TIN COATING BARREL/ comp problem

[QUATTROISKING]

Hey guys in the middle of picking and choosing through colour combos for the new open blaster being built I wanted to go with a gold tin coating on the barrel, comp and hammer but was told not to even go near this option as the heating of the titanium comp and barrel to apply the coating ( or something along these kinds he described) makes it too brittle and and comps explode/break/crack along with the barrel under major pf...

 

does anyone know of a coating that negates this problem to get the gold look? 
 

also this builder that will remain nameless is insanely experienced, built multiple guns for the best shooters of all time and knows his stuff to say the least and even had a position working for a very top tear company that builds the best open guns in the world. 

 

 

[zzt]

I would follow his advice.

[yigal]

It's hard for me to explain all the physics in English, but he gave you some good advice.

[hurley326]

I have no idea but I have seen an Atlas with this exact combo.

 

 

 

[QUATTROISKING]

2 hours ago, hurley326 said:

I have no idea but I have seen an Atlas with this exact combo.

 

 

 

That’s the exact I was going to go lol not anymore now not to sure what to do all black or all natural/ ss

[Silent]

Hasn’t SVI been TiN costing barrels/comps/small parts for years without issue? I have a single stack gun with a TiN coated barrel and no issues. Just go to there website and see all the guns like that. 

[QUATTROISKING]

1 hour ago, Silent said:

Hasn’t SVI been TiN costing barrels/comps/small parts for years without issue? I have a single stack gun with a TiN coated barrel and no issues. Just go to there website and see all the guns like that. 

You are completly correct they have a different method of application which is a tightly held secret, they won’t give out/ no one else known is doing, he addressed that to me also lol  

good for them I would do the exact same thing as anyone would but it sucks that the gun can’t be a reliable work horse and good looking at the same time. 

[Silent]

3 minutes ago, QUATTROISKING said:

You are completly correct they have a different method of application which is a tightly held secret, they won’t give out/ no one else known is doing, he addressed that to me also lol  

good for them I would do the exact same thing as anyone would but it sucks that the gun can’t be a reliable work horse and good looking at the same time. 

Oh gotcha. I didn’t know there were different ways of doing it. Just assumed it was all the same. 

[waktasz]

The various PVD processes have different operating temperatures. Some can be up to 900 degrees F. That said, i had a pretty heavily lightened 6" slide TiCN coated and it has outlasted the non coated barrel that was in it. 

[andersonj55126]

I have a TIN coated barrel in my 9major open gun.  No problems.  I was planning to do with all future barrels. 

[PrimaryBruce]

OP, I don't know who told you that...and I'm certainly NOT a PVD expert, as a lot of the science bend it is certainly above my head. But our PVD vendor processes TiN at a lower temp than nitride. And I've never...ever, ever hear of anyone complain about nitride parts being "brittle."

 

 

[QUATTROISKING]

53 minutes ago, PrimaryBruce said:

OP, I don't know who told you that...and I'm certainly NOT a PVD expert, as a lot of the science bend it is certainly above my head. But our PVD vendor processes TiN at a lower temp than nitride. And I've never...ever, ever hear of anyone complain about nitride parts being "brittle."

 

 

Steel starts annealing around 250*c

titanium starts stress release at 538*c and starts annealing at 700*c

 

so you would need to be under these numbers for tin coating safety if you do find a company that does this a good amount under these numbers please let me know lol

 

[MikeRush]

https://www.calicocoatings.com/coating-data-sheets/titanium-nitride-pvd-tin-coating/

 

That is the top link on Google for "titanium nitride coating temperature". It states it is suitable for steel, hardened steel, titanium and stainless steel with a process temp of 448 c.

 

Barrel steel isn't pot metal. I think a lot of manufacturers are using either 416R or 4150 which anneal at temperatures way higher than the 250 c you are referencing.

 

Sometimes builders have a bad experience or no experience with a coating, don't want to deal with a coating, or have some other reason they discourage customers from going with it. SVI says that hard chroming is detrimental to the quality of plated products, but most builders will do hard chrome with no apparent issues from potential hydrogen embrittlement. I usually tend to trust what builders prefer, but maybe in this case your builder uses a company that can't do that coating well or has some other reason for discouraging it. What is clear is that there are companies doing it still which I would think would not be the case if barrels and comps were exploding.

 

I've shot a TiN coated 416 barrel/titanium comp setup in a 9 Major open gun and I have all my fingers. The gold look isn't for me, but I wouldn't be afraid to go with a suitable coating from a reputable company.

[belus]

1 hour ago, MikeRush said:

Barrel steel isn't pot metal. I think a lot of manufacturers are using either 416R or 4150 which anneal at temperatures way higher than the 250 c you are referencing.

 

I'm not a PVD expert though I've done a little of it myself in school. I studied metallurgy at the time and Giancarlo is right that steel starts to anneal around 250C.  You can read more about 4150 annealing here if you wish: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/59db/1c74a902503f84c78b07d3566850fb4dd7ae.pdf
(To understand that paper it helps to read this first https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isothermal_transformation_diagram )

I found this nice review of TiN processes, including it's effect of extending machine tool life by 20x in the case of stainless steel drill bits.
https://www3.ntu.edu.sg/ThinFilms/mae-thinfilms/Thinfilms/pdfpapers/zhangzhu93.pdf

I'd be inclined to get it on my guns with no concern for the underlying material's strength. It's had a long track record outside of shooting and machinists trust it on their expensive precision tools.

[waktasz]

2 hours ago, MikeRush said:

https://www.calicocoatings.com/coating-data-sheets/titanium-nitride-pvd-tin-coating/

 

That is the top link on Google for "titanium nitride coating temperature". It states it is suitable for steel, hardened steel, titanium and stainless steel with a process temp of 448 c.

 

Barrel steel isn't pot metal. I think a lot of manufacturers are using either 416R or 4150 which anneal at temperatures way higher than the 250 c you are referencing.

 

Sometimes builders have a bad experience or no experience with a coating, don't want to deal with a coating, or have some other reason they discourage customers from going with it. SVI says that hard chroming is detrimental to the quality of plated products, but most builders will do hard chrome with no apparent issues from potential hydrogen embrittlement. I usually tend to trust what builders prefer, but maybe in this case your builder uses a company that can't do that coating well or has some other reason for discouraging it. What is clear is that there are companies doing it still which I would think would not be the case if barrels and comps were exploding.

 

I've shot a TiN coated 416 barrel/titanium comp setup in a 9 Major open gun and I have all my fingers. The gold look isn't for me, but I wouldn't be afraid to go with a suitable coating from a reputable company.

 

LeBronze was done by Calico and it was super duper awesome. They aren't doing guns anymore (at least not unless you are a major manufacturer) 

[hurley326]

Ironic look what Phoenix Trinity just posted yesterday




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[MikeRush]

On 11/22/2019 at 2:15 PM, belus said:

 

I'm not a PVD expert though I've done a little of it myself in school. I studied metallurgy at the time and Giancarlo is right that steel starts to anneal around 250C.  You can read more about 4150 annealing here if you wish: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/59db/1c74a902503f84c78b07d3566850fb4dd7ae.pdf
(To understand that paper it helps to read this first https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isothermal_transformation_diagram )

 

Not trying to get in a Wikipedia duel here, but I do not understand what an paper on heating an alloy over its critical temperature and then cooling in different increments has to do with a coating that does not approach anywhere near the critical temperature of said alloy. What am I missing? That entire paper describes what happens after heating the metal to 854 c, right?

 

I'm not a metallurgist, but I have seen spec sheets for 4150 and 416, and those advise temperatures of 840-899 c for a full anneal, and over 700 c for a sub-critical anneal to enhance ease of machining. Those alloys are used as barrel steels in part due to their ability to handle high heat. Either way, I think the OP's mystery smith is taking a stand that other builders and the coating industry don't seem to share. I couldn't find anything that indicated that these alloys would be adversely affected by a process that is under 450 c and cooler than nitride (which is used on tons of barrels including rifle barrels that see much higher pressures than a pistol barrels.

 

If I wanted barrel/Ti comp coated gold TiN, I would find a coating company that does it on guns and talk to them.

[belus]

3 hours ago, MikeRush said:

 

Not trying to get in a Wikipedia duel here, but I do not understand what an paper on heating an alloy over its critical temperature and then cooling in different increments has to do with a coating that does not approach anywhere near the critical temperature of said alloy. What am I missing? That entire paper describes what happens after heating the metal to 854 c, right?

 

I'm not a metallurgist, but I have seen spec sheets for 4150 and 416, and those advise temperatures of 840-899 c for a full anneal, and over 700 c for a sub-critical anneal to enhance ease of machining. Those alloys are used as barrel steels in part due to their ability to handle high heat. Either way, I think the OP's mystery smith is taking a stand that other builders and the coating industry don't seem to share. I couldn't find anything that indicated that these alloys would be adversely affected by a process that is under 450 c and cooler than nitride (which is used on tons of barrels including rifle barrels that see much higher pressures than a pistol barrels.

 

If I wanted barrel/Ti comp coated gold TiN, I would find a coating company that does it on guns and talk to them.

 

You're right and I agree with you on all the core points being discussed in this thread.

 

If you have the time/patience I'll try to briefly explain how I think you and Giancarlo (QUATTROISKING) are both correct about the annealing temperature. It mostly comes down to annealing being an imprecise word.

Steel is complicated metallurgically and I don't deal with the metallurgy on a regular basis. You're correct that annealing temperatures for steel are much higher than 250C. But there are heat treating processes used at much lower temperatures (as low as 150C) and this is sometimes called annealing, though it might be more accurate to call it tempering.

Above about 730C all of the carbon is dissolved in the iron in what's called Austenite steel. When it cools to room temperature the carbon precipitates out and these precipitates control many of the steel's properties. How fast you cool the austenitic steel determines how large, where, and what shape the carbon-rich crystals are. Usually when someone talks about annealing steel they mean heating it above 730C to dissolve all the carbon back into the iron.

Annealing or tempering at lower temperatures doesn't redissolve the carbon in the iron, but it does make it more mobile so it can diffuse between the iron atoms. This mostly makes the precipitates larger and take up more volume. This carbon-rich region of the steel is called Bainite (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bainite), and once it takes up more than about 50% of the volume it improves the hardness and strength of the metal by significant amounts. The first paper I linked to were studying how long it took to form Bainite at different temperatures in 4150. It was just an example I found of "annealing" data at 250C.

The curves on all the Temperature v Time plots usually represent how long fully-annealed Austenite needs to remain at temperature to form a specific carbon-rich crystal morphology as there's more than just Bainite and Austenite. Sometimes cooling rates are plotted on the same plots so people can estimate how fast they need to cool an annealed part to get or avoid a specific microstructure.

Edited November 26, 2019 by belus
forgot a word

[QUATTROISKING]

1 hour ago, belus said:

 

You're right and I agree with you on all the core points being discussed in this thread.

 

If you have the time/patience I'll try to briefly explain how I think you and Giancarlo (QUATTROISKING) are both correct about the annealing temperature. It mostly comes down to annealing being an imprecise word.

Steel is complicated metallurgically and I don't deal with the metallurgy on a regular basis. You're correct that annealing temperatures for steel are much higher than 250C. But there are heat treating processes used at much lower temperatures (as low as 150C) and this is sometimes called annealing, though it might be more accurate to call it tempering.

Above about 730C all of the carbon is dissolved in the iron in what's called Austenite steel. When it cools to room temperature the carbon precipitates out and these precipitates control many of the steel's properties. How fast you cool the austenitic steel determines how large, where, and what shape the carbon-rich crystals are. Usually when someone talks about annealing steel they mean heating it above 730C to dissolve all the carbon back into the iron.

Annealing or tempering at lower temperatures doesn't redissolve the carbon in the iron, but it does make it more mobile so it can diffuse between the iron atoms. This mostly makes the precipitates larger and take up more volume. This carbon-rich region of the steel is called Bainite (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bainite), and once it takes up more than about 50% of the volume it improves the hardness and strength of the metal by significant amounts. The first paper I linked to were studying how long it took to form Bainite at different temperatures in 4150. It was just an example I found of "annealing" data at 250C.

The curves on all the Temperature v Time plots usually represent how long fully-annealed Austenite needs to remain at temperature to form a specific carbon-rich crystal morphology as there's more than just Bainite and Austenite. Sometimes cooling rates are plotted on the same plots so people can estimate how fast they need to cool an annealed part to get or avoid a specific microstructure.

You lost me great knowledge would it be greedy to ask a spoon fed question? Lol 

what temperature would the coating need to be under Temperature wise to run the titanium comp and steel barrel for gold nitride coating

[belus]

1 hour ago, QUATTROISKING said:

You lost me great knowledge would it be greedy to ask a spoon fed question? Lol 

what temperature would the coating need to be under Temperature wise to run the titanium comp and steel barrel for gold nitride coating

I think getting into the metallurgy of it and being worried about the temperature is a distraction.  Yes, the steel might change a little at the 400-600C while the coating is applied, but I don't think it changes enough to be a concern.  I suspect most barrels are already annealed for stress relief after machining, and in the paper on 4140/4150 above, the alloy never got below a Rockwell C hardness of 30 which is considered acceptable for barrels. In my searching, it seems the best quality TiN films were deposited at about 400C.

 

I'll attach the two important files to this post to inform future searchers.
 

In short, I think it's probably a worthwhile thing to do. In high-stress high-temperature applications (drill bits) TiN improves the useful life of 4140 by 7x, and that's also a common US barrel alloy. It improves the life of stainless steels by even more. And it doesn't change the dimensions of the part, being only 0.0001" thick.

 

TiN is probably a good anti-corrosion coating too.

If you don't like the gold color opt for blackish Ti-Al-N, it's apparently even more wear resistant.

1993 Zhang - TiN coating tool steel.pdf

[yigal]

Just did not mention that the efforts/forces  for these tools are different  from gun parts and the life of these tools is measured in minutes and not tens of thousands of cycles with impact like in guns.

 

Edited November 27, 2019 by yigal

[QUATTROISKING]

3 hours ago, belus said:

I think getting into the metallurgy of it and being worried about the temperature is a distraction.  Yes, the steel might change a little at the 400-600C while the coating is applied, but I don't think it changes enough to be a concern.  I suspect most barrels are already annealed for stress relief after machining, and in the paper on 4140/4150 above, the alloy never got below a Rockwell C hardness of 30 which is considered acceptable for barrels. In my searching, it seems the best quality TiN films were deposited at about 400C.

 

I'll attach the two important files to this post to inform future searchers.
 

In short, I think it's probably a worthwhile thing to do. In high-stress high-temperature applications (drill bits) TiN improves the useful life of 4140 by 7x, and that's also a common US barrel alloy. It improves the life of stainless steels by even more. And it doesn't change the dimensions of the part, being only 0.0001" thick.

 

TiN is probably a good anti-corrosion coating too.

If you don't like the gold color opt for blackish Ti-Al-N, it's apparently even more wear resistant.

1993 Zhang - TiN coating tool steel.pdf 775.88 kB · 0 downloads

Thank you very much for all you’re input greatly appreciated 

[MikeBurgess]

On 11/26/2019 at 9:08 PM, yigal said:

Just did not mention that the efforts/forces  for these tools are different  from gun parts and the life of these tools is measured in minutes and not tens of thousands of cycles with impact like in guns.

 

yes gun parts are subject to exponentially lower loads at much lower velocities with lower impact forces all this done with better lubrication at lower temperatures. 

 

Impact forces on mill cutters are high enough to shear the metal being cut you don't hit the frame that hard with the slide

[yigal]

2 hours ago, MikeBurgess said:

yes gun parts are subject to exponentially lower loads at much lower velocities with lower impact forces all this done with better lubrication at lower temperatures. 

 

Impact forces on mill cutters are high enough to shear the metal being cut you don't hit the frame that hard with the slide

different materials for mill cutters  and different hardness. and expected life for this cutters  measurements in minutes.

if u will make calculations for handgun impacts  u will discover that they much higher than u think.

[yigal]

2 hours ago, MikeBurgess said:

yes gun parts are subject to exponentially lower loads at much lower velocities with lower impact forces all this done with better lubrication at lower temperatures. 

 

Impact forces on mill cutters are high enough to shear the metal being cut you don't hit the frame that hard with the slide

different materials for mill cutters  and different hardness. and expected life for this cutters  measurements in minutes.

if u will make calculations for handgun impacts  u will discover that they much higher than u think.