Your Advice: Refinishing a Colt Lawman Mk III .357 4"

[jsmosby]

I just bought a Colt Lawman, .357 Magnum, 4", blued. It needs refinishing due to some wear spots, scratching, and mild rust. This is strictly a CCW holster gun -- not a collector's piece. I have two choices on refinishing.

[1] RE-BLUE. I could get the existing bluing stripped off, and reblue the gun again. My chief concern is that the internal parts cannot be polished for a trigger tune since they are made of case-hardened steel. I am wondering if this same limitation also applies to the outside of the gun. If so, stripping the bluing off with some type of "blasting" operation doesn't seem particularly smart. Since I plan to do a lot of holster practice with this gun, I would probably have to reblue it again in the future.

[2] CHROME (MATTE FINISH). This is what I am leaning toward. I get a very durable, non-glare finish. Is case-hardened steel a limitation? Should I get the inside parts of the gun chromed since I live in the Southwest? If the front sight is chromed, will this cause glare when sighting (there must be a reason that Rugers SS revolvers have blued front and rear sights)?

Please let me know your thoughts.

 

[Old Fuff]

The hammer and trigger in your Mk III Colt are slintered metal, made by a molding process. Trying to polish them won't get you very far. However dry firing will burnish the contact surfaces, and get you as much improvement as can be expected.

The rest of the revolver is high-carbon steel, and can be refinished by bluing, Parkerizing, or plating. However there is a problem. If you go to plating the firing pin should be removed, and putting it back is something only the factory can do. I consider this to be a major fault in an otherwise fine revolver. If I was going to get one refinished by any method I would call Colt's customer service department first for advise.

 

[gb6491]

I had a Colt Trooper MKIII (hammer and trigger as well) matte hard chromed years ago. Local guy (Anaheim,CA. at the time) did all the work and it came out very nice. I also had him install an orange insert in the front sight.
Regards,
Greg

 

[dfariswheel]

Colt will refinish your Lawman in your choice of blue or hard chrome.

They do really excellent work, price is very competitive, and turnaround is usually the fastest.

For a using gun, my choice would be hard chrome. This will enhance the case hardened internal parts, and will make the trigger action even smoother.
A hard chromed Lawman is about as close as you can get to a "forever gun".
The Colt "J" frame is likely the strongest medium frame DA revolver ever made, and hard chrome is one of the few gun finishes that is considered to be a true life time finish.

One word of caution, always use snap caps when dry firing A Mark III or later Colt.
The firing pin "can" break, and as above, replacement is a factory ONLY job.