I know this is probably a bad idea that I don't want to even try, but here's what I've got. I have a very nice green painted 601 pistol grip and green B type buttstock, but for the life of me, I can't find a set of green 601 handgaurds. Recently however, I did come by a black 601 furniture set. Black paint over brown bakelite type B stock, black paint over brown bakelite 601 pistol grip, and a black paint, over green paint, bakelite 601 handguards. See where I'm going here? I know JT at retro arms works has done this before, but he's not looking at taking on this kind of work right now. Has any one ever stripped off one layer while leaving the green totally intact? There's only one or two bumps where the paint is fully gone, so there should be a nice solid layer of green underneath. I've considered going at it very light with some lacquer thinner and just rubbing gently. Thoughts? Have any of y'all tried this before? If anyone's got a set of original green that would want to trade for black...

I’ve got a set of almost be willing to trade before you do that… I have a police build but no black furniture set.

Thats insanity.  Dont do it.  You are literally devaluing the set you have, which is debatably more rare than the 601 green handguards.  Keep on the search and wait for the green ones, but seems someone already has you covered!!!

Im looking for one (i forget left or right) black handguard, if anyone has one, let me know!

I'm going to agree that you should definitely NOT do this. Original black over green furniture is probably even more rare than regular green and there's a good chance you strip the green with the black. I'd just keep searching for the HGs you need.

If it makes you feel better, I think it took me 8 or 9 years of searching for just my left side handguard to complete my 601. I had all the rest except that one piece. When I finally found it, it was a great feeling but don't lose hope. You'll find them eventually.

Several years ago, I had a set of black furniture, and I posted a “how to” tutorial on stripping JUST the black paint, leaving the beautiful green paint behind.  When I posted it, I had just done the grip, the stock, and one extra hand guard, and still had a set of hand guards to go. I had several people on INGO yelling at me saying that I was “devaluing the hand guards”, and that black hand guards were “more rare and valuable” than green ones.  So, I offered to trade straight up my black hand guards for a set of green.  In over a month NOBODY wanted to trade.  So, I took off the black paint, and ended up with a perfect set of green hand guards. Just because something is more “rare” does NOT mean that it is more desirable or valuable.

Im with you on that, no one wants the black ones. Im sure if you do it right you end up with beautiful green furniture considering the green has been preserved all these years.

Thank you for the insight. I knew that it's been done successfully many times before which is why I started the thread, I just wasn't sure what the best way to go about it was. Haven't been able to find a definitive how-to by searching. I've heard from others, including John at Retro Arms that the green layer is generally tougher than the so there's a margin of safety there as well.

I'm not in a huge rush to do it, and of course the easiest route is to trade them for an original set, but it's been tough finding what I'm looking for. Seems like most green sets which I've come across are repainted which I'm a little less interested in. Do you happen to have a link to the how-to thread you made?

Bingo, that's the attractive part of stripping off the black paint. There's only a few small nicks where the paint is totally rubbed off, probably from a rack or something. My stock and pistol grip are at about 95%+ original finish, so it'd be nice to have a matching set of just as complete green handgaurds.

Well, took a month to get around to it but I finally decided to give it a try. Extremely happy with how well it worked. Took about 3 hours to do just the right side, but it came out damn near perfect! All I used was lacquer thinner, 0000 steel wool and some paper towel to wipe up. Started by removing the black paint near all the details like vent hole teeth and the front and rear. Then just scrubbed the main areas clean. The black paint is pretty soft and the only real issue I had was paint clogging up the steel wool. Took about 2 1/2 pads worth to do this one side. Basically tear a small piece of steel wool, dip it in a cup of thinner, squeeze the extra and get to work. Once an area was done I used thinner on a piece of paper towel to remove any paint residue. Surprisingly when I did that, there was hardly any green coming up so I think that layer is a LOT more durable than the black. After I finished, I rubbed the whole thing down with CLP on a paper towel and it looks brand spanking new! What surprised me the most was that I only burned through both layers of paint in a few small pin-head sized places near the back of the handguard by the slip ring where it was tough to get into all the contours. I was expecting to have a few small spots, maybe pinky sized, that I was ready to live with, but all was good.

Anyways, I know this may rustle a few jimmies out there, but I figured I'd follow up that it can be done if you're patient and work slow. One down, one to go.

In progress:


Finished, flat light:


Finished, direct light:

fucking badass

Nice!

When I stripped the black off of my green hand guards and stock, the black paint was DEFINITELY NOT SOFT.  The factory black paint is almost as tough as the green paint, so maybe your hand guards were just rattle canned black

Hell of a job!

Attached File

Nice job, even though I wasn’t into it. Glad it worked out! Looks great!

If anyone has any single lefts or rights either black or green, let me know!

Thanks y'all! Finally got the other side finished over a couple podcast episodes last night and this morning so all finished. Gotta say, a little CLP really makes these guys look great. My 601 upper came complete from APEX, and it seems like minus the type E handgaurds it came with, everything was factory original, so I'm really happy to be able to put a nice set of handguards on it. I've had to piece together all the lower parts/stock/etc., but at this point, just waiting on a new 601 receiver and it's finished.



I should've been more clear, it was really only the very top of the black layer that felt soft. The black was reasonably thick and tough, just gummed up the steel wool a lot. Probably went through about 6 pads in all, just kept tearing a postage stamp sized piece, work a small area, rinse, repeat. It required quite a good bit of scrubbing to clean up, it was very well adhered to the green paint so I'm pretty certain it was factory. It at least wasn't spray paint.

Anyways, here's the final results. Figured black paint coverage was about 98% with just a few small exposed bakelite spots. Now it's probably at about 95%, burned through in a few small spots, but otherwise they're perfect. Paint's very smooth after essentially getting burnished/polished by the steel wool.

Thats going to be a very nice rifle

Big time!

Looks great. I remember when I had two 601’s in green.

Looks great. I remember when I had two 601’s in green.