AR Outside Barrel Rust

I would use 0000 steel wool and oil and wipe it down with Rig or some other type of protective coating. If you choose to paint it with something you will have to bead blast it to get rid of any oxidation that's present.

If you don't apply oil to a parkerized finish, it will rust. The common parts on a AR that rust are the barrel, front sight tower, flashider, bolt catch, mag release, trigger, safety selector, takedown pins and dust cover.
Just wipe them down with good gun oil and you will be fine.
Now you can have all those parts Cerakoted, but that will cost you $50 to $100 and sometimes more.
Or you can buy a can of Brownell's Aluma-Hyde II for $12 and coat them yourself. I have used it on a few builds and it works great. It also comes in a few different colors.

I use hi temp black grill paint on all my barrels. Wipe them down good with a coat of oil make sure all rust is gone. Use some brake clean to get off all the oil and then put 3 to 4 coats of paint. Dries very fast so there's not a lot of time wasted between coat. I'm in florida with lots of humidity and use an outdoor range in all weather conditions. Have not had any barrel/gas block rust issues since I started using it.

A little oil and a wooden match stick or clothes pin will take it off without ruing any more of the parkerization.
Then oil everything down with a nice aerosol oil if your have a rail that covers the effected area.

What do you guys do with barrel under handguard? How frequent do you remove handguard and oil? Honestly, I have never, but I don't bring my rifles out in rain either!

Use a real light oil such as Kroil or other penetrating type to get under the rust and help lift it off when lightly scrubbed with steel wool. I use 0000 steel wool with it. On worse cases, try blue wonder rust removal with 0000 steel wool. After the removal, you will need to oil again. I normally re oil parkerized guns about once a year and recoat my wood stocks with BLO. Put the oil on, let it sit for a moment or two, then wipe off excess has worked for me.

If you choose to paint over the parkerizing, make sure you get rid of any trace of rust before painting as it can then rust under the paint.

Hank,
I remove my actions from the stocks about once a year because most of my stocks are oil finishes on very old wood military stocks. These tend to dry out if not re oiled causing cracks and splits as well as warping. Not rich enough to dunk the whole stock in BLO like the military did. But I do treat my barrel channel, handguards, magazine, and trigger areas, even remove the buttplate for re oiling. I use swabs for oiling the cutouts and the like to get into crevices. This also protects the stock by sealing it from gun oils which can soften the wood.

With the action out, it is easy to re oil the firearm's action and barrel. This tends to prevent pitting below the wood line on a stock.

HankC said:

What do you guys do with barrel under handguard? How frequent do you remove handguard and oil? Honestly, I have never, but I don't bring my rifles out in rain either!

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Depends. if I'm just shooting at the range it's not that big a deal to me. if I've got the gun out in the field and it's getting dirt and dust on it, and hanging out in a humid environment then the exterior gets a good wipe down before I put it up.

My guns with a delta ring are no big deal, just snap the hand guards off to oil it, then snap back on. Some of the others can be a small inconvenience because I need a tool to get the hand guards off, but it's still not too big a deal.

When you expose a rifle or any gun for that matter to the elements like rain for example, you clean and oil the rifle. When moisture is left trapped in places like under hand guards or in stock channels bad things will begin to happen real quick. You clean the gun and apply a protective coating of gun oil. I would think common sense would dictate that to any responsible gun owner.

Ron

I use a light aerosol like rem oil sprayed on liberally through holes in hand guards. Then blast off excess with compressed air. Using a light oil you won't have problems attracting grit and dust.