DIY Gun finishing

Are you near any of our DIY coaters ?

We use Duracoat. It’s a pretty good finish if it’s applied correctly. It’s “user applied” according to the manufacturer. This is true to an extent. You’ll need a few basic things to make it work though. These include (but are not limited to) a blasting cabinet with aluminum oxide, airbrush or HVLP gun, air compressor with some good filters, and some good tools. A good cleaning / degreasing setup is a plus too. Some of these things are not vital but they will drastically improve the quality. I could write you a book on prep and application but we’ll skip all of that. If you do try Duracoat don’t hesitate to let me know if you hit any snags. I’ll help out if I can.

We’re talking about getting into Ceracoat as well. My knowledge of that is pretty limited though. You’ll need all of the stuff mentioned above plus an oven. Gun Coat is about the same.

If you want to try Parkerizing you’ll need several stainless dip tanks and a regulated heat source. We’re in the process of building our Parkerizing setup so I’m still learning about that too.

Hot Blueing is WAY over my head. May be somebody else could chime in on that.

I’m not a certified expert at any of these things but a do have a pretty well rounded knowledge of Duracoat. If you need help with any specifics just let me know.

You must blast with cerakote an use exactly the grit they say use... Learned hard way.. Also acetone bath.

O lord my stuff is either old or homemade.. You can make this as expensive as you want it to be. Harbor frieght has some cheap blasting cabinets an air brushes. What is the specs on your compressor? Blasting is a air hog!! Most welding shops sell fairly cheap water seperators an inline air dryers... If you wanna spend 8k on a true drier go for it. Aersol kits suck for cerakote not enough pressure.
YouTube is your friend

The aerosol sprayers are not too impressive. Duracoat is sensitive to pressure and volume changes. I would strongly suggest the cheapest of airbrushes over the aerosol solution any day. Like Beladran said, you can get most of what you need at Harbor Freight. The quality may not be the best in the world but it will get you by.

The blast cabinet isn’t a necessity. It’s VERY VERY VERY nice to have though. You can use a regular hand-held blaster and siphon media out of the bad if you want. It’s not too much fun but it’ll get the job done.

If I'm not mistaken we've been using 120. You can determine how much you rough up the finish by adjusting your air pressure and and length of time that you blast. Grit size isn't too critical with Duracoat.

Any of those airbrushes look like they'd work.

You could blast with something other than aluminum oxide for duracoat. I use to do a lot of powder coating for my cars and would blast those parts with walnut shells. Then spray powder and cook in oven. Works for guns too. Its hard stuff. Harbor freight has the gun on and off sale all the time. Just need an old oven to make the powder flow out.