Slow rust bluing

Thought I Had this down pat. Working on a .32 cal barrel, blued once it looked great....had to shave a bit of the barrel because it didn't match up very well to the lock, now blued it again, after stripping it down to bare metal, after I carded it down, treated it with baking soda to stop acid reaction, applied a bit used motor oil to finish it. Came back two days later and noticed that it a rough coarse finish in spots, sort of like cast iron, perhaps pig iron..went back today and picked it up, and lo and behold the finish just started flaking off in parts, however there were areas of the barrel, the ends , that did not...any thoughts?

I assume you're talking about a typical browning process. I wonder if you carded in between coats. It seems to me if you did the carding properly in between applications, the resistance required would tell how durable the finish is at that point, and show any spots that aren't taking the process. Whatever you have after carding should be permanent. In other words, good or bad, it should tell the tale at that point. Additional coats should not remove any previous finish. I can't see going through the process of proper carding and rusting and having it flake off in the end.

In the carding process, you should remove all the fuzzy rust before going to the next application.

My thoughts anyway, and I do hope it works out in the end. Kind of frustrating when things go south after all that work. :redface: Bill

This is very similar, done with a mixture of hydrochloric and nitric acid I think, and the first time I did it (.50cal), I didn.t boil the barrel between rusting and carding, and that produced a nice plum color. This time(.32cal) I actually followed my directions, boiled between carding and reapplications, and the first time it was beautiful, posted a couple of pics, but it didn,t match up well as above, and now this time I messed something up. Chalk it up to experience... Thx
:idunno:


and simply carded and