Frequently Asked Questions
1. How much coating is needed to coat a firearm?
Generally speaking, 2.5 oz. of product will coat an AR-15 size rifle when using an airbrush. If you spray too wide a pattern or heavy volume, or use a sprayer other than an airbrush, you may use more product than needed.
2. I sprayed a flat color and the appearance is glossier than desired.
The flat black and other flat colors should be applied to hot metal and in 5 or 6 light passes to get to full coverage rather than sprayed in a single heavy and wet pass that soaks the metal. Wetting the metal or letting the metal cool to room temperature will produce a glossier sheen. The goal is to spray in light passes so the hot metal will evaporate the solvents so the coating on the metal will be almost dry to the touch.
3. Can I make a flat color have more gloss?
Yes, spray the flat color in heavier passes and wet the metal.
4. Can I spray Moly Resin over an existing coating of another brand and type?
Moly Resin is made to be applied directly to fresh clean blasted slightly textured metal, over Parkerizing or other surfaces that are not polished or slick. Spraying Moly Resin over other existing coatings and finishes may not produce the adhesion needed. This would be true of any brand or type of coating. Bear in mind that a top coat can’t be any better adhered to the metal surface than the pre-existing undercoat. Additional coats of Moly Resin may be applied over itself before or after curing.
5. The coating comes off the metal after baked in the oven when I use common household chemicals.
Moly Resin products need to be cured at 300 degrees for one hour to adequately activate the hardening catalyst. Check your oven temperature for accuracy in the location of the oven you placed the part for curing. Use an inexpensive oven thermometer from Walmart. Before curing, Moly Resin can be wiped off with alcohol, acetone and many other solvents. Once cured, these solvent have no impact on Moly Resin. This is a good reason to get the part looking exactly like you want it before you cure it.
6. Can I cure Moly Resin at a lower temperature than 300 degrees by baking it longer?
No, the hardening catalyst chemical is not activated at lower temperatures. This temperature threshold keep Moly Resin from prematurely hardening or degrading until it is triggered by its designed curing temperature.
7. Can I make Moly Resin harder by curing longer or at a higher temperature?
The desired compromise between hardness, flexibility and durability is achieved at 300 degrees. Curing at higher temperatures may make Moly Resin harder but can become brittle. This is true of any brand or type of coating. It should be noted that curing with a longer duration or at higher temperatures other than 300 degrees with our flat or semi-gloss Grayish-Black Moly Resin produce will a green hue/tint that is desired by our military collectors. See curing instructions for Grayish-Black.
8. I used a glass bead blaster to prepare the metal, pre-heated, coated and cured but the coating does not adhere well.
Don’t use glass beads to prepare the metal surface. Because glass beads are smooth and round, they polish a surface rather than create a slight texture needed for coatings of any brand or type. In addition as glass beads breaks down under pressure against the metal surface, the metal can become coated with glass. Sand, aluminum oxide, garnet, etc. make much better blasting media.
9. The coating does not adhere well to certain places like edges and sharp angles areas.
It is very common during the blasting process to think in terms of blasting the flat surfaces and missing the edges that join the flat areas together. Be sure to directly blast the edges so you get the textured surfaced needed for best adhesion.
10. Some of the parts I spray have wet shiny spots on them.
You are holding the airbrush too close to the surface and spraying too much coating in that one spot and may have let the metal cool down. Spray many light passes to coat the metal, keep the airbrush moving as to not over-spray a single spot and keep the metal warm. If your metal cools down as you are spraying, hang the part back in the oven for a few minutes to raise the temperature. Keeping the metal warm to hot evaporate the solvents immediately as the coating hits the metal. This eliminates runs, fish eyes, and other problems.
11. When I pre-heat some parts, oil runs out of the metal. I keep wiping it off but it keeps bleeding out.
Some firearms have joints, cavities, and other areas that are hard to degrease. If you have done all you can to clean and degrease these problem areas, with soap, chemicals, etc., one way that can work well to get around this problem is to spray the part after the part is just warm in the oven before, the grease starts to run out again. The idea is to get the Moly Resin on the metal before this oil runs so it will be on top of the coating. Many times the oil can be wiped off Moly Resin after you have fully cured the parts. You don’t want grease or oil under the coating as it will block adhesion.
12. When I spray, the coating appears to be thin and almost clear. I have to use a lot of coating to color the part. Other times it sprays thick.
These two issues are related. Moly Resin contains heavy pigments that settle out on the bottom of the bottle just like all coatings. You must adequately shake and agitate the bottles to mix in all of the pigments. Some colors of Moly Resin may have as many as five separate pigments in the bottle. Shaking well to get all pigments into solution is a key preparatory action to take to keep the color of the coating from a bottle to be the same from start to finish. The pigments will also settle out in the bottom of your airbrush bottle if you delay in spraying.
13. I’m (actually my wife) is concerned with me using out home cooking oven for curing my gun parts.
There can be an odor as you cure your parts in the kitchen oven, especially, if you place parts in the oven immediately after spraying. We suggest you spray and let the parts completely dry off the solvents someplace other than the kitchen before placing them in the oven. Other suggestions are to do your refinishing when your wife is not home or make some type of deal with her. A more permanent solution is to build a small oven from a small school locker and use broiler/toaster oven parts in it that you rob from an inexpensive counter top oven from Walmart.
14. After curing the coating on my AR-15 firearm parts, they look very dry, lighter and flatter than the desired finish.
Moly Resin is available in several AR-15 color shades, especially in the gray to gray/black range. Assuming you chose the correct color shade, the parts right out of the oven will be ultra-dried out, flat and void of any oils due to the heat. Place some light oil like REM Oil on the parts and wipe the oil back off. This will give the coating a richness and bring out the full color. You can also polish the coating with a cloth cotton rag to buff up more sheen if desired.
15. Aren’t Moly Resin and other firearm coatings just really paints, just better than normal paints, but nevertheless paint?
No. In the paint industry, the term “paint” technically applies to coatings that harden by solvent evaporation or in some instances reactive with oxygen to create a film. The solvent evaporation leaves behind a hard film that is referred to as the paint. Most paints can be dissolved back into their original solvent and slightly stronger solvent. This is why “paints” are not suitable for firearm refinishing since bore cleaners, and other common solvents will remove them.
Moly Resin and most other firearm coatings are called specialty coatings and harden by a chemical catalyst that lets various chemicals in the coating react and turn into a different substance. These chemicals are held inactive until the catalyst is triggered. Once the coating cured, the coating no longer are dissolvable in the strongest solvents, acids, etc. In additional “specialty coatings” can be applied in film thickness much less than a paint.
16. How can I remove Moly Resin from my firearm without blasting with media?
There does not appear to be a chemical that will remove cured Moly Resin. If you wish to remove the coating before curing, it may be wiped off with Acetone, MEK, and common solvents. Moly Resin’s resistance to chemicals is one of the strong attributes of the product.
17. Can a camo pattern (including digital patterns) be done with Moly Resin?
Numbers of our customers use Moly Resin for creating simple, as well as, elaborate camo patterns. As with any camo project there I skill needed and attention to detail required. The basic question with creating a camo pattern is whether to cure each color separately as you add it to your design or wait until all the colors are sprayed and then cure at the end. Either method will work. It is slower curing one color at a time but much more forgiving in handling the parts especially if you are using masking tape, etc. Curing all the colors at the end works too but you have to be more careful in your process.
18. Can I mix Moly Resin colors to make new shades and colors?
While the resin base itself may be compatible, some of the pigments are not. Generally speaking, the darker colors mix best with other darker colors while lighter colors may mix best with other lighter colors. We would suggest you experiment mixing the colors and test spray on some scrap metal and cure to see how well it works for your needs. You can always test the adhesion of a color mix to see if it will perform for you by wiping it with Acetone or another solvent.
19. When I coat and cure my parts with Grayish-Black Moly Resin, the color changes and turned out to have a green hue and tint.
The answer is that you cured at a temperature higher than 300 degrees. If you did not do this on purpose check the accuracy of your oven. Flat and semi-gloss Grayish-Black Moly Resin has a unique characteristic in that the curing process can be altered to create two colors. Grayish-Black color is created by curing at the normal temperature of 300 degrees for one hour. If you are seeking a Grayish-Black with a green tint like WWI and WWII collectors want, then increase the cure time and temperature. Old Parkerized military rifles have many times turned slightly green due to being stored in Cosmoline grease. See special curing instructions for Grayish-Black Moly Resin.
20. What is the shelf life of Moly Resin and how should I store it?
Shelf life of Moly Resin is a year or longer stored in a room temperature location. If stored in a cool location you may find it will still be usable much longer. It is not uncommon to use it several years when stored in metal cans. We can provide it in metal if you request when you place the order. Test a piece of scrap metal to check. If it sprays well, looks good after curing and does not pull off the surface when using duct tape to test it, then you are in good shape.
21. Can I coat and cure Moly Resin on plastic/polymer parts?
The question should actually be,” Will the polymer parts such as the stock, forearm, pistol grip, etc. withstand the curing temperature and not be damaged.” Plastic/polymer parts are injection molds that use a wide variety of polymer resins with different characteristics regarding the amount of heat the polymer will take and not shrink or crack. While we do have a number of customers that use Moly Resin on polymer parts of one type or another, we suggest you checking with the parts manufacturer as to the heat range of the specific polymer resin.
22. What is your privacy policy when I give you personal information to place an order?
Privacy Policy: We take your personal information seriously. Any personal information received will only be used to fill your order. We do not sell or redistribute your information to anyone. If you have questions, phone contact is (501)225-9417, 11 a.m. through 4 p.m. Central, MTWTF. The best contact is through email at smg1022@sbcglobal.net. Orders for products using credit cards must be placed by the purchaser on the order page on the www.molyresin.com or www.johnnorrellarms.com website. We do not directly process your credit card or have access to your CC numbers or security codes.
23. What is your refund policy?
Refund policy: You may return Moly Resin products within 30 days for a refund to your credit card if product is unopened and unused. If you have received the wrong color, or feel a product is defective, please contact us for replacement or refunds by email at smg1022@sbcglobal.net.