as that had a good quality. I hope the picture is crisp enough to show the Damascus pattern.
regrards, Kieffer
-- Edited by kieffer on Monday 4th of October 2010 10:48:26 AM
Dont know if this helps in the 1906 Rexer report the guns were browned with bright metal magazines... I've used modern gun blue to get a good matt black finish....
Ironsides wrote:Dont know if this helps in the 1906 Rexer report the guns were browned with bright metal magazines...
That's interesting - those were quite prominent magazines (single-stack). I wonder if the "bright metal" was left in wartime service?
Ironsides wrote:I've used modern gun blue to get a good matt black finish....
Yes, it's all about the thickness of the oxide layer. Of course gunsmiths tell us the self-applied chemical bluing is not as durable as the hot-bath (or whatever it is) professional treatment - but it is great for display arms, I should think. Wikipedia backs them up on the relative durability. Talking of that Wikipedia article - Bluing_(steel) - under TerminologySome prefer to call thin coatings of black oxide by the name gun bluing, and to call heavier coatings by the name black oxide, but they are both the same chemical conversion process for providing true gun bluing.
Browning is controlled red rust Fe2O3 and is also known as pluming or plum brown. One can generally use the same solution to brown as to blue. The difference is immersion in boiling water for bluing. The rust then turns to black-blue Fe3O4. Many older browning and bluing formulae are based on corrosive solutions (necessary to cause metal to rust), and often contain cyanide solutions that are especially toxic to humans.
It appears (taking into account the process described by Greener) that the terms "blueing" and "browning" were once, certainly not long before WW1, interchangeable to some degree. Apart from the boiling water treatment, Greener makes it clear that (with most steels) the "browning" treatment could be progressed to successively darken the coating. "Up to and including black." I would add.
-- Edited by Rectalgia on Tuesday 5th of October 2010 07:22:51 AM
Nice pictures! Every day, you guys bring up something new on this forum, just great. The Belgian Mauser: isn't the box magazine an integral part, welded on to the receiver? It looks it's having a hinged lid at the bottom. There must be some snapping device or may be a springed button to open it I guess.
I don't know about the magazine being integral with the receiver. The brief description I have of the magazine is "not normally detached." The military had a phobia about soldiers losing or damaging their magazines (the early British .303s even had a chain to link the rifle and magazine) so maybe that is so with some or all of the M1889s. Certaily the base-plate of the magazine is hinged so the platform and spring can be swung away and unfired rounds then safely extracted without working through the action.
Not all designers were smart enough to include that feature. The M1912 ("broomhandle") Mauser pistol was notorious for making no provision for unloading the integral magazine other than by working the rounds back through the action. I suppose it was intended for officers only, who might be smart enough and always careful enough to do it safely. That is a silly notion, it must have cost 'own side' lives.
Yes. Some rifles, the lid and V spring come out as loose part like the MAS 1936 rifle. Others are hinged, Mosin-Nagant had that if I am correct. I vaguely remember Belgian Mausers, deactivated in some old museum, without their magazines but I am not sure. Mustn't be that difficult to find that out. Unloading: it's ww2 but the Garand clip...
