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Posted: 11/19/2006 4:20:27 AM EDT
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Anyone proficent with this product? I shot some small parts and have some issues. Would anyone familiar with this product be willing to walk me through a few things over the phone? I could wait until Monday and call NICS but I'd like to get this done today (Sunday). I've used Norrells, KG, Duracote and others quite a bit but the Cerakote seems to have it's own issues and the instructions they sent are lacking. Thanks in advance, JR |
Enforcer, I shot two sets of small parts satin black. Same mix ratio (24/1) and one set is noticably more flat and slightly grey. Instructions say to bake @ 250* for 20min prior to coating. Are you supposed to coat straight from the oven while the parts are 250*? The reason I ask is the first batch came out of preheat and hung for 15/20min while I fiddled around with mixing etc. These parts were still warm but not hot and were sprayed in my normal fashion of airbrush for hard to reach areas and detail gun for an overall medium wet coat to finish, air dried for 30min then into the oven for baking. The second set of parts came out of preheat and were coated within minutes. These came out as described above looking slightly grey and had less sheen. I suspect that coating the parts while they were still very hot was the reason but the directions that came with the Cerakote are rather vague about application. I also coated a barrel I had laying around to see how I liked the overall finish/match as compared to various lowers I have. The preheat brought out some darkened areas in the metal...not dark but noticable none the less. I re-cleaned the barrel after letting it cool some and the stains seemed to go away, that is until I coated and baked the barrel. Now the same stains are showing through the finish. I re-blasted the barrel to try again, just wondering if I'm doing something really wrong or if Cerakote is just a little finicky. Thanks for your time in advance. |
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First you dont need to preheat the parts prior to finishing. It sounds like you may have gotten the mix ratio a little off from one batch to the other. Even being off a hair on the ratio can and will affect the "look" of the finished product. Edited - I just thought of something CeraKote dosent come in satin black. Are you sure its CeraKote and not another "Ceramic" coating? What number is on the bottle of part "A" there should be a letter and then a three digit number on the bottle. Also CeraKote is not for sale to the general public. May I ask where you obtained it? If you do have some make sure you wear a GOOD respirator (even when mixing) and have a good fresh air ventilation system. This stuff is very NASTY when its in a vapor form and makes KG & DuraCoat look like clean air. Joe |
Joe, Thanks for taking the time to reply. I'm pretty sure the mix ratio was correct as the slide and frame that I refinished at the same time came out perfect, I'm almost 100% sure the small parts were too hot when I sprayed them giving the flat/grey finish or maybe to much air pressure/distance now that I think about it.....I'll confirm with a call to NICS this AM. I obtained the product directly from NICS, graphite black H-146. As I said in my first post, I have a pretty good grasp on other products (dozens of partial and compete refinishes) but this is my first attempt with the Cerakote. A local highend smith requested Cerakote coatings and this is my test project, so far I love the results other than this minor hiccup. On a side note, I took a trip over to your web site and must say you folks do an awesome job. I hope in the months/years to come that I might become as proficient. I started "playing" with gun refinishing a couple years ago after seeing HATECA's work on the hide. Having a background in automotive refinishing this was sort of a natural path to take. It's alot of fun for me and it seems I learn something with every project I take on. Again, thanks for your time. JR |
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