Henry Rifle Forums

Lately I’ve been trying to take better care of my 3 Colt Lightning rifles and other antique firearms. Not so much thinking of “restoration” as “preservation”. I inherited 3 of these really cool old rifles from my grandfather probably about 30 years ago along with a 1906 Winchester .22 pump gallery rifle, a Sharps 4 barrel .22 derringer, a SAA evolved chambered in .38 Colt, & some original Army & Navy percussion revolvers. I really didn’t (and still don’t) know how to properly care for them. They each have some rust and pitting I’d like to try to minimize as much as possible. My grandad had most of the guns coated in a thick grease, and then wrapped in a thick cotton cloth. The guns have been stored in a small, cheap sheet metal gun safe in my basement for the last 25 years. I don’t believe the surface rust has gotten much worse in that time, but it certainly hasn’t gotten any better. This one is marked “38 Cal.”, which I believe mean’s it’s chambered for the .38-40? It feels tight enough to actually be a shooter, if light loads were used. Pretty certain I don’t wanna go there, but a neat idea to entertain.
One cool thing about these rifles versus a lever gun is the ability to be “slam fired”. You can pull the trigger and hold it back as you pump the next round in it, and then just keep pumping while holding the trigger until 15 rounds have been launched. Might make a nice Home Defense gun that doesn’t look as “threatening as, say, an AR platform rifle. I have another medium frame chambered in .32-20, and a small frame in .22 long, if I recall correctly. Here’s the.38:


The “Rampant Colt” logo, or whatever it is called, may be somewhat just barely visible here:



Does anyone know of a method and/or product to help preserve antique bluing and finishes? So far, all I’ve done is to wipe it down with a cloth rag and Renaissance wax polish. Just wondering if there’s a better method of keeping the rust from getting worse, and preserving what’s left of the bluing?

FWIW, I’ve watched this 4 part video series from a guy that is an INCREDIBLE CRAFTSMAN that restores a rifle a bit older than mine. If you “fast forward” to the 13:20 point or so, you can see what he began with, and what it looked like to the end of the video. The way he repaired the cracked/missing section of the wooden pump handle was amazing to me. I built and assembled the body of the guitar in the top photo (bought a neck, however, to speed things up and to actually get to play the thing), but my skills suck like a bucketful of ticks compared to this guy.

https://youtu.be/Um-hWmgnxPY

I feel my rifle is in slightly better shape than what he started with, and am probably not going down the restoration path. But man, did he ever do a fantastic job!

Always liked those rifles. Hard to find 'em now. Interesting to see a Strat body with Telecaster pick-ups and controls. All nice!

I'm no restoration expert - those are actually rare - but I do know about rust and storage issues with guns. Storing guns in your basement in a simple metal gun safe is fine as long as a couple of conditions are met.

One is humidity. Humidity definitely promotes rust and basements tend to have a higher humidity than the rest of the house. The most common way to solve this is to add a dehumidifier to the safe and maintain as per the instructions. You can find these online at sites that also sell gun safes. Now, if you're basement isn't very humid no big deal, but do continue wiping down your guns with a good gun cloth after every handling to remove your fingerprints, which can also leave enough moisture and salt to cause rust.

The other potential issue with basements is that they tend to be cooler than the rest of the house. Not a problem for storing the guns and leaving them there when you handle them, but if you bring them into other parts of the house that are warmer or take them outside directly on a hot day, you can get enough condensation on the gun to cause rust if you return the gun to the safe without wiping it down. Our basement is much cooler in the summer than the rest of the house, so one thing I do is to wrap the gun in a plastic bag before bringing it upstairs and then leave it in the bag for 30 minutes or so until the gun comes to room temp. That way the condensation forms on the outside of the plastic, rather than the gun.

As for the original bluing, just continue what you are doing and wipe down the guns lightly with an oiled rag. Don't drown the gun in oil or get aggressive and try to hand polish the metal. You just want to leave a light coating of oil after handling. If you want maintain the collectibility on those guns, do NOT re-blue. That definitely reduces the value to a collector and to many other buyers as well. Buyers want the original finish.

That goes for the stock, as well. Just wipe it down, too, and otherwise leave it alone. The Renaissance wax is fine, though. You just don't want to use any product that removes or degrades the original finish. On that note, be cautious not to get any bug dope with DEET on your stock. DEET actually makes a good stock finish remover.

Mr. Neutron wrote: ↑

Fri Nov 11, 2022 11:23 am

... if there’s a better method of keeping the rust from getting worse, and preserving what’s left of the bluing?

I 2nd NCG advice. See the wear as 'character' to be preserved.

Very nice original Lightning!

Thanks for the replies, Y'all!!!

Yeah, North Coutry Gal, you're totally right about my basement. It sounds pretty similar to yours. Cooler with more stable temps pretty much year round. I do think it has considerably less humidity than, say, my pole barn. The barn is uninsulated and has no moisture barrier or vents for the roof. Some years in March, I get rain on the inside of it from condensation. Anyway, my basement is where we put stuff that we don't want to have rust issues with, like some of my old machinist tools, my wife's antiques, my reloading area, and such. There is a staircase going down into my basement that has a fair amount of room under it. It has a concrete wall on one side, is behind a downstairs fireplace on one side, the stair treads are on one side, and a metal door framed in for the 4th side. I intended for that to be a humidified gun room at one point in my life. But while I was elk hunting one year, my son moved into the room adjacent to "my Future Gun Room". He has since moved out again, but living in a small apartment, still has stuff stored in the Future Gun Room. Sigh....... So much for those plans......

Anyway, I think the humidifier is a good idea at any rate. I had planned to put one in that "Future Gun Room", but forgot about it since it's full of my son's junk in there.......

And another good suggestion from ya is to let the steel/wood of the firearm acclimate when I bring it upstairs to wax, oil, or whatever. This time of year we are using our wood heat in the upstairs fireplace insert, so the humidity is practically nil. But it is probably 15-20 degrees warmer in the living room, I'm bettin'. Probably should at the very least keep it in the silicone-saturated gun sock gizzie it's in for a few minutes, huh?

Rifletom, Thanks! The amp, guitar, and the gun are "a few of my favorite things", hee hee.....

For some reason, I wanted to make something just a bit different from a regular Tele (or Strat). I found out that Warmoth actually makes bodies like this (I believe that Fender is now as well? ), but still built my own from some Alder I had that has some decent grain (for Alder). I really didn't pioneer any new ground here. It's finished in Tru-Oil; around a dozen really light coats. At about 5 years of age, I'm kinda surprised at how beat up it's getting, but it's the "Daily Driver" of my guitar collection. Gets played daily. The neck was bought from Warmoth because so far, I haven't yet built a neck I like. Necks are HARD to build! Well, GOOD Playing necks are tough to make, anyway, with my skill level. I'm still learning there..... The amp was a Christmas present from the wife a coupla years ago, and I love the little thing. I have a 15 watt Fender Super Champ X2 tube amp that i like, but the Yamaha takes up a bit less space, sounds just as good to me, and looks "vintage" with the little orange LEDs insde the thing.

Again, I truly appreciate your responses here! Thank y'all! I really am trying NOT to mess up what finish is left on these firearms, and hopefully keep 'em nice for another 100+ years....... Probably should just lightly oil and wax 'em, huh? Then keep 'em wrapped up in those "gun sock" gizzies in the safe?

Now I have to go outside while it's not raining, and use my "gas powered hydraulic sight pusher" (Mags knows about this, hee hee) on some firewood.

Glad to help. Love those Colts. I often wonder how the tradition of lever guns in the Old West would have fared if pump guns had arrived on the scene, earlier. After all, pump guns are more effective for followup shots. Would all those TV western stars we baby boomers grew up with been shooting pump guns?

My experience with wood stove heat is similar. It is very dry heat, so the condensation thing would be pretty minimal.

Here’s a quick pic before my phone battery totally dies. These are the handguns:


There’s some cool stuff about them. I will go into EDIT on my laptop in a minute, and give some more info about these……….

In EDIT, on my laptop: The handguns seem to be less affected with rust than the rifles are, sorta. They're in mostly the same shape as I received them from my Gandpa. Will send pics of the other 2 Colt Rifles, and the little Winchester pump gun later, after my phone charges.

Anyway, sorry the pic is rotated 90 degrees clockwise. Learning a new iphone at the same time I'm posting with it. The gun on (what would be) the top of the photo has very good engraving on it. You can see some of it, but the engraving of the Naval battle on the cylinder is tougher to see in person, and in the photo. It's a nice tight gun (cylinder lockup is good), that if I were so inclined (I'm not) could possibly be fired. All the S/Ns from the barrel, frame, trigger guard, on the bottom of the grip are the same, and they're all very legible. Sometimes, during wartime repairs during the Civil War (and possibly later battles, I'd suppose) parts would get mixed and matched from, say, one frame or triggerguard to another, and you'd have a mix of different S/Ns on one running gun. On this one, they all match, which is good from a collectible standpoint. I'm guessig it's a .38 cal. or so. I used to have more info on these Colt revolvers, and just figured out that I can't find it. Have no idea of the model, the year, and other specs. I really need to get off my butt and write a letter to Colt requesting as much info I can get from them (and afford) as they are able to provide. I do have been told that there was a fire a long time ago in their records dept., and a lot of info on some guns is no longer available.

The next one down is a bigger caliber with a longer barrel, possibly .40 or .44? It has more pitting than the upper gun, and is a much "looser"gun. The cylinder rattles when the hammer is down, at half-cock, or full cock. I believe it's been shot more than once. The serial nos. for the frame, barrel, triggerguard, and the part that runs down from below the hammer, down the grip, and around the bottom of the grip are much harder to read, but all seem to match. There is some engraving on the cylinder that says "Colt's Patent XXXXXX." and other info, but the pitting makes it tough to read accurately. In tiny engraving below that, it reads XXXXX 1853. Very hard to read, even with a magnifying glass. I can't read the parts of it where I put the "X"s in......

The SAA is chambered for .38 colt, which I'm told is a VERY Anemic round. I won't volunteer to jump in front of it when fired, however...... I had a gun shop look up some info for me on these 4 guns many years ago, and again, I can't find it right now, but I seem to recall that this one was made around 1911. And that's about all I know about that one. It's cylinder lockup is fairly tight, and has some grips made from an antler from something; I dunno what though...... I'm not certain that it shipped from the factory with these, for some reason.........

Below that is a little C. Sharps 4-barrel derringer. Shoots either .22 shorts or .22 longs; I forget which. You put it at half cock, push a little button below the front of the barrels, and all 4 barrels slide forward for loading. The hammer has (what I feel is) an incredible little tiny rotating mechanism built into "the business end" of it that moves 90 degrees everytime you cock the hammer back and aligns with one of the barrels, to bump the .22 primer. A really cool feat of engineering, especially considering the timeframe when it was made. Which I don't know was, again...... I seem to recall finding out that there quite few of these made, so they're not really very rare.

I don't know that any of these guns are considered "rare", but to me, mean the world. Not really concerned about rarity.

And that's about all I know about these, for now. More pics of rifles in another post a bit later.

Again, thanks for your help and advice. It's very much appreciated. I hope my writing about this stuff ain't too terribly boring.....

Jimmie

Those are some amazing guns. In that kind of vintage, you'd have to get the help of an established expert in the field to get a realistic value. As you've already done at one point, you can get a lot of info online, but it would take a real expert to fully evaluate what you have.

Regardless, thank you so much for sharing. I can't tale my eyes off those pics.

Very nice bunch of Colts and thanks for the excellent photos. The Colt Lightning was also made in a large frame and some were in 50-95 express the same as the Winchester 76.

Thanks, Travlin!

Yeah, it would be really nice to round out a collection with a Large Frame Lightning. Probably be tough to find one that I could afford, though.

If I recall from some reading I’ve done awhile back, or a video I’ve watched in the last week, I think that there were only around 6000 of those made. I believe total production was around 190.000 total for all 3 frame sizes, with most of those .22s? I likely have my facts wrong on that, and wouldn’t mind being corrected if needed. I’ve been so busy and preoccupied with other stuff around here I can’t recall what I’ve seen lately……..I need to find a Colt Lightning Pump rifle Guru, I reckon…….

Like North Country Gal alluded to, I went to a Colt website last night. I found out the med. frame .38 cal pump rifle was built in 1890 by its serial number. They were made until sometime in the early (1903-ish) 1900s. The two med frames are not “the early ones”, as those just had a hole/slot in the top of the receiver for the case to be ejected through. My .32 & the .38 both have covers kinda built into the bolt that closes the slot in the top of the receiver when the bolt is forward.

Will try to get photos of the other pumpers soon………
Thanks, Y’all!

I got back from the range, and decided to post some pics of the old Colt pump guns and the Winchester .22 pump.

The Winchester .22 Is on top of this pic, with the small frame Lightning in the middle, and the other medium frame .32 cal. pump on bottom.

To me, the tang mount peep on the .32 cal Lightning is kinda interesting. I really like the way it works and the sight picture you get with it. Like to have something like it on my H009G, I think…….

You can *barely* kinda see the Rampant Colt logo in the old bluing on this .32 cal. just slightly better than the .38. Or you might see it if I knew how to run a camera…….

Fun guns to look at, for me. Hope y’all like ‘em. If there’s a view of something you may want a closer look at, please lemme know, & I’ll try to get it.

Beautiful classics. Thanks for sharing.

And I also love tang peeps. Tang peeps kind of went out style in the 50s when receiver mounted peeps and scopes began to become more popular. Prior to that, a lot of classic guns were drilled and tapped on the tang for tang peep sights. Now and then you'll see some modern special editions of the old classic guns with tangs drilled and tapped for that kind of peep. Here's my pride and joy. It's a modern edition of the Winchester Low Wall 22 LR, special run of a thousand guns, made for one year in 2000. I wasted no time adding a tang peep and a globe front sight.



Definitely check out the recent post by Sir Henry on his http://henryrifleforums.com/viewtopic.php?f=42&t=14077 with a tang peep.

Wow, that looks GREAT, North Country Gal!!! Very Cool! It looks like it belonged there in the first place! I'd be justifiably proud of that rifle too!

Do you mind me asking what brand of Tang Peep that is? What kinda sight is under the front hood? Do most folks consider them “no too fragile” to hunt with?

A Marbles. Pretty easy to mount, since the rifle was already drilled and tapped for one. The front globe sight I added is a Lymans. It had interchangeable inserts. Actually, such a globe front sight does a better job of protecting the sight than a typical bead or blade front.

As for the tang sight, pretty durable and for carrying or when not in use, you just fold them back out of the way. Never had an issue with tangs carrying a gun out in the woods or brush. When folded, I think a tang is actually less likely to snag than the usual receiver mounted peep sight. Hey, Quigley used one, right?

Hey, Quigley used one, right?

'Yeah, well this ain't Dodge City, and I ain't Bill Hickock"......... Hee hee, the wife & I just "re-watched" that movie a few nights ago! Boy, nowadays, I'm more like "Ol Hank", the guy who never was exactly a "quick draw" and got shot by a sloth. See the fine print in my Far Side cartoon avatar.......

Thanks for the good info, North Country Gal! I realize this is kinda off topic, but.....
I do have the slots for a hood on the Williams front sight ramp on my .30-30 H009G. Those hoods are mostly just used for "protection" for the front sight, be it a post, bead, or whatever, correct??? Maybe glare reduction???

Yes, hoods on front sights are for both protection and cutting glare. Glad you added the glare part. A lot of shooters don't appreciate this function, thinking from sight hoods are just for protection. Competition bullseye shooters are very aware of this issue. The problem is that when you change the angle at which light hits the front sight, the front sight can appear brighter on one side than the other to the shooter and, yes, this can cause the shooters sight picture to change enough to cause a miss/pull a shot out of the 10 or x ring. The traditional way for handgun shooters to deal with this, since most pistols don't use hooded front sights, is to blacken the sight with soot or sight back compounds.

Hmmmm. Think I'll leave the hood off for an "excuse" kinda deal.....

Always good to have a couple of those, handy.