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Posted: 6/3/2012 7:16:26 PM EDT
| Do any of you have a retro build using the natural color Type III hardcoat anodizing that US Anodizing offers? I have seen the photo in the archives that mike_nds posted with the various colors on a stripped lower, but I have not seen a complete build with one. Same question with the pre-ban gray. It seems that most of our builds are with the XM gray. Thanks. |
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Thanks, that is helpful.
I wondered if the natural color was supposed to be more like the "champagne" hue that can be seen on some of the H&R rifles. But it seems to be a very light metallic color. I was also surprised to see that the light gray actually looks close to the XM gray once the rifle is fully assembled. |
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Quoted:
Victor calls this NP3 It was as close as we could get to natural The steel is Electroless Nickel http://i367.photobucket.com/albums/oo119/hotdogit250/458-223finalassbly0222-1.jpg SP-1's the lighter grey http://i367.photobucket.com/albums/oo119/hotdogit250/SP-1onachair0012.jpg Like the old ColtGuard finish huh? I always thought that it'd be pretty cool to have a 603 or 604 clone done up with all the bits and pieces done in electroless nickel. |
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Victor advised against nickel plating aluminum because it would bubble up and come off.
He sowed me pictures of a E-N plated with the plating coming off the front of the mag well. Didn't you state you had seen the chart with various colored lowers from NoDak? Victor is the sole (as far as i know) anodizer for ND so....there's your comparison. i THOUGHT i had a XM but i don't. Plus Victor has samples of the colors on his U.S.Anodizing website. |
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Yes. However, the photos on the US Anodizing website are not labeled, so I am guessing at which color is represented. In addition, I am very familiar with XM gray, but Victor lists the colors for Type III hardcoats on the website as pre-ban gray and early gray. No mention of XM gray with a color sample. I thought I had read somewhere that NDS uses an XM gray that is just a bit darker, but maybe I am not recalling it correctly.
I was curious by your statement that the two grays looked a lot different. It is hard for me to visualize how an annodized finish will look on just a stripped lower. It is a lot clearer when I see it next to the furniture on a completed rifle. No biggie though. I believe the below color samples photo was posted by mike_nds. It is hard for me to see how much different the two grays would really appear on a fully assembled retro. And, the labels that Mike put on the below photo, I do not see an Early gray. I cannot tell if this is the same as the pre-ban gray listed in the below photo. Mike, let me know if you want me to take this down in that it is not my photo, I borrowed it from one of your posts in the archive. 
From top to bottom; Black Pre-Ban gray XM gray Natural (on 7075) I do think that this post answers my initial question which is we don't have any handy examples of a fully assembled retro in Natural anodizing. |
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Quoted:
Victor advised against nickel plating aluminum because it would bubble up and come off. He sowed me pictures of a E-N plated with the plating coming off the front of the mag well. You know I'm pretty sure I know the rifle rifle you're talking about. IIRC I've seen it for sale on Gunbroker a few times. I was under the impression that having the finish flake off like that was more the exception rather than the rule. If we could get him to do the steel parts, at least, I think the 'Natural' finish might be close enough for a look-alike, though? |
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Quoted:
Quoted:
Victor advised against nickel plating aluminum because it would bubble up and come off. He sowed me pictures of a E-N plated with the plating coming off the front of the mag well. You know I'm pretty sure I know the rifle rifle you're talking about. IIRC I've seen it for sale on Gunbroker a few times. I was under the impression that having the finish flake off like that was more the exception rather than the rule. If we could get him to do the steel parts, at least, I think the 'Natural' finish might be close enough for a look-alike, though? Bubbling was (is) a concern, but from what I've read it's caused by improper cleaning. The story is (and I'm neither a chemist nor a metallurgist, so this could be total bull), the plating process uses a thin layer of copper to adhere the nickel to the aluminum. If the nickel is damaged in anyway––a crack or nick or scratch––it can create a small opening all the way down to the copper. Now if the rifle is cleaned with a copper solvent and that solvent seeps down into that crack or nick or scratch, it can eat away at the copper, releasing the bond between nickel and aluminum and causing...bubbles and blisters and peeling, oh my! Now that story, true or not, sounds reasonable to me, so I make sure to keep the Hoppes #9 far away from my ColtGuard SP1 when I clean it. But frankly, that's not why I'd steer anyone away from electroless nickel. As far as I'm concerned, the biggest problem is that the finish is soft. It marks easily if you're not careful. The marks aren't "bad"––you wouldn't notice most of them them from a couple yards away. But when you have a pretty finish like that, every little flaw is really annoying. Don't use copper solvent, handle it with care, and keep it away from anything that might rub against it or fall onto it. If you can live with that, do electroless nickel. Otherwise, try the anodizing. Now give me a buck and I'll owe you 98 cents in change. |
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