Had a local jewelry store engrave my AR lower and CZ Scorpion, they did a great job on both, but the AR is VERY shallow, I think it's 0.003 but can't be sure, doubt it's any over for sure! After I used aluminum black you don't even really notice it, if there's a glare or anything it can almost disappear.

If it went through the anodizing I should be OK right? It's making me a little nervous, I doubt it will ever matter but the possible penalties could be severe I'm sure.













 

The typical thickness produced by hard coat anodizing is .0005”-0.002”.  So probably questionable.

Some of my commercialy produced suppressors, that I have are difficult to see the manufacturer's markings, because of the paint.
if you are concerned just remove the aluma black.

I like it black of course, but I want to be legal, just in case


I'd feel better if it was a little deeper, but I'm not sure what I could do about it now without it looking like crap.

 

If worried just have it redone at a laser place and no more worry.

Have them make it deeper.

You listed 2 others you were happy with, so its not like they dont know you. Im sure they will try again.

The last thing you want to do is build everything, and not be legal.  .002999, and your going away for awhile

Can you catch the edges with your fingernail?

I don't think they can go deeper, he said that he set the machine as deep as it would go. It's deep enough I can go over it with a small screwdriver and stay "down in it" pretty easy if that makes sense. It's probably OK, Looking at 0.003" on the calipers sure isn't a very big gap!

 

They should be able to deepen the engraving without much trouble.

Trace over it with a silver paint Sharpie and wipe away the excess with a little CLP.  No one's going to bother measuring if they can make it out clearly.

My take is that you are probably fine.   The odd of being prosecuted because the engraving is not deep enough is probably somewhere south of being struck by lighting.

Assuming this was done via a rotary pantograph type engraver, they probably cant make the existing markings deeper as once you remove the piece from the vice you can never really line up the stylus/trace font again to the prior engraving.

Whenever I engrave folks guns, I always tell them "is this what you want and is it deep enough for you, because once I remove it from the vice that's it"   In my experience some folks want the engraving ground super deep where it matches the depth of the factory engraving and others want the bare minimum so that it will all but disappear with alumablack.

Standard copy paper is generally in the 0.003 to 0.004 range so if the engraving is as deep as a single sheet of paper you should be good from a regulation perspective if you want a frame of reference.

Personally I would just leave as is.

If you can feel it with a fingernail, it is deep enough.

Don't over think it!