HW35 With Rotating Piston

[BAD DAZ]

I'm looking forward to shooting it, excellent work Mick, atb Daz

[T 20]

Excellent. Really looking forward to seeing this.

I'm looking forward to shooting it, excellent work Mick, atb Daz

I'm hoping to have it up and running ASAP as it only needs assembling now, but I've got a little waylaid again.

I'd never had any success with fume bluing in the winter months until I cobbled together the heated wheely bin I used to rust this 35 cylinder, so I thought I'd go a little further and make something permanent.

I'm going to fume blue my next project while I'm assembling the 35, now the next gun's a .177" BSA club special standard which has the longest action of any of my guns, so I've set to and built a heated fume bluing cabinet long enough to fit that action in. :-

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In the bottom tank is an electric oil filled radiator with thermostat control so I can adjust the temperature, this warms the underside of the B&Q planter which is set into the wooden top of the bottom tank.
The hinged lid is made out of thick timber to act as insulation and also to give weight to compress the B&Q draught excluder sealing the lid to the bottom tank when closed.


And it only cost me £16.75 in parts.






All the best Mick

[maximus]

That's great Mick, you can go into mass production now! How long / how many rusting and boiling cycles does it take to achieve the final finish? I have never seen a rust blued finish up close, can a mirror finish be achieved? For some reason I imagine it to be matt. Also, a piccy of the John Deere in the background wouldn't go amiss either

[T 20]

That's great Mick, you can go into mass production now! How long / how many rusting and boiling cycles does it take to achieve the final finish? I have never seen a rust blued finish up close, can a mirror finish be achieved? For some reason I imagine it to be matt. Also, a piccy of the John Deere in the background wouldn't go amiss either

It's worth me getting set up properly as I have at least 20 guns to black and I may have a few custom tattoo machines to do as well.

In the summer months with no additional heating the first rusting took about 8 hours to develope, further rustings took 24 hours and about 10 rusts were required until the rusting stopped.

With the heated wheely bin the first rust took just three hours so did the second, third and fourth, after that I was rusting and boiling every 8 hours until it stopped rusting --- in all I rusted about 9 rustings

Fume/rust bluing is more of a satin finish like you find on old prewar shotguns, I think Holland and Holland and Purdey still rust blue their barrels ?

And as requested, me on the Quigley Hollow lawnmower :-


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[Vernal]

[

And as requested, me on the Quigley Hollow lawnmower :-


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Happy days to come, not getting much use now!

[maximus]

It's worth me getting set up properly as I have at least 20 guns to black and I may have a few custom tattoo machines to do as well.

In the summer months with no additional heating the first rusting took about 8 hours to develope, further rustings took 24 hours and about 10 rusts were required until the rusting stopped.

With the heated wheely bin the first rust took just three hours so did the second, third and fourth, after that I was rusting and boiling every 8 hours until it stopped rusting --- in all I rusted about 9 rustings

Fume/rust bluing is more of a satin finish like you find on old prewar shotguns, I think Holland and Holland and Purdey still rust blue their barrels ?

And as requested, me on the Quigley Hollow lawnmower :-


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Cheers Mick, that's a nice tidy 2850, jealous!

[T 20]

So after blacking I've polished out the cylinder, sized an old Knibbs red seal, slightly altered the latch and rebuilt her.
The only Spring I had to hand was a well used old school HW50 Spring which fitted perfectly.

With a 13"" 0.22" barrel I'm getting this :-

Superdome averaging 590 feet per second.

Hobby averaging 670 feet per second.

[joffy]

So after blacking I've polished out the cylinder, sized an old Knibbs red seal, slightly altered the latch and rebuilt her.
The only Spring I had to hand was a well used old school HW50 Spring which fitted perfectly.

With a 13"" 0.22" barrel I'm getting this :-

Superdome averaging 590 feet per second.

Hobby averaging 670 feet per second.

Sounds like a result

[thisisdonald]

In the bottom tank is an electric oil filled radiator with thermostat control so I can adjust the temperature, this warms the underside of the B&Q planter which is set into the wooden top of the bottom tank.
The hinged lid is made out of thick timber to act as insulation and also to give weight to compress the B&Q draught excluder sealing the lid to the bottom tank when closed.


And it only cost me £16.75 in parts.






All the best Mick

That looks great... I've seen some good setups.. a guy in the states sent me pics of his when I was setting mine up.. he had a 5' Fish tank which was awesome.

I experimented with a piece of 12" galvanised chimney, that I hung the parts in vertically, and hooked up a wallpaper steamer to the side of. I was hoping to combine the rusting and 'boiling' into one unit that didn't take ages to boil like the tank I was using.... it didn't work. The rusting was aggressive at the bottom where I sat the acid, and it didn't really steam that good either. I think it would work with a much larger chamber, well sealed.

[T 20]

That looks great... I've seen some good setups.. a guy in the states sent me pics of his when I was setting mine up.. he had a 5' Fish tank which was awesome.

I experimented with a piece of 12" galvanised chimney, that I hung the parts in vertically, and hooked up a wallpaper steamer to the side of. I was hoping to combine the rusting and 'boiling' into one unit that didn't take ages to boil like the tank I was using.... it didn't work. The rusting was aggressive at the bottom where I sat the acid, and it didn't really steam that good either. I think it would work with a much larger chamber, well sealed.

Well it may look great, Donald, but I've not had much success in rusting with it using acid fumes.

Strangely, using hydrochloric brick cleaning acid the metal struck black in the cabinet but never actually produced red rust. --- This black never got any thicker over ten sessions in the fume cabinet.

So today I changed tack and gave up with the fume bluing and changed to rust bluing, by turning the heat up in the cabinet and putting a pellet tin full of water inside it became a damp box.
I'm now using a saturated water/Ammonium Chloride solution to coat the metal before placing in the fume cabinet to rust --- instant success.

[Bluefan]

Brick acid ain't wot it used to be Ive heard brick is say it's only like tcp now and not much more harm if you gargle with it. Glad the new approach is working out .

[thisisdonald]

I was using neat hydrochloric!! You used to be able to buy it on ... I've still got a little left.. dangerous stuff!!
You had to keep a close eye on rusts, I pitted a Vulcan barrel really badly in a matter of a couple hrs.. atmospheric conditions must have changed because I was getting a nice fine rust in about 8hrs on previous days. It's a dark art sure enough!
My dad bought me a copy of angiers book a couple years ago, there's loads of paint on rusting recipes there. Pm me if you want some pdfs

[arnie2b]

Well it may look great, Donald, but I've not had much success in rusting with it using acid fumes.

Strangely, using hydrochloric brick cleaning acid the metal struck black in the cabinet but never actually produced red rust. --- This black never got any thicker over ten sessions in the fume cabinet.

So today I changed tack and gave up with the fume bluing and changed to rust bluing, by turning the heat up in the cabinet and putting a pellet tin full of water inside it became a damp box.
I'm now using a saturated water/Ammonium Chloride solution to coat the metal before placing in the fume cabinet to rust --- instant success.

This solution gives in the right hands a Johnsons(does/did most of Purdeys/H&H stuff) type black within a few hours(big hint) not a month.
It really is good and great for helping you out of the sticky stuff.

There are gunsmiths who have analyzed this/similarly working rust bluing solution and use it all the time.
The more time you put in to it the better the result.

[TonyL]

Wow!

I've just had a good read of those instructions and it sounds very good.

One to have a go at one day when time finally allows to properly play with many more things airgunnery!

[T 20]

This solution gives in the right hands a Johnsons(does/did most of Purdeys/H&H stuff) type black within a few hours(big hint) not a month.
It really is good and great for helping you out of the sticky stuff.

There are gunsmiths who have analyzed this/similarly working rust bluing solution and use it all the time.
The more time you put in to it the better the result.

Ah, very interesting but two of the old guns I'm bluing at the moment have cylinders which are sealed to the breechblock with solder and I'd be loathe to go anywhere near them with a blowlamp.
Besides which I seem to have cracked the job by switching from acid fume bluing to rust bluing using Ammonium Chloride --- I managed three rustings today.

One of the items I'm bluing is the barrel weight for this rotary pistoned HW35 which should finish the front end off nicely.


All the best Mick