Ever wanted to “blacken” a stainless gun?

The completed "629 Dark" revolver - Image copyright 2012 Northwest Gun Magazine

Have you ever wanted to turn a “silver” gun black? A while back I bought a very nice used Smith and Wesson model 629 from my friend Kevin Smith. This was actually my second 629 (my primary hiking carry gun is a 4″ 629). Why the second 629 you ask? Well, I felt it would be nice to have for the range (with red dot), and hey, it was for sale. 🙂

It wasn’t long and I was pondering what it would look like black. This led to a search for the perfect refinishing process for stainless steel guns. After quite a bit of research, I stumbled across a really cool finish called DLC (Diamond Like Carbon) from a company called Ionbond. This finish is only 4 microns thick, and is as hard or harder than natural diamond. Translation: If you don’t gouge the base metal, the finish isn’t going anywhere.

In the first two issues of Northwest Gun Magazine, you can read about the complete process of refinishing this revolver. The name of this series is “629 Dark, taking a stainless revolver to the dark side”. The first installment will cover research and prepping the revolver, including a complete teardown. The second installment will cover refinishing, reassembly, red dot install, and taking the dark 629 to the range.

Want to check it out? You can read the full first article in the Issue 1 preview of Northwest Gun Magazine (free PDF download available here).

This leaves me wondering, what else do I need to turn black? 🙂

Thanks,
Gavin

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