Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Custom Rifles & Wildcats question regarding build order on chromoly rifle

I am going to be receiving a chromoly barrel and action in the next few weeks that will be sent off for blueing. Should I have the barrel chambered and threaded before or after bluing?

Were it me, I would want all machine work done before any finish work. Wouldn't make sense to me to have a fine finish put on then marred up while doing the machine work.

John

I suppose that makes sense. My local gunsmith retired so I'm probably looking at shipping the gun around for most of the work. Since my stock won't be ready for a couple months after the receiver/barrel I was hoping to get the blueing done then hold off on the chambering until the stock was ready so I could have it bedded at the same time.

IGuru,
What caliber are you planning on?
What Riflesmith will you be working with?
and lastly....who is making your stock?
Thanks, JH (30mm)

Bluing is the last operation for a rifle. Wasting time and money doing it in advance.

Leaning towards good ole 30-06. I don't like to shoot game past 300 meters and picking up plinking ammo for $20 a box is really nice.

I don't yet have a smith lined up for the bedding and action work, that's what my local guy use to cover. Honestly he needed to retire, I'm not entirely happy with the last rifle he did for me, the action ended up tilted upward on the barrel end and it just looks sloppy. Oh yeh, and he labeled the new barrel with the cal, but then when he put it in the stock it was hidden from view, so he cut a notch in the stock.

Stock is a mcmillan, on order but 6 months out.

Then I asked him if I could fit it as a hat for him...

Wow.. Speechless...

W

This is the notch.

Here's one of the "free floated barrel" that doubles as a space to store loose change and pens.



Back on the subject of my upcoming build, should I wait on the stock from mcmillan before I have the barrel mated to the action? If I don't wait, I may be able to have the barrel work and then the blueing completed before the stock gets here.

That rivals some of the bad gunsmithing I have paid for.

Bluing is the very last step because you have got to polish the metal absolutely mar-free in order to get a nice bluing job. Doing any of the metal work ore even the bedding after bluing will put scratches in the finish that are a non-issue when they occur before the polishing.

If you know how to completely disassemble the gun, and are painstaking enough, you could hand polish the gun yourself and send it to Glenrock Blue for their dip service, which is about $100 and quick turn around. They don't polish it--what you get back is what you sent them.

Send all the parts to Chad Dixon and he can do all that work at his place. One stop shopping...

Glenrock blue is who I was planning to have do the blueing. I will bookmark the Longrifles inc website, that looks like a pretty high tech operation- good website too.

I suppose I will wait to get everything blued until it's been bedded in the stock. Once a part is polished, does it need to be blued immediately or can it sit around a few weeks/months?

My current parts on order or already here are:
Borden Timberline long action C/M
Shillen #3 30cal 1/10 twist C/M
Echols Shrike stock
Pacific tool steel floorplate
Haven't decided on trigger

Certain high tech operations and websites scare me.