Uberti Case-Hardening

[Coal Creek Griff]

This question is related to my other query regarding engraving my Uberti 1873 rifle side plate.  Can anyone tell me definitively that the Uberti color case-hardening is an actual hardening process, rather than just a cosmetic finish?  I can't remember who told me that it was just cosmetic, but now others are suggesting that it is actually case-hardened.  It makes a difference to an engraver.

Thanks, ladies and gents.

CC Griff

[Chance]

I asked Uberti that very question some years back - didn't get a reply.

Chance

[Montana Slim]

I believe it is casehardened, just not the bone-type hardening.
I recall an engraver telling me the same. And, that he was able to do it, but with difficulty.
Now if you want the side plates engraved, they could be removed, stripped and lightly ground through the case, then they can be carved easily and either blued, nickled, or re-cased afterward.

If your considering laser-engraving or etch-engraving, this can be done regardless of the hardness.

Regards,
Slim

[Coffinmaker]

Uberti case hardening is actual case hardening.  It is NOT chemical.

Coffinmaker

[Ten Wolves Fiveshooter]

     This gun is an Intercontinental Dakota, in 45 long Colt, I bought in 1967, it's been heavily used over the years, and strong solvents used to clean it, but the colors were never affected, it's a true Case Hardening, a lot of what they put out today with the chem. treatment doesn't seem to hold up for long, that's why Ruger stopped doing it on there Vaquero's, too many complaints, my Gun is a Jaeger Dakota, and was even proofed tested nine times by firing nine bullets into a plugged barrel, most of the Uberti's I've seen with case hardening seem to have the real hardening on them, and tend to look good after years of use also.

                     tEN wOLVES    

[Coal Creek Griff]

Thanks, gents.  I'm glad to know that it is "real" case-hardening, although that pushes my engraving idea beyond my budget.

CC Griff

[Chase]

I do not believe that Uberti case hardens their receivers.  I do think that they are case colored, however-probably a chemical treatment.
I have engraved on the sideplates of an 1873 with no problems.  OOOO steel wool takes off the finish rather easily.

Chemical casecoloring goes back a ways too. .  Cyanide was used to color case  but as you can guess, a little dangerous.
(I had a friend would restored an 1849 Colt use the cyanide method)

Casehardening was more for wear resistance than it was for cosmetic purposes. Although people liked its looks.
The concept behind casecoloring was to provide a hard surface while maintaining a more flexible "inner core" of metal
that would hold up to the stresses of the firearm's function. 

I would hate to see what Uberti would raise their prices to if the guns were truly casehardened.
Besides, after engraving the gun, I think it would look more historically correct if the gun were blued
as most Winchesters came from the factory.

[GunClick Rick]

Got two Dakotas and a 92 and they all match,i have not used them alot but have cleaned them and nothin came off.Would real case hardening not show the engraving as well? I like them also..

[Hoof Hearted]

Anyone offering real color case hardening can remove case hardening (the colors are a by-product which occurs in the quench and are directly related to water hardness and oxygen levels as well as shielding) by annealing your parts.

HH

[Curley Cole]

My Jager Dakota is not as old as 10W, but it probably is proper cch, as it is about 30 years old and still vivid.
I have a Uberti SAA from Taylors that I have only had for about 6 years and the cch has albut rubbed off. The frame of that gun almost looks pure white.

The bottom gun in the pix below is my Taylors Uberti, and the finish is less than what shows in this pix. (and dang thing is I don't shoot it all that much)
good shootin
curley

[Coal Creek Griff]

Well, now there doesn't seem to be agreement.  If I had to have it annealed and re-case hardened, it would push it out of my price range.  Oh well, engraving was only an idle thought anyway...

CC Griff

[Curley Cole]

Griff

I think the reason there is "no agreement" is probably because, depending on what year you would buy a gun would also affect the "perks" on said gun.

As you can see on my Uberti above, the cch was for sure not even up to par for the chemical process. I know depending on when you buy/bought a GW2 you could have gotten excellent Turnbull, some other guys good bone cch and even the cheaper process. They all have been available.

So I would imagine everyone that has responded has been right about their own gun, and others seen.

I would like to see some other folks pix of their gunz and the case hardening on them.
good shootin
curley

[concho]

This is a case hardened action done in bone & charcoal mix cooked in a crucible then droped in water . depth of hardness ranges from .005 to .030 depending on length of time it is inside furnace .

[Abilene]

Uberti heats the frames in a mixture of salts, then quenches them in cold water.  I have been told that they don't pay close attention to keeping the water cold which is the reason some of the frames have little color.  Griff, many engravers have worked on Uberti frames and I've never heard any of them complain about the difficulty, so I'm thinking you should be able to get your side plates done easily.  I know one engraver would add cold blue into his engraving lines with a toothpick.  This makes the engraving more subtle to the eye but also protects the bare metal from rust.

[Curley Cole]

I know one engraver would add cold blue into his engraving lines with a toothpick.  This makes the engraving more subtle to the eye but also protects the bare metal from rust.

I think it is Jim Aliamo that does that, it is called "inking"..also makes the engraving stand out more. My Taylors have been inked and they look great.

curley

[Coal Creek Griff]

Thanks again for the good info, folks.

CC Griff

[rifle]

I wouldn't believe Uberti's are pack hardened with the actual bone and wood charcoal like ,say,Turnbulls. The metal is probably hardened in some fashion though and the color case is chemical applied which used some heast but not like the red hot for hours pack hardening. The gun metal is probably actually pretty low in carbon so it can be hardened some but wouldn't get brittle and need tempering to bring it back from the "too brittle".
Even real case hardening colors fad. Some guns hold the colors better than others depending on the depth of the case colors. The colors are actually made from the heat and the quench as the water hits the steel and cools it and leaves the "heat colors". You know...different heat temps make steel turn different colors. The parts fall into the water and cool at different rates on different parts of the piece and the different temps on the areas leve different colors. It's all "heat colors". What makes the difference between real case hardening and chemical is that the real stuff actually has "globules of carbon" on the surface as seen under the microscope. Like a mountain range in "micro size". The globules of carbom adherring to the surface reflect light differently. The gases in the crucible where the parts are packed in the wood/bone charcoal contain crbon and the carbon reacts to the steel molecules and attaches.
Anyway....I'd have to get my research papers out with an article I have that explains a lot of what the real case hardening actually is. The article states that no one knows for sure what the actual activity is exactly where the cae hardenind reactions take place. It's still a mystery for s lot of what actually happens.
What is known is that carbon enters the steel on the surface only so deep into the steel. The longer the steel is held at what they call the "critical temp"  the deep the carbon gets into the surface.
In the old days.....they learned to harden metal with getting carbon into it by taking the gun parts that were relatively mild steel and some iron. The encased the part in a clay with organic articles inside with the steel. They found wood and bone charcoal seemed to work best. The gun metal was wrapped in leather sometimes too.
The parts in the clay were put in a fire and left to get red hot for a period. The clay with the parts in it was then thrown into cold water. One time,it is said, that the clay holding the gun parts cracked just as it was being thrown in the water. The gunsmith noticed thst the parts turned different colors in different areas and the colors were pretty. Gunsmiths learned people lked the colors too. The colors began to be a visual sign the parts were hardened. People wanted the colors since that was proof the parts were hardened and hardened parts people learned lasted longer.
Gunsmiths then realized that if they cracked the clay just before the clay with the parts was thrown into the water the colors appeared on the parts and proved the parts were hardened.
Anyway....the parts in the clay were quenched with the water getting into the crackes in the clsy and cooling the steel at different rates in different asreas and leaving the  different "heat" colors on the steel. That's all the colors are. Heat colors with the carbon globules on the surface retaining the colors. There's a whole spectrum of colors left on steel from cooling at the different temps and the colors just became a visual sign the metal was hardened and that became the proof people wanted that their gunparts were quality and hardened properly. The colors on the steel were discovered by accident when a gunsmith threw his clay enshrouded parts in the water when the clay was cracked cooling the parts ast different temps in different areas.
Anyway..gunsmiths learned the colors didn't last real well so they began to cover the colors on the steel with laquer to protet them. The laquer wears away  eventually and then the colors begin to fad eventually too.
Under the laquer or before the gunparts are laquered,if they even are, the real case hardening isn't gloss. It has a certain matt to it. That certain unshiny look to it. That's one way to tell the real stuff. It ain't real shiny. Photos may make it look like it is more shiny than it actually is. I've read that a real case hardening has a file slide over it without scratching. Like the case of carbon is as hard as a file.
The steel used in gunmaking wasn't real high in carbon and is relatively mild and resilient. The encasing of the parts in carbon rich steel makes for better wear resistance and actuall does make the piece harder on the surface to asvoid deformation. You know...like a percussion revolvers hammer nose needs to be resilient but still able to withstand the beating. The carbon surface helps the part keep from deforming longer and the relatively mild steel core retained the parts resiliency. Case hardening means the part is encased in a surface of hard carbon rich steel. The steel used back in the day was mild since steel manufacturing was still evolving.
I just read something on that and the gun steel that was evolved more was shipped in from Sheffield England and from the Bessemer blast furnaces invented by Mr. Bessemer in England also. No one in the US was able to duplicate the quality of the Sheffield or Bessemer steel for decades. The Sheffield steel was simply discovered to haphazzardly be produced where the ore was different and had qualities to it not found anywhere else in England or the US.
Later they found that they could heat flat sheared off steel pieces for awhile in a certain envirinments and get the pieces to soak up carbon thru the whole flat piece. Then they discovered they could do the process again and get more carbon in. Shear steel was discoverd then resheared steel. bacically it went somehow like that. Finding good gun steel was a problem back in the day. At one time the best came from England from around Sheffield England and from the Bessemer furnances in England. The Bessemer steel wasn't able to be produced in the US and attempts to duplicate the Bessemer process wasn't successful in the US for a good long time. Bessemer did a ting where a huge air supply was blasted thru the furnace and that somehow got carbon into the steel. It's amazing what the people went thru to make good steel and amazing what the gunmakers went thru to find and get the good steel.
Anyway....in the beginning the more mild steel they had to use needed some help and the case hardening was what they had to use since they didn't know what else to do to harden the steel well enough. Steel is just iron with carbon in it.
When Winchester finally began to use smokeless powder they took the heavy octagon barrels for black powder cartridges from the 1886 lever action and replaced it with a thinner round barrel since the better steel was discovered that would withstand the pressures of smokeless without being so heavy walled . That's an example.
Anyway......I wouldn't say the Uberti's are case hardened for real. They have the color case not the case hardneing.
Cyanide was used to color steel as an easy way to do it. The cyanide was just a medium to heat parts in where the parts would be a uniform temp throughout and be protected from ther atmosphere getting to the metal and oxodizing the surface instantly and ruining the ability of the metal to get colored by the quench. If air gets to the parts in pack hardening just before the quench the colors don't appear and it's the same with cyanide but the cyanide covers the metal so air can't get to it. The parts in cyanide coloring are dipped into the quench slowly and the heat colors appear on the steel simply from the heat at different temps coloring the steel. Heat colors. Not real carbon cased.Like cheating on the process. Get the colors and the hell with hardening the steel. Gunsmiths didn't have to actually harden the steel since it was already hard. The red hot heat of the cyanide bath softened the steel and then the water quench rehardened it. The process is just for the heat colors to the metal and not a carbon surface. Just the colors from the different temps the parts quench at when they are placed relatively slowly into the quench water.The cyanide parts aren't really dumped in. You can get real nice tiger striped colors to the parts from lowering the parts and stopping an instant then lower then stop then lower then stop. Kinda fast but not just dumped. The NEF shotguns have that cyanide bath quench look to them. Like stripes of color.
Cyanide may add carbon to the surface but I see it as a simple faster way to get colors. Some gunsmiths may have used scenarios where they splashed water on the parts to get that random colors to the metal like the real case hardening.
Anyway with the cyanide coloring the metal was usually laquered to protect it.
Sometimes even the real pack hardening is laquered. That makes it look more shiny then it really is.
Anyway that's about the way it is in a vague unprofessionsal simple guy talk way the best I can relate it.
Other people probably know more about this than I and probably could type it out better too.

[Professor Marvel]

I offer for your perusal and edification some amusing links

http://www.doublegunshop.com/doublegunjournal_v7i4_9.htm
http://web.archive.org/web/20050520082250/http://www.restoration-gunsmith.com/ArtCCase.html

yhs
prof marvel

[rifle]

Prof. Marvel, I typed a reply to this and...the puter messed up and my reply went off into cyber space lost forever,I think.
Anywhooo...can you be any help in my quest to find the secrete to geting more "GREEN" to my color case hardening? I need to find the secrete to more REDS too.
Can you be any help in finding more info on the original authentic bluing of the cap&ballers? I have some info but I bet there's more somewhere. Any in the ole noggin of Prof. Marvel?
Anywhooooo..... this is "Wayne" that hangs out at www.voy.com/60048/ which is voy forums black powder revolver message board. Here I'm referred to as "Rifle" naturally. Revolvers I do up and put in order are :"Waynerized". 
I'm sorta planning on doing and offering some cap&baller revolvers  tuned,timed,indexed,aligned,reamed in the chambers and forcing cone  properly and point of aim=point of impact and with the authentic pack bone and charcoal case hardening and...with the authentic type bluing.
I wanna get it right first time out with the authentic bluing. I have done some experiments and have some info but...I bet there's more info out there somewhere.
Anywhooo.....there's a Colt 1862 Pocket Police pic on the home page of "Classic Guns". I can get that kind of case hardening but need the "green" and more "red".
One last thing about that cyanide casehardening. It does harden the steels surface with some kind of carbon-nitrite process. I just read that somewhere this morning reading stuff off the web. Anyway cyanide would be difficult to get now-a-days since it's so poisonous. One little speck in a tiny cut in your finger and it's by-by time. I know someone that at least had a whole fifty-five gallon drum of the stuff. Never would give me any though. Cyanide salts melt and get moulten and clear so you can see the parts in it ged red as the crucible gets red hot too. Heat tongs....get the parts out and quench the however the gunsmiths method  was. I had a friend that did up a cheapie NEF single barrel shotgun with the cyanide. He dipped the reciever in the water a little at a time but...kinda fast. It got real nice colors to it in stripes across the reciever and...to me didn't look much different than it did befire he polished off the original colors. maybe it had cyanide case hardening on it originally. I guess a manufacturer could get cyanide and do it that way. It's easier since the air can't get to the pieces surface because the cyanide is on it. The packhardening with the bone and wood charcoal has to be dropped from the crucible real close to the water so air doesn't hit the piece and instantly oxidize the surface and ruin the colors...but....as so often happens with gunsmithing stuff there is an opposite opposing  trait that means the air is also good. It gets sucked down with the parts into the water and oxygenates the water and gives good colors  since the water needs to be oxygen rich. What some people relate to other people is that the coils of brass tubing in the bottom of the quench tank that is hooked to a compressor to oxygenate the water "is blowing air into the water as the guench is taking place. That's not true. The compressor does the oxygenating before the quench and its turned off at quench time. It's not difficult to find mis-information on the web. Know what I mean?
Thanks for any help (finding what gives greens and reds with the case hardening) from you or anyone here.