not the dogs

I have a couple of questions. On a revolver, what parts should I not duracoat? I'm not doing the inside of the barrel or the inside of the place where the bullets slide in, but is there anywhere else that I should tape off? Also can you spray a few coats of laquer over the duracoat to give it a shine? Thanks.

Nomercy448

Hookeye, did you do any sanding work between coats? Like anything else, painted finish is only as good as the metal prep done before it is applied. You can use paint on finishes to correct pitting if you plan it as a filler. Proper "paint" coats go on in regular thicknesses, so they don't fill voids. But if you paint, sand, paint, sand, paint sand... and so on, using sanding blocks to ensure it doesn't clear the pitting, you can fill pitting with paint coats. Taking off the sharp edges of the pitting before painting helps also.

A duracoat revolver, eh? Hmm... I've never seen such an animal. Single action or double action? Going through the thought exercise here without researching much, but knowing where revolvers have critical clearances and/or moving parts...

On a single action, you won't want to paint the stem of the basepin, probably won't want to paint the recoil plate or the rear face of the barrel. Probably won't be able to paint the indexing "star" or the front face of the cylinder (B/C gap clearance). You'll have to live with the cylinder ring digging through the paint, which may cause chipping if you apply the paint too thick --> especially if you do it in one coat. You may or may not be able to paint the inner faces of the loading port or the loading gate. Pay CAREFUL attention to successfully plug the firing pin on both sides. Many models, the firing pin cannot be removed by the owner (ruger for example), so you'd have to paint it with the pin in situ, which means you run the risk of painting the pin and locking it up, or "clogging" the pin housing. Can't paint the inner faces of the hammer recesses or trigger recess, can't paint the inside of the ejector rod housing. Can't paint the sides of the hammer or trigger unless you have lots of clearance (i.e. trigger & hammer that need shims badly). Will have to be careful painting the basepin latch, may or may not have clearance, and it may scrape the paint off as you use the latch. So that's an awful lot of revolver that you just can't paint.

On a double action revolver, probably can't paint (or will have to THIN coat) the inside of the crane, maybe not the "roller" of the crane (bottom exposed face). The front face of the cylinder is probably off limits, the hammer and trigger - and their recesses - are probably off limits just like in SA's. Very careful around the lock up mortise at the front if your revolver has them, and the cylinder stop bolt slot in the frame of course. Firing pin has the same issues as the SA's also - improper painting will lock it up or limit travel. Can't paint under the extractor on the cylinder, can't paint the cylinder pin, probably can't paint the extractor rod shaft, both for clearance and for the fact it will scratch badly as you cycle it.

So yeah, I'd honestly go looking at something else to refinish a revolver than duracoat, other than a purely superficial frame paint job. Seems like there's gonna be a lot of holes in the paint job on pretty visible faces (i.e. front of the cylinder) and there will be a lot of scratches if you do paint certain parts