Breathing old life into an old shotgun.

It all started with a minor late night bidding war on a 1930-40's J Springfield 16 gauge sxs on gun broker. It had a badly cracked oil soaked stock that had been bubba repaired at least twice no original finish the tang well to the left of the safety etc. and probably hadnt been lubed since the cold war that I ended up taking home.

Goals for this project are to

gain an understanding of sxs shotgun mechanical workings. Including fixing the locking lever being so far to the left. (If anybody knows what this entails please let me know.

simulate the orginal finish as possible without spending the big money on true color case hardening

learn to finish a stock in tru-oil to be applied to 2 more stocks that need to be redone

learn to cerakote to protect the finish

I intially was going to rust blue the barrels but logistics in a condo are not going to allow that to happen. So i am going to use the durablue coating from duracoat.







It doesnt have any pitting anywhere. no barrel bulges and is mechanically sound minus the stock.

I got it home and started disassembling it.

years of dried up lube

http://i.imgur.com/Nb5nHWE.jpg

the firing pins have been replaced at one point not well, but replaced none the less.

http://i.imgur.com/WRQ44KA.jpg


I let it soak in eds red for 3 days and still had tons of build up

http://i.imgur.com/uOc8Z5a.jpg


time for drastic measures


completely stripped the reciever and threw it in the ultrasonic cleaner for an hour.

http://i.imgur.com/nVfNkQ8.jpg

reciever cleaned up

http://i.imgur.com/RLKypuI.jpg


I am going to attempt to replicate color case hardening using different patinas. I found a kit online at steel FX and am impressed with it. I will need to cerakote over it so that the patina is protected as it is very fragile.


practicing different techniques for the patina

http://i.imgur.com/dcx1iuH.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/RkGd8tT.jpg


my first attempt on the gun it looks pretty good I do not like the straight pattern on the side in the second picture so I am going to redo it.

http://i.imgur.com/CjFDHbQ.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/cJZFJLo.jpg



I am going to get a replacement stock and foreend wood coming for it in the near future and work on getting that fitted

I will update with pictures as it comes along.

I love projects like this. I had a brief period in my life where I was restoring military surplus rifles. It was quite fun.

I like the patina so far.

Looks really neat. Look forward to seeing the finished product.

Thanks for posting this, really neat. I look forward to the progress!

Very cool.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Looking good. I have an old H&R Topper I have to finish up- got the stock work all done, but didn't know how to tackle the case hardened look.
I think I'll try it how your doing it. Keep us updated.

Quick update on this project. I got the new stock and forend wood from the brown truck. standard grade walnut fresh off the pantagraph

http://i.imgur.com/8vND6QM.jpg


While playing around with the patina was fun I need to get the gun in proper mechanical order or at least to the best of my limited abilities in a condo with only hand tools youtube and tidbits on various message forums at my disposal.

The largest issue that need addressed is that the barrels are on the water table and top lever is so far to the left that the lever is maxed out on travel or it would keep going farther left

http://i.imgur.com/VtKdyZs.jpg

One issue is the rough machining on the hook on the barrel. The wear says that it is not parallel with the face of the receiver. Took some measurements and it is about .005 high sloping torwards the right barrel. I cleaned up the machining marks and when i build up the material on the hook i will plumb it up.


http://i.imgur.com/Lnsaf9b.jpg



I started shimming up the hook and with about .006 I was able to get the lever to the 4 o clock postion and .003 of gap at the back of the barrels to the flat of the receiver.

http://i.imgur.com/QKgQ7n1.jpg


did some basic fitting of the stock to the receiver http://i.imgur.com/JKnKG5a.jpg


Here are a couple pics of another project I am working on that I started before this one and then realizing that I had a great piece of stockwood I found on Ebay for less than I paid for this sxs and should practice a bit so I dont F it up.

its an SKB O/U that is stripped completely and am going to nickle plate

http://i.imgur.com/KEkQC9R.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Wq3alOI.jpg