How to Polish a Rifle Barrel to Prepare It for Bluing

Larry Potterfield • February 13, 2017

When rebluing a barrel or any other metal part, it's important to do a real bang-up job of polishing it first. Let me show you how I go about polishing a barrel and getting it ready for bluing.

First I clean and degrease the lettering, apply some blue and rust remover, and then scrub out the rust in the bottom of the lettering with a nylon brush.

Scrub the rust off with a nylon brush
Scrub the rust off with a nylon brush

Now we can clamp the barrel in a vise for polishing. For this job, we're using cloth-backed abrasive in grits from 120 to 220. Starting with the 120 grit, I polish the barrel lengthwise using some type of block as a backer. Remember to tape over the lettering with masking tape first and stay away from it for now.

120 to 220 grit abrasives
120 to 220 grit abrasives

Switch to the 150 grit and polish using a shoeshine motion—this is called cross polishing. Then we'll go up to 180 grit, using the block backer and a lengthwise motion again.

Cross polishing with 150 grit
Cross polishing with 150 grit

Now we can remove the masking tape. For final polishing, we're using an inexpensive hobby lathe and the 220 grit abrasive. This will give us a nice consistent finish ready for bluing.

Lathe machine
Lathe machine

And that's how I polish up a barrel and get it ready for bluing.

Polished barrel
Polished barrel

-- Larry Potterfield