It doesn't look at all like an antique nickel !
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The above is a modern gun with an "antique nickel" finish, done in the recent past by Reliable Electroplating, from Chartley, MA.
Different nickel finishes below with the addition of one in silver plate. Top to bottom, modern Colt bright nickel, Watt's nickel (Nutmeg's antique nickel), modern Colt bright nickel again, Antique nickel from Reliable, and finally 30 year old silver plate. The silver is also Reliable's work.
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Different nickel finishes below with the addition of one in silver plate. Top to bottom, modern Colt bright nickel, Watt's nickel (Nutmeg's antique nickel), modern Colt bright nickel again, Antique nickel from Reliable, and finally 30 year old silver plate. The silver is also Reliable's work.
Cozmo, I've been collecting antique American firearms for the last 40 years, and I know very well what a real antique nickel finish looks like. I didn't know you were talking about "a modern antique nickel finish".
For example, here is a trully antique nickel finish on a Remington Rider pocket :
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For example, here is a trully antique nickel finish on a Remington Rider pocket :
Cozmo, here are two nickeled Colts about 150 years old, and they don't look like your modern antique nickel. As I don't know anything about modern guns and their finish, I was easily fooled.
Patbar,
You do realize that modern "antique nickel" is an approximation, that can't literally duplicate 100 years of actual chemical reaction on a nickel finish. I am not sure why you are getting all bent out of shape over the term. It is a marketing term that just sounds better than "dull nickel".
Just wait until you find out that "bluing" is actually "blacking".
You do realize that modern "antique nickel" is an approximation, that can't literally duplicate 100 years of actual chemical reaction on a nickel finish. I am not sure why you are getting all bent out of shape over the term. It is a marketing term that just sounds better than "dull nickel".
Just wait until you find out that "bluing" is actually "blacking".
I am not bent out of shape over the term "antique nickel". It's simply that I completely misunderstood this thread. When I read the first message, I thought that Gozmo was asking if the nickel on his SAA was antique or if the gun had been restored. I didn't know that the term defined a particular modern gun finish.Patbar,
You do realize that modern "antique nickel" is an approximation, that can't literally duplicate 100 years of actual chemical reaction on a nickel finish. I am not sure why you are getting all bent out of shape over the term. It is a marketing term that just sounds better than "dull nickel".
Just wait until you find out that "bluing" is actually "blacking".
Sorry for this misunderstanding.
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Nice looking BP era Colt pictured above. Problem with actual, old nickel, guns that are now antiques, is they are, well, actual antiques. Most have been well used and the nickel finish shows it. Shooting black powder is not going to help retain the finish on any firearm, nickel or blued. Originally Colt applied the nickel with no base prep plating past a high polish. At some point Colt started plating with copper prior to the nickel. The idea, still used today, was to give a softer more flexible metal for the harder and more brittle nickel to better adhere to. The idea generally works but not always. And why the occasional modern Colt will shed big flakes of nickel plate. The "modern antique" nickel plate applications have been used in part to help eliminate the bright nickel finish flaking even when done over copper.
I have a few modern Colt's with bright nickel. Pretty guns. And most of them that I have shot a lot still look pretty much new. Some are 50 years old now. Not that you'd know it by looking at them. But the term antique typically implies an age of 100 years old or more. Not there yet
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