duracoat or not??
I have a blued Taurus 605 .357 Mag revolver. Has light pitting on the bottom of the outside of the trigger guard and light pitting on the frame just above the left-hand side of the grip, where pistol has touched skin or sweaty clothes from IWB-carry. Should I get this Duracoated or parkerized? If so, what do I need to be careful of?
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My only experience with Duracoating was not positive. It may be due to operator error during application. I had an old, beatup Ruger P89 Duracoated and it still doesn't function properly after several hundred rounds. Only a short while back after much firing was I able to get it apart for cleaning. The coating takes up space that may cause binding.
A different shop might get better results. My answer to your situation would be a deep cleaning with Brakekleen and a brass bristle brush and a coat of Krylon on the affected areas.0 -
Personally, unless there were some strong emotional attachment there, I wouldn't try to sink too much money into a "working" gun like a blued Taurus revolver. That particularly applies to spending the money to have one professionally Duracoated.
A pitted Taurus 305 is probably worth about $250 maybe $275 on a good day. Tack on the roughly $150 it would cost you to have the gun professionally duracoated, and you're "in" for $400.
Instead, you could sell the used blued gun, take that same $400 and buy a brand new stainless steel Taurus 605 if you like. You could also probably find a good condition USED stainless Ruger SP101 for roughly the same amount of money.
If you're committed to refinishing it, for whatever reason, I think Parkerizing is the way to go. It won't look great, but its a tough finish, and its more cost effective than the epoxy-based finishes.
Edit, responding to below.
The original question asked "should I get this Duracoated" (instead of "should I Duracoat this"), implying to me, having the refinish done professionally.
If you're willng and able to refinish the gun yourself, then obviously the cost will be a lot lower, and it becomes much more cost-effective. I agree that the Brownell's bake-on gunkote in a can is probably a pretty easy and inexpensive way to get a decent finish at home.
Incidentally, what you paid for the gun isn't really a factor in whether or not it makes economic sense to refinish it. Whether you paid $0.01 for it or $1000.00, that's yesterday's news. The gun is only worth what someone else is willing to pay for it on the open market, not what you paid for it. In this case, that ought to be somewhere around $250, and that's the base figure you need to work from to decide whether or not it pays to refinish.0 -
I asked a friend to bead-blast a hideous Ruger Mk I last year, and we used the gray Brownells bake-on stuff. (The gun looked like it was in a flood and forgotten)It looks a lot better and so far has been pretty durable. I think it cost me about 30 bucks for the spray can and shipping, and I used an old toaster oven to cook it in. I then did up a Charles Daly .45 with the same stuff, and this, too has been a good deal so far.
This stuff is certainly not as good or durable as an Mp3 finish by any means, but I didn't sink a bunch of $$ into guns that I didn't think were worth it either.0 -
For a working gun, you also have the alternative of using high temp engine/exhaust paint or woodstove paint and baking them on. Both are very inexpensive and yield good results for a noncollectable. [:D]
In all cases, the cleaning and prep are KEY to getting a good final appearance.0 -
Duracoat is awesome stuff if applied correctly! [:)] It can be baked on right in your own oven, provided the wife lets you. [:D] The major key in the process is to let it "CURE" for the right amount of time. I would guess that the curing time varies with the kind of duracoat. The master's of duracoat are just down the road from me. Here is there site.... http://www.lauerweaponry.com/
And here is a rifle they did for me just about 10 years ago now. It has been hunted with here in Wisconsin a bit and in Alaska some and held up very well.
Jon0 -
it's a carry gun that I paid $150 for along with 200 rounds of .357 SWC cartridges and a box of 50 .38 Spl wadcutters. I won't sink any money into it. Just looking for to see if it was really feasible or not to re-coat it. 0 -
it's feasible and can give a nice end result.
do it yourself
ceramacoat is a matte black baked on finish that looks like magnesium oxide parkerized finish. bake it at 350 in the kitchen.
about $35 a can from midway or brownells.
i've done 20+ guns for me and friends. practically foolproof.
tom0 -
Is duracoat really going to be worth it?
For that gun +1 on the other options.0
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