Steel Parts of Pipe Pistol
/Over the last 2 days I worked on finishing the steel sheet parts for the gun. Straight cuts I will do with a shear, corners and shaped cuts I will use a nibbler tool to take care of.
So first I marked out all the outlines on the sheet, then drilled holes for screw and in any corners or slits I need to cut with the nibbler. Smaller accurate cuts were done with the hand nibbler, and for the longer cuts for the strip that wraps around the front and sides were done with a air power nibbler.
As well as cutting out the sheet metal, I also cut out the section in the gun barrel for the bolt action sliding part. The ends of the slot were drilled, then angle grinder - file - dremel were used in series to cut and clean up the slot.
Lining up the pieces roughly to the wood everything fits in place. So ow all there is to do is to finish off the metal properly.
So I'm using hydrochloric acid to aid the corrosion. This is why I didn't care if the steel was blacked or galvanized when purchasing. A bucket of around 20% acid to water was made up (not measured, just by feel) and the parts were put in to soak for about half an hour. the barrel only got a quick dip because I didn't want the inside to rust too much. I didn't clean off the blue marking ink first, thinking it would come off in the acid. It did a bit but some parts needed steel wool to get it right off.
After soaking in the acid for a while the parts were left sitting out to start rusting. After about 4 hours the pieces had a light rust I was happy with, so I dipped them in a solution of caustic soda to neutralize and stop the rusting and rinsed off thoroughly.
As a final finish the steel was given a coat of clear coat rust inhibit so it looks polished and is gentler to the touch. Should be dry tomorrow.
