Make steel parts look good

[Poboy kartman]

Clean Metal:
Paint of any description won't be too successful on moving parts, it'll wear off in short order. Your best options are either polishing which, as previously mentioned, takes a lot of time to achieve & maintain a good finish, or chrome plating. Having said that, the metal is polished before it's plated, that's what costs, the actual plating costs next to nothing...

Another trick for a great visual effect is to heat the parts in an oven after they're polished/plated; that's how you get the bluing effect...

..

Yes- most people don't realize that first the steel is derusted cleaned and then plated with copper which acts like a filler/primer and the copper is sanded and polished to perfection before being plated in nickle and finally chrome.....

Proper blueing is much more than just heating the metal. It involves certain chemical salts and to be done properly is about as involved as chrome plating. There are several general types of "bluing" used on firearms. The most common modern commercial type being bluing with chemical salts and high heat. Again- this requires a polished surface for the best results. There is cold bluing- the stuff you can buy at Wal-Mart. It also requires a polished and meticulously clean surface for good results. Then there is Parkerizing which can be done on sandblasted surfaces and is done with phosphates. Then there is the old-time browning finish which is basically controlled rusting. Finally- there is a much rarer blued finish that is a multi-colored mottled looking finish that I have only seen on some H&R recievers but I'm sure are on some older revolvers and probably used more in other countries that is achieved strictly through controlled heat.

 

[itsid]

... plastic welders.. nothing YOU (consumer) can go buy is worth a spit.

I disagree

I've seen a handfull of very nice ones doing a great job,
available to anyone who likes to spend that amount of money
The Leister hand extruder for example... great tool!

And for small repairs, even the plastic welding tip you can mount to any 80W soldering iron does a decent job.
(Harbour freight sells a kit for $15)

Nowadays I think one could rather easily modify a reprap extruder for plastic welding.
better than the $15 HF thing, not even remotely as expensive as a leister hand extruder
(smaller, less powerfull yes.. but I think for ~$100 max that's okay )

'sid

 

[Awalker702]

All the ideas are awesome. I'm the type that will try every idea until one of them works. There is a local shop that does do plastic welding so if I can't get it done myself I do have a back up plan. Hope to be able to do it myself though. This is my first project like this and it has been a ton of fun.