About Me: A certified yet non-professional gunsmith learning the trade through trail and inspiration

Friday, September 22, 2017

Lil' Buckeroo Project part 4

Part four of this project, if you missed the other click on the links below:

Featured Gun
Part One: introduction and the search for parts
Part Two: The stock
Part Three: The barreled action

This post will focus on the bolts, yes plural, I have two of them and since I was restoring one, I might as well do both of them and then sell the one I don't need.


The outer bolt bodies are chromed and the chrome is pealing. The cocking knobs are both rusted and pitted.


I dis-assembled the bolts so I could clean, polish and reblue some of the parts

I chucked the cocking knobs into my drill and used sand paper to clean them up, starting with 220 grit and finishing with 400 grit



A before and after picture


The firing pin is staked in place and can't be easily removed, but I was able to remove the extractor, it was gunked up, I cleaned them up with Hoppes #9


The inside of these bolts haven't been this clean since they left New Haven


I polished the bolt bodies with 400 grit sand paper


Then buffed them on the buffer, the chrome is intact on one of the bolts, the other is flaking off in places.



The rear sight and the bolt strikers were cleaned up on the wire wheel, a burnished finish will be fine for these parts. They will be re-blued and the red paint will be replaced.



Here are the parts after bluing

I repainted the "ready to fire" indicators with some Testors model paint (enamel)


Here is the bolt I will be using, assembled, lubed and ready to go