I'm refinishing a brand new lower to match a USGI carry handle upper. The color I'm looking for is referred to as colt gray. Its a Martin-Marietta M16A1 upper.

 

Thing is, the cans of paint for Gunkote and Duracoat seem to be an upwards of $30 or so, then tack on a hazmat fee of $15 and shipping and I'm $50 into a can of spraypaint. I can't justify that much on paint. Alumahyde is out of the question because I don't want to strip the existing annodization. Also, I don't have a spray gun so I am stuck with aerosol cans.

 

To get it re anodized, its going to run me about the same, but I don't want to have to ship the lower and be without it for a month or more.

 

Sure, I'm being cheap. I just don't want to be without my lower for a month or more, and I can't spend $50 on fancy spraypaint that I may screw up.

 

Thoughts? Advice? Suggestions?

Just leave it the way it is. Spend the money on ammo and shoot the poop out of it. Eventually, if you use it enough, the carbine will all look the same.

 

Who cares if the upper and lower don't match? It's a gun, not a purse and shoes.

Duracoat sucks and so does there tec. support people , I'm sure some people had good results with it. I did 4 guns at the same time, On 2 i was able to scratch off the paint .

1st i was told it was impossible to scratch it off ! then i was asked how i de greased them,, i used there de greaser and sprayed them down twice . I was told i de greased them to much ! At that point i ended my emails with them and stripped it off with paint remover .And used gunkote

I wanted to dabble in the Duracoat thing to see for myself if it lived up to the hype. I had three projects in mind. I like tools and tinkering and am also planning to restore / repaint my 78 Triumph Bonneville and figured cutting my teeth on some firearms would be a fine way to play around with a spray gun.

 

1. Remy 7600 carbine - This was bought to be a trunk gun / BO rifle. I modified the stock buy building up the grip area with some Marine Epoxy, drilled in a QD socket and 'bed' the stock to receiver mating surfaces. This was not disassembled as far as I would have liked, because I lacked the special tool to remove the pump tube. But figured F'it and just ran with it. I de-greased it and started with a base of ACU Gray followed by Colt Gray and hit is with some FDE. This job came out very, very nice and seems to be perfect. Neither the scope or rifle has any damage to the surfaces with a few trips to the range, bumping other rifles and essentially being tossed around a bit by design. This is the red-headed stepchild experiment.

 

2. A Marlin 336 that had a lot of blue worn off, some surface rust and a new barrel. I total stripped it down, with the exception of separating the barrel from the receiver and just removed the trigger group which I am not spraying (duh). I thought, key word, thought I did a good job de-greasing it. Where the bottom metal / floor plate slides into the receiver after the first coat of Tactical Black, I could see that I didn't. I wiped down the areas with Acetone and let it dry and repeated it a few more times and that seemed to cure my woes. I let it cure for about 4 days before reassembly and about 4 weeks before shooting it this past Thursday. The bottom metal to receiver mating surface scuffed during reassembly. Not bad, but noticeable to me. The bullet loading trap door, is already down to the factory blue from reloading it with about 30 rounds thru it. Overall, it looks much better then before and more importantly, have a nice coating on it to protect the surfaces. But not thrilled with this project's outcome.

 

3. Tikka T3 Stainless Hunter Fluted Barrel - I hit the barrel with Tactical OD as it sits in a nice factory stock in Mossy Oak. I am very pleased with the overall finish. However, I found one small nick on the underside that is just above the foregrip of the stock. It was there prior to assembly so I need to monitor that to see if it will spread or not. I plan to mix some up using an eye dropper and apply a drop with a Q-Tip. Overall...this looks frigging sweet. Let's see how it does over time and getting humped around in the woods by me.

 

Set up - I bought a $12 dollar Air Brush from Harbor Freight and then bought a second one to make my life easier. If I was to do one color for one job. I would buy the prefab sprayer / paint kit and be done.

 

There is no way I am painting my Sig with this. That project is going out to Windsong for his Black T treatment in FDE / Tac Black. For a utilitarian firearm, I think Duracoat has its place. For a quality restoration or a finish that will stand up to abuse or extreme elements like saltwater...NFW.

 

YMMV.

Who cares if the upper and lower don't match? It's a gun, not a purse and shoes.

Am I the only one that almost likes the mismatched finishes on guns?

Am I the only one that almost likes the mismatched finishes on guns?

 

Nope...funny, but doing my AR's hasn't even been thought about. My mutts have all sorts of character, like scratches and scars on a good bird dog or well worn motorcycle jacket.

I'm trying to build something nice. A worn XM gray upper mated to matte black lower is going to irritate me.

 

If you guys want mismatched guns, so be it. Go buy a wingmaster and throw a polymer stock on and keep the walnut foregrip.

I'm trying to build something nice. A worn XM gray upper mated to matte black lower is going to irritate me.

 

If you guys want mismatched guns, so be it. Go buy a wingmaster and throw a polymer stock on and keep the walnut foregrip.

I actually have a .410 o/u with a wood stock and a polymer foregrip.