The thread asks an excellent question. Don's comments make sense and suggest to me that they skipped rust bluing small parts as a cost saving measure; that's speculation by me.
When restoring WWII aircraft we often see a clear decision by the manufacturer to make small parts cheaply vs. durably. Restorers of vintage WWII aircraft love to gripe/observe that the aircraft were not built to last for decades, but rather to win a war (i.e.built for a single-digit service life). A flying WWII aircraft today often has less than 30% of its original parts by weight/parts count.
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