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



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




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




time for drastic measures


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



reciever cleaned up




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






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.







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.