DIY Barrel polishing write-up

[Captain Jack]

Will the barrel and chamber be more prone to rust once the black finish is removed?

[rogerxd45]

there was a thread a while ago that tested a barrel half polished and half regular. well in this test i belive they de greased it and then put it in salt water and let it sit out. well the degreasing step is going to remove all of the protectants from the polishing but from what i remmber there wasnt much of a difference between the polished and stock sections.

also i use a gun grease to protect and lubricate the barrel since oil doesnt stick ot the polished surface very well. there has been times it sat for a month that all i did was put CLP on it and i had no rust what so ever. even though it didn't rust i am using grease so it will stay on the barrel and keep it protected.

and ive yet to hear anyone say theirs rusted after polishing

[rogerxd45]

also any type of grease should prevent rust while the gun is in stroage i just use a gun specific one so i can leave it on and use it as a lube which also prevents scratching

you could allways just polish the chamber area of the barrel and then the very end and unless the slide is back you wont be able to tell

[g29cc]

Roger great post. Good pictures too.

Couple things with the direction of the polishing buff. ( I ve been buffing and polishing for so long I cant remember exactly, almost as long as I ve been machining which is probably around 16-17 years ).

Going with the buff rotation ( think of driving forward with your car and the tire spinning clockwise ) is polishing.



Going against the buff rotation ( think of driving forward say 30 mph and then jamming it in reverse and flooring it, you still move forward but the tires will be going backwards counterclockwise ) is buffing.



Ear plugs is a great idea.

For the best results, you should set a surface speed 3600-7500 sfpm ( surface feet per minute ). I am not sure what the dremel spins at, but your probably up there in sfpm.

Formula for figuring out SFPM

SFPM = 1/4 x diameter of Wheel x RPM (revs of spindle per min.)

The idea of polishing is the remove the sharp edge surface. This is how the reflection is shown as dissipated light with a rough surface. The light does NOT reflect back to you. With a small smoother surface the light then reflects back to you. Here is a picture of what I am talking about.



The surface on the left is your stock barrel. The surface on your right is the polished barrel.

For me I say dont try and strip off the black surface and then start polishing. Leave it on and you ll now what spots need to be buffed and what spots need to be polished. Because all the black will be gone when your ready to polish.

Its alot of work, a long dirty process and with a dremel its not that bad, but I would probably still were a face mask. With the process I use, which is very large buffing wheels and numerous compounds on a buffing machine, it leaves you looking black and gritty.

Here is a post I responded to in another forum, for those that wonder about dimensionally changing their barrel.

Originally posted by XXXXXX:
Personally, I'd stay away from anything that can risk change of dimension. If a chemical finish strip can change the tolerance (ask me how), I'd stay clear off the way mechanical means (polishing). You cannot convince me that those rounded edges in those pictures do not affect critical dimensions. Bluing is a chemical process. If you polish enough to take the barrel bluing off, you've gone pretty far.

Since you're a machinist...ever mic'd before and after polishing? You can say all you want, but without before/after measurement.....what you say don't really mean much.

Yep sure have mic'ed before and after and well within tolerance of a factory part that is by spec in some areas not dimensionally concentric , or parallel either.

So here is an example.

EFK and Sig barrel outside width of flats

.657 sig factory
.648 EFK factory

EFK and Sig barrel outside width of OD barrel

.550 Sig factory
.547 EFK factory

Here are some pictures of a barrel I just ran out and half polished an area to show the Caliper in picture , NO DIFFERENCE IN MEASUREMENT !!!

Lower area outside barrel od of polished surface

.5325


Upper area outside barrel od of unpolished BLUED surface

.5325


Polished area was .5325 before polishing as well.

Does it remove metal in some case yes it will remove .0003-.0008 and possibly on a high side .001. But even in that range, look at the difference between the EFK barrel and a Sig factory barrel dimension. Those are measurement from my own 229 barrel and a customer's EFK barrel in front of me. Why do I bother to measure things and write them down. Just pure curiosity to what machine tolerances are between companies and what not. Or if someone asks me why I think a certain company is better then another, I ll tell them, with all the barrels I ve done from XX company, they were all within .001 of each other, or they were all way out .008 from each other or from side to side.

So basically in a nut shell , STOP FIRING YOUR GUN RIGHT NOW. Your unevenly machining your surfaces every time you pull the trigger !! LOL Seriously though,with every trigger pull you cause friction , which in turn will remove material over time. In essence again, a well broken in gun shoots smoother , has less malfunctions then a new gun ( well we know Sigs dont malfunction ). Race guns are fit and polished to a very fine degree. They are not extremely loose such as service guns. If a service gun was super tight, there would be problems ( ahem... M16 vs AK 47 )

So while polishing may remove a inSIGnificant amount of material, its nothing that will hurt performance , and in 99.9 % of all cases improves greatly the performance.

Removing a surface such as blueing is so small that the factory doesnt even take in account for this in their tolerances for machining. If the factory had to take this into account and the tolerances were that tight to begin with, your gun would cost 4 times what it does now.

So again, yep I am a machinist and here is your pics of before and after as you requested. I ll further back up anything else I do as well with more hard facts and pictures if you would like.

And dont worry everyone I dont take offense to questions like this. I would rather have everyone understand the workings behind what is being done. If I can educate you in the process of what I am doing to further make you feel confident in what your having done, then please feel free to ask. I am super busy and might not get a chance to email or respond quickly , but will do my best.

Couple of XD 40 barrels



And when I am done polishing, I do alot of engraving as well





Roger the only thing I wonder is how long did the felt bob last ? Was it one of the soft ones you used ? Or one of the extremely hard ones ? I think also the small cloth buffs for the dremel wouldnt work that well, or atleast would make you work alot longer at buffing it.

These are the type of felt bobs I use. They are extremely hard and better suited to cake/wax type compounds then liquid. Though paste like mothers works pretty good with them too. They run about $3 or so each , but last a long time if you keep your surface speed at the right setting. If you go to fast they will burn and melt away.



These are from caswellplating.com. A great source for materials.

Buffing and polishing is a real art form. But you can get great results with some effort and patience. Roger has done a great job with pictures and explaining a good general idea of what to do.

Good luck everyone

[Rotty37]

WOW!! Impressive!! Never know about all of that. It's good to know now for anyone that's going to DIY barrels, guide rods etc. Very good write up Todd.

Love the etching on the barrels. Gotta send some more work to Todd

[rogerxd45]

ive tried the hard wheels with the "heavy metal polish" and they did not work nearly as well with this polish since its a liquid. the soft ones work best with this specific polish i havent worked with any other polishes so i cant comment on those. I dont know if im just useing the hard ones wrong but i found that the soft ones will form to the shape alot better, but then again i only had one hard wheel

and the reason i go against the motion of the wheel is just because if i dont it will just "suck" all the liquid under it and blow it out the back. by going against it i am able to keep the polishing compound on the part. ive tried both ways in with this specific polish it seems to work better. Once again i havent used any of the non-liquid polishes so i cant comment on that but with you haveing FAR more experience then me im sure you know what works

thank you for your comments your work is VERY good

[cookieXD40]

bad pics (cell phone) but got it done today used mothers polish...

[speeddemon40]

DAMN! nice job guys! I guess I am going to have to give this a try.

[yocan]

now if you do that work commercially why aren't you a forum sponsor?

I kid I kid... but it might be worth it to you I dunno

Ok I"m about crazy enough to try this now. I guess if I have the option it makes sense to use the larger barrel I should think considering these won't be used in the sandbox. that being said

How do I read polishing tops to purchase/use them? I have no idea, I know the lowest grit paper I'll use on metal is 550, on knives usually just use 600 to get a streacky mirror, but how do I differentiat polishing tips?

Oh and machine guy (Lol) what do you think about polishing where the barrel attaches? I think its a bad idea, that being smoother I don't feell would help... I dunno I guess polished would slip off easier but does that ever happen? And if not less likely to attract dirt. I ask cause in effect its a friction joint basically. so yeah someone enlighten me.

[D-Bo]

Great thread!

Thanks for the writeup rogerxd45 I think you've inspired me to give this a whirl (pun intended ) and thanks g39cc for the excellent contribution, the engraving is nice!