Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats Bluing is Still Tough to Beat

My son just returned from his Alaskan moose hunt and wanted me to tear down his rifle to check for any rust underneath the stock. He hunted for a week in steady rain most every day out on the peninsula so there was likely some salt in the air as well. I found a couple spots on the underside of the action and under the scope bases but otherwise nothing. He was concerned about how wet the hunt would likely be and I offered to let him use one of my rifles that'd been Cerakoted or was a stainless unit but in the end he decided to use his own. After taking it down I'm even more convinced that metal coatings of any type are really unnecessary except for those who guide in that type of environment or are just lazy about the care of their guns. I've hunted up there on several occasions from the interior near Denali out to the ABC islands of southeast Alaska, every time with a blued rifle and have yet to have a problem. YMMV.

My mileage varies considerably. Hunting A Island pretty much every year. Gave up on blued rifles a loooooong time ago . . . but I'm ok with it working out for you and your son.

"Blued is Tuff to beat"??? SS wins hand down every day of the week and twice on Sunday.

For you and others that hunt that area a lot I'd agree, but for the occasional trip there I've done fine with my blued guns. Our experiences just show me that a S/S or coated gun isn't absolutely necessary if one gives his rifle proper care before, during and after such a hunt.

John, many guys just don’t care or are to lazy to properly maintain a rifle. I agree with your above sentiment.

Agreed.

I love my blued rifles and don’t hunt anywhere as harsh as Alaska but my hunting rifles see rain, and snow. Sometimes after hunting all day it’s nice to be able to do a wipe down or minimal maintenance when I get home tired, hungry and equipment to put away. There’s a time and a place for both IMO.

Rifles that have cheap bluing are my biggest pet peeve. None of the class and tradition of nice mirror polished deep bluing and usually don’t protect as well either. Kind of the worst of both worlds.

I couldn't disagree more.

But I've also hunted Alaska more than once.......

And going again on 10/5.

And know I will be using Barricade and steel wool when I return......

You might try Corrosion X instead of Barricade. Works very well for me.

There's some areas of the state that are generally pretty dry and a blued rifle will work fine. There are also areas of the state that are very wet and they do not work particularly well. A man could hunt only one or the other of those types of places and reach the conclusion blued rifles worked great or sucked. Either way, he'd be only half right and should get out more. For me, hunting the ABCs, stainless is a no brainer. Anyone who makes statements that guys using stainless are "just lazy about the care of their guns" has likely never spent any quality time in this corner of the world.

As a quick example lets take a typical fall goat hunt: You spend the entire day hiking through a mix of snow and rain, sit glassing in the weather for hours, or stalking, killing, cutting and packing meat. Every night you crawl into your small tent and burrow into a sleeping bag after wolfing down a mountain house. The only dry thing you own at the point is your sleeping bag and your night-night clothes. Your rifle is soaked generally. So much so that when you get home the rounds in the magazine will have a bit of corrosion where the water pooled between the contact points of the cartridges. Regardless, that rifle is good friend. You've chosen a rugged design and it's been proven on many hunts. This is brown bear country, so you make sure to place the soaking wet rifle in the same way beside you each night and even practice indexing it from where you lay in order to build some muscle memory about where it is, so that should you need it in the middle of the wee hours you'll have a better chance. Each time you roll over that rifle in the middle of the night it's a comfort to know it's there. If you hunt like this you're not lazy. Instead you're just living the life of a wilderness hunter, and you've got some well earned perspective.

Thanks. Will try that when I come home with a rifle that looks like it's been case colored orange in its entirety.......

No apply the Corrosion-X to your rifle before the hunt as the idea is it may not rust at all on your hunt.

Won’t touch wood/blue anymore after a few frustrating seasons of chasing my tail keeping rust at bay. Now it’s SS and Corrosion-X as the majority of my hunting involves some form of moisture.

Not all blueing is created equal. Gawdy as it may be, I'd expect a lot better rust resistance from the high-polish bluing on a Weatherby MK V, Browning A-Bolt Medallion, Win (USRAC) XTR's, etc. than I would from a 700 SPS.

Circa late-90's a buddy took his Kimber of Oregon 89 to Alaska on a caribou hunt. It was orange by the 2nd morning. He bought several SS/Syn rifles upon his return from AK.

I hunted caribou on the N Slope of the Brooks in '11. There was more danger of the rifles rusting in the hard-case on the plane flights than there was while we were hunting. We all had SS rifles, but, I'm pretty sure we could've easily completed the hunt with bbl'd actions of carbon steel "in the white" sans any rust.

Absolutely depends upon where you hunt. And yes you don’t need to use SS. My big game rifles are nearly all Pre War Mod 70 customs. They’re all blued. I just know what to expect and don’t really give a [bleep] if I have to wipe off some (cosmetic) rust when I get home.

One other thing not mentioned when hunting coastal Alaska, there may be a time or two when you may have to bathe your rifle in fresh water- outside, inside and down the barrel before drying it off. The first time you do that you cringe a little, but necessity is the mother of invention. And this done under a tarp, not in a cabin “wiping down” and oiling your gun by the fire next to your wife…

Where do you Drooling Fhuqktards DREAM this schit up? Hint.

I've never been to Alaska,because it sounds expensive. Hint.

Fhuqking LAUGHING!...................

August in SC Alaska it rained almost every day good luck taking care of your rifle living out of a tent.

The BEST way to treat High Polish Blueing and Living Walnut. 80-grit. Hint.





Ooooopsie...pardon actual use. Hint.





Pardon Reality colliding with your Fhuqktarded Fantasies,yet again. Hint.

Fhuqking LAUGHING!...............

What is blued stainless steel? How does it stack up against coatings or parkerizing?

Wax on bluing works pretty well

"Compelling" Fhuqktardation. Hint.






You Do NOTHING Kchunts are a HOOT! Hint.

Fhuqking LAUGHING!..................

Perfect deer hunting weather - don't have to drag your deer out, just float 'em out.

There's always a bright side. Hint.(grin)

Haven't bought a Blued Rifle since yesterday and I reckon I could do an "experiment",though I know how these things end. Hint.






Strikes me as a 22 PPC AFI Donor and likely yet another 20". Hint.




Thinking prolly a 1-6x HD Lit Bitch in MQ(of course). If only for conversation. Hint.

Got Wayne on the horn yesterday and he's shipping his metal floorplate,though he's out of follower springs. I asked that he send the magbox and bottom any way,as I'd probably have something that'll crossover as a follower spring. Will likely chop this spout,later in the day,after I open up more Mail. Hint......................

After playing with that one a bit, give us a rundown on it. Should be an interesting little rifle.

I like nitride, preferably over SS like my Knight UltraLite ML. Have two that are Cerakoted, a Howa Alpine and a CZ O/U. That stuff is okay, but will wear off of contact areas and can be scratched, so I treat it like blued. Mostly, it’s for the color.

Legacy really futzed up when they decided to replace SS with Cerakote. Saw a nice SS Mini online the other day, but the dang thing was in OZ, not here. C’mon Legacy, you’re losing sales on this, no doubt about it.

Birds of a feather. Ooooopsie! Hint.



Fhuqking LAUGHING!................

The one parkerized chrome-moly rifle I've had for 30 years easily beats all the other blued chrome-moly rifles I have for weather resistance, wear and gives a nice flat no-shine finish. It doesn't scratch as easy as my cerakoted stainless barrels. Bead blasted stainless using coarse beads is even more durable and not too shiny.

All "new" to me. Hint................

Pretty dry here but it ain't Paradise! Bluing doesn't protect against anything. Only coating does that. I have stainless rifles and I have blued rifles. I recognized that stainless and synthetic was better for bad weather and low maintenance, 45 years ago. Nonetheless, I still build and use blued steel and wood stocked rifles. GD

This worked well for me on some backpack hunts in Colorado in the snow and just the condensation that forms.

It may take some more applications of wax though while on a sure enough wet Alaskan hunt and running a patch with Hoppes or light oil then a dry patch down the bore every so often. This my slightly effect your zero though.

I’m a big fan of stainless in conjunction with Eezox or Corrosion-X. Stainless and Cerakote is maybe the best option.

If it is blued, I believe the deep gloss bluing is best. The Remington SPS is simply Horrible!

Stainless and Birdsongs Black T for the win! I have hunted a lot on Admiralty, Chichagof, Douglas, Haines, and Juneau. Blued guns just don't hold up. Your son went on a short trip one time. It is great that it worked out well for him and you are sold on Bluing. But that is a very very small sample size and period of time to come to the conclusion you have in my opinion.

Really? Blued rifles that have withstood harsh conditions are a small sample size?

I see reading comprehension isn't you forte!

Yes one rifle on a few weeks hunt in AK is like I said, a very very small sample size and period of time to come to the conclusion you have in my opinion.

Now if you want to talk about guns from everyone in general we can certainly talk about that. But it is still a uphill battle! Anyone that has spent any decent amount of time in the rain forest of SE AK knows they are going to get corrosion on blued rifles. Sure if you are only a day hunter maybe you can preserve a blued gun. But if you are spending weeks at a time in the field year after year there is no way you are going to keep a blued gun from corrosion. Now I never said sever pitting or exfoliation, I said corrosion!

We are talking about guns and blueing in general. But apparently your sample size of 1 kicks that to pieces? My reading comprehension is fine. Your conclusion is out to lunch. And of course any bafoon can ruin a rifle. That’s hardly an endorsement for painted rifles.

Bingo! The only thing I can add is that hard chrome ala Ron Mahosky's Metalife has proven to be corrosion proof and more durable than Black T. You just haveta watch the bores.

Surface rust is cosmetic ... rust in a bore or chamber is a problem. Stainless for the win! Hell, I had a blued rifle rust in the bore simply from bringing a cold gun into a warm house. Any copper in the bore reacts with the steel when moisture is present and pits the schit out of it too.