Treatments for '82 pistol

[NickD]

    I'm on the verge of having my C&R FFL, and I've decided my first piece must be an '82 pistol - It seems to offer the best classical elements of the old-school, reliable, all metal design paired with a reasonable carry size and weight, an inexpensive yet adequately powered round, and overall, it's just a nice looking, always-goes-bang sidearm.  I'm presently trying to decide what I should have done to the gun.  I'm certainly going to have some advanced thermal processing done, because the '82 is nearly all steel, which the processor I know does the best work I've seen with, and my experience with the owner of www.metalscience.com has always been more than positive over the past 12 years.  However, I still need to decide what else to do to my new pistol.  I'm going to go with a high end barrel coating for lowest possible friction shooting and the best frame/internal component coatings I can dig up as well, I want long coat life and elemental resistance that shines.  So, has anyone here used any particular coatings/surface treatments, and if so, to what end?

[NVCZ]

Congratulations on your choice of pistol! I love my new to me 82 and plan on refinishing it in near future. Or get another to do it to.
Not to waste your time, I have no experience in that department but please keep us updated, particularly with pics about your project because I would like to see results.

I think for my future project that first I will want to refinish the pistol, then new grips (wood preferred), then sight work to make them more visible. I am currently happy with the DA trigger pull, but would like to finish up the pistol with a trigger job.

Does this seem like a logical progression? I plan on adding this to CC permit.

Best of luck with your project.

NVCZ

[brigadier]

 Hello nick and welcome to the forum.

 As you know, I had a Beretta 96 therma cycled, and today, it's the only working 10mm Beretta handgun in existence that I know of. Holds up better then before, even when firing Double Tap's hottest loads. That says something. If therma cycling a CZ-82 is anything, it's overkill. A word of advice though. If you are going to have any smithing done to your gun, have it done BEFORE you have it therma cycled. Machining therma cycled metal is hell. There is a reason why their swords cost $2500, which seams like a low price IMO, given what is put in.

 Anyway, before you do anything to the gun, take it out and shoot it. Then you will have a much better impression of what you really want and need.

BTW.
 If You decide to put tritium sights on the gun, you can send the slide and sights to me and I can do the replacement for you, free of charge.

[NickD]

Thanks for the welcome!
     I realize an '82 is a really sturdy, accurate gun to start with, but I figure after a Thermacycle there would just be no way I could blow it up.  I am definately planning to do the basic light metal work(trigger job, polishing certain parts) _before_ the thermacycle.  Have to figure out what kind of finish I would like on it, too, the wear I see on the finish of most of the new surplus being imported saddens me and I don't think I have the kind of money for Robar finishes.
     Also, thanks for the offer on the sites - I hadn't really put much thought into that aspect, never realized it was possible to put them on an '82.

[mvelimir]

NickD, please, please don't do anything until you fire you gun first. I got my CZ-82 a month ago and it's the best pistol I ever had. The trigger on this thing is unbelievable. All I did first was just to clean it well and then I went shooting. Tack driver, I'm telling you. If you buy Russian surplus ammo, use Silver Bear. Brown Bear is less accurate, stinky and dirty. Silver Bear is much, much better. The problem I have with my pistol is mag release. It doesn't work well when pressed from left side, but the grip is so wide, that I actually found much easier to push with my middle finger from right side. All I have to do weaken the mag release spring a little bit.

My gun had a ding on the outside of the barrel, near muzzle. Somebody must have dropped it. I didn't even noticed at first, but it's on the outside edge of the barrel so it doesn't effect anything. The inside edge of the muzzle had a few small chips so I decided to recrown the barrel. I used a ball sander with hand drill and then smooth it with fine grit sand paper with finger. Not the best work, but my groups got a bit tighter and bullets were lending even closer to the POA. Then I ordered a set of recoil springs (14.5, 16 and 18lbs) and tried heaviest two. Both worked fine and I kept #18 in the gun. Honestly, I haven't noticed any difference at shooting compared with original spring, except that it's much, much harder to field strip the gun now.

What I'm trying to say is that these guns are so good, there's almost no need to do anything to them. I could have probably save $25 for springs and give that money to the gunsmith to do professional recrowning. Other than that - maybe wood grips and fiber optic front sight. CZ-75 sight will fit, I checked with CZ-USA. Since these are surplus guns, anything is possible. You might get one that's even better than one I got, and then again, you might end up with one that does require gunsmithing. In any case, it's well worth it. See, I'm selling my Glock 23 with additional Lone Wolf conversion barrel (.40-9mm) and I'm going to buy one more CZ-82, if not even two, so go figure. lol

Good luck with it, and let us know how did it go.

[brigadier]

 Therma cycle definitely won't hurt it, but if the gun you get has a cracked part and snaps in the first box of ammo, then you spent all that money on therma cycle for nothing.

 Therma cycle is good for accuracy and longevity. Those are the main difference the therma cycle will give you. Therma cycle does almost nothing to the RC hardness. Though it often has very tiny plus or minus effects on the RC hardness of different metals with different heat treats, it's not MEANT to increase or decrease it so to speak. The tiny effects on the RC hardness are merely a byproduct of the therma cycle's real purpose. Therma cycle is meant to dramatically increase the wear resistance and the gun's ability to take a beating. Think of turning hard plastic in to nylon 7.

 Think about it. The therma cycle process was invented for swords. What metallurgic features are really important with swords? How would that apply to a handgun?

[mvelimir]

I forgot to mention probably the most important reason NOT TO thermal cycle your gun. The gun barrels a re supposed to be of a little bit softer steel than one usually thinks because, it is not just friction of a bullet going through the barrel that it's applied. It is also a pressure of the gasses that is pushing that barrel wall outside. There is a tiny amount of flexibility that is required for barrel to actually work well. Thermal cycling is making your steel harder, but it also becomes brittle and once it cracks - it's gone. You'll gain much more in accuracy by recrowning the barrel and customizing grips and working on a trigger mechanism then spending all that money for process that can be deadly to your gun. And with the price they are offered now - you can buy three, four and pick the best among them, and keep others as spare parts.

[NickD]

As Brigadier said, the particular thermal processing I'm interested in is not a hardness boost, I wouldn't see any reason for doing that.  It's designed to maximize toughness and resiliency, effectively, it removes any trace of brittleness, which seems to me to be particularly desirable.  It also - without effecting the metal hardness - makes steel less vulnerable to abrasive wear, for a longer life.  It's also a very fairly priced process considering what is involved - about half what the gun costs; I'm not up for one of these crazy gun jobs that costs many times what the weapon does.

[brigadier]

I forgot to mention probably the most important reason NOT TO thermal cycle your gun. The gun barrels a re supposed to be of a little bit softer steel than one usually thinks because, it is not just friction of a bullet going through the barrel that it's applied. It is also a pressure of the gasses that is pushing that barrel wall outside. There is a tiny amount of flexibility that is required for barrel to actually work well. Thermal cycling is making your steel harder, but it also becomes brittle and once it cracks - it's gone. You'll gain much more in accuracy by recrowning the barrel and customizing grips and working on a trigger mechanism then spending all that money for process that can be deadly to your gun. And with the price they are offered now - you can buy three, four and pick the best among them, and keep others as spare parts.

 The therma cycle does almost the exact opposite of that. The therma cycle process consists of heating the metal for sustained periods at high oven temperature for hours and then quickly cooling it to sub zero temperatures (cryo) for hours and back and fourth to specific temperatures for specific amounts of time. It is a 3 day process and a CNC tank is used to achieve the exact temperatures for exact periods of time. Think of it as a mega, state of the art cryo process. The process was designed for the purpose of making REAL (not wall hanger or Paul Chen stuff) swords tougher and more resilient to shock. I am building a sword made of S7 steel that I recently had therma cycled. It's amazing what it can take. You could literally make a compound bow out of the blade, yet it's so hard that it dented my hammer (at the fuller/fluting) without taking the slightest dent when I pounded on it.

 I have a 10mm Beretta 96 Handgun that has been therma cycled. I have machined on Berettas in the past and am familiar with the toughness of their metal. When it came back from therma cycle, it looked exactly as it did when it left. I even wondered for a bit if they treated the gun at all. When I started machining on the frame, I could feel a HUGE difference. Machining on a Beretta frame went from being a piece of cake to an absolute nightmare.

 So anyway, as I stated, the therma cycle IS NOT meant to raise the hardness of the metal. In some cases, it LOWERS the hardness, though the RC hardness differences are always tiny. The therma cycle is meant to make the metal tougher and more resilient to wear. As I said, it's very intended purpose is to keep a sword from cracking, breaking or denting when it takes a hit. That's a good thing; a very good thing when it comes to firearms. As I said earlier, it's somewhat similar to converting hard plastic to nylon 7 (what Glock frames are made of) Hardness doesn't change much, but it's wear resistance and ability to take a beating goes WAY up.

 Think of the therma cycle as something to submit gun parts to that are TOO brittle (CZ-52 firing pins for instance.

 Nick's only real question is whether or not it's worth it. IMO, it's entirely a matter of what he can afford. I would have all my guns therma cycled if I could afford it. Increase in longevity, mechanical accuracy and better chance of parts not breaking are what you are going to get out of therma cycle.
 
 Right now, the gun will probably go kaput on your great grandson. If you therma cycle it, whoever it goes kaput on will probably be living on Mars or Venus when it does.

[mvelimir]

Hi brigadier,

Thank you for clearing it up. I thought it was more of an old-fashion process of heating and cooling it in which case it becomes brittle. This is a very interesting information worth remembering. I guess, you're right - it comes to feasibility of doing it. Also, depends very much on how much people are shooting. If it is, as I see people do it, once a months, 10-15 rounds, then I think it will last long enough to travel to Mars, even without therma cycle. If you shoot few boxes 2-4 times a week, things are starting to look interesting regarding the treatment.

[brigadier]

Longevity is nice, but I would do it more for overall durability and mechanical accuracy. I don't know that I would bother with a CZ-82, but therma cycle is something I have been thinking about getting for my CZ-52. I would certainly feel much more comfortable with Bulgarian ammo.

 If I WERE to do it to an 82, my decisive reason would be to make sure that any microscopic fractures are mended and stress relieved.

[NickD]

I was also thinking that with such a tough gun to begin with, post-thermacycle I could probably reload or shop for rounds hot enough to get the same kind of pop as a standard 9x19 has without any fear of shortening its lifespan.

[brigadier]

I thought about doing that with my CZ-52 to allow it to handle Bulgarian surplus without a problem. Be careful though. You'll be wandering in to uncharted territory.