Fire Blue Parts

[DonVoigt]

I believe I would call it "heat treatment" or "drawing" or "tempering".
The colors range from light yellow through red and blue to grey. It can be done for decoration but is more often the result of drawing hardened parts to render them less brittle.

Fire blueing is a commonly used mis-nomer, there is a "fire" blue , sometimes called carbon bluing or carbonia bluing; I believe Colt was "famous" for this very pretty but not very durable blue.

Here are the colors and temperatures required to achieve them on polished steel. These are not "my" charts but borrowed from other posts on these forums.

[ithacaartist]

Originally Posted by DonVoigt

I believe I would call it "heat treatment" or "drawing" or "tempering".
The colors range from light yellow through red and blue to grey. It can be done for decoration but is more often the result of drawing hardened parts to render them less brittle.

Fire blueing is a commonly used mis-nomer, there is a "fire" blue , sometimes called carbon bluing or carbonia bluing; I believe Colt was "famous" for this very pretty but not very durable blue.

Here are the colors and temperatures required to achieve them on polished steel. These are not "my" charts but borrowed from other posts on these forums.

I think Smith & Wesson also did the thin charcoal blue. My Llama mini 1911-styled pistols from the 40s also seem to have it. Thin, indeed!

Other than heating without the presence of as much oxygen, I'm not sure there's a difference between the carbon bluing and "fire bluing."

[Rick W.]

In my simple opinion, the early Lugers were as much a piece of art, as they were functional. Different concepts, times, and labor.

I always heard that the straw left vintage Lugers in mid 1937, but is only that, I can offer no document that says such. Must be out there, I hear the 37 straw timeframe a lot mentioned here.

One might surmise, and only that on my part, that the fire blue small Luger parts, was discontinued with the advent of hot blue, why not do all of them the same and get more pistols on line? Again just wondering and conjecture on my part.

The heat tempering/drawing tables show a number of colours. The home guy can do ok with the home cooking stove on a polished part as discussed here on this forum, but the big boys have controlled furnaces and a special controlled timing recipe. The home guy with the kitchen can get close with a bit of experimentation on methodology(heat control/time). Recipes could even be applicable to certain parts because of variables to get a common hue.

The heated parts are really not very durable, but to some quite beautiful on a vintage firearm.

I have seen a little of steel coloring with nitre salts. Brownells has them, used straight up, at temperatures for different colors.

I have a curiosity about the bluing of later firearms, charcoal blue; Colt, S&W etc, but never got into it. I would suspect parts are heated in a charcoal environment, perhaps in a metal container; kinda like case coloring; but not quite. Not even a novice here.

Green case coloring perhaps is gone with the schwinn, perhaps because of the hazardous materials. Old case coloring is a sight to behold to some of us.

A full regalia early Luger is indeed a pleasant sight. Sometimes I forget it was really a war weapon. I suspect some of that, and maybe just time/labor/$ caused the specialized coloring to go away.

Perhaps the Sturgess book references might shed some light on when all of that went away?