Metal finishes

[Siringo]

When did bluing become the predominant metal finish over browning? I am assembling a 36 caliber SMR this winter. Even though it’s a flintlock, the time period is around 1820’s. I have read the old rifles from the period, when disassembled, had blue metal on the bottom of the barrel while the top surface was brown. Obviously aging, but if it was NEW, I wonder what it looked like.

 

[Phil Coffins]

Blued.
Theres different ways to do it and each looks a bit different. Modern hot blue wasn’t around then.

 

[tenngun]

Blueing was done back on armor in the Middle Ages. We see shinny armor in museums often with tooled steel. In paintings we see plain blue black armor. Museum keep ‘dress uniforms’.
Blueing was done via chemical and via hot fire.
And we see old guns with blues barrels back to wheelocks.
Many old guns in America and made to be transported were in the white but charcoal blueing and chemical blueing was not uncommon.
Brown is is more a nineteenth century thing. And most old guns we see today are brown. However much of this is age and not the original finish.
Middlesex village has an original Kirkland officers fusil. When they removed the barrel they found it blue on the bottom.
However many of us (me) think blueing looks bad on an ml till the WBTS.
The NWG were blued, no matter how ‘wrong’ that looks
Chemical blueing can be done with a browning solution that’s then exposed to boiling water. I wonder if some gunsmith didn’t leave a unboiled brown barrel as a selling feature. Market forces applied back then too.

 

[kansas_volunteer]

Original Hawkens are said to have had blued barrels.