You can't judge a Parker by how it looks on the outside

[Bruce Day]

Thanks, Rich. Nice work, nice pictures. The problem is that too many do not approach the work with the same care and methodical manner. Spray penetrating oil on every screw and just let it sit for a day or two before even attempting to turn screws. So many mangled screws and lost parts.

I need to do one this winter, waiting for a miserable day where its too nasty to go out. You get plenty of those up in Fairbanks.

[Jerry Andrews]

Wow, nice job on the clean up! I'd never have guessed that gun would have been that cruddy inside! Good go of it though, good job. Jerry Andrews

[Richard Flanders]

They ALL look like this inside Jerry, and many look much worse. Fortunately, this one was just oil vs corrosion, except in the trigger group, so it cleaned up quite easily, and for whatever reason, the wood was not oil soaked and punky as it could have been. I have some old posts showing others I have done the same to. My DH12 looked much cleaner than this one externally and was almost this bad inside. My Remington hammer gun looked cleaner than this outside and was much worse inside, with far more corrosion, and took 10days to clean up, mostly due to waiting on stuck screws. There are definite pitfalls to these cleaning adventures. When you get some of the screws nice and clean they no longer index properly; one side screw on this gun was/is like that; I may try reversing them to see if that helps. None of the floorplate screws was in the proper hole; the one with no marking was up front instead of by the trigger guard and was not indexed properly. With experimentation, I think I got them right now. Floor plates are often bent from someone in the past now knowing how to properly removing them, as in trying to tap them out without removing all the floorplate screws. The front of this one was that way, proud of the receiver and I had to lay it on a thick flat aluminum block I have for just such things and carefully hammer it back to the proper shape with the little nylon hammer, which is a delicate operation no matter how you do it; major pucker factor involved here I assure you. It still isn't quite perfect but is better than before. And it seems that no matter how careful you try to be, it's just all too often that a screw slot gets a mark or two from your efforts, even when it's not a badly stuck one. That happened on this gun also. It's very difficult to get a gummed up slot clean enough so that the proper driver will fit properly. Round toothpicks are the best tool for that and it takes 5-6 toothpicks to clean a single slot most of the time, and the narrow slots on the sides are so thin it's very difficult to clean them. Dental picks get into the corners of the slots better then toothpicks, but I can personally guarantee that if you try metal cleaning picks of any kind, you WILL scratch something, generally the case hardening on the receiver.... been there. Don't do it. Ever. Never. Please. I don't care how good you think you are, don't use metal picks to clean screw slots. Use 20 toothpicks if you have to, use 50, and lacquer thinner to soften that last little bit in the slot ends; they're cheap and if you don't get that last little bit of gunk out of a screw slot that pretty screw driver you have will NOT fit properly and you will bugger a screw eventually, guaranteed. Every one is a learning experience. My work area is pretty cluttered also. At one point the little spring in the plunger that comes out the front of the receiver bounced off the work bench onto the floor to my left. I could not find it and ended up emptying out a box of about 300 28ga hulls sitting by my feet, checking each one for the spring. Eventually, after moving everything within 6ft, which was a lot, I found it on my right side on the floor. Phew; that was too close. I was about to email you to see if you had any Parker parts carcasses. When I get the receiver out I put it into a large jar of lacquer thinner in the sonic cleaner and let it buzz away for about 30 minutes. It's incredible to watch the amount of gunk that comes out. I then spray the inside with Ballistol and let it drip dry. That stuff is incredible for this. It dries enough to form a coating that will not run off and protects the insides very well and doesn't seem to turn to varnish like regular oil does. It's the best innards preservative I've seen to date.

[Jerry Andrews]

Thanks for a nice post, I appreciate that information, and the toothpick idea is a great idea! Jerry

[Richard Flanders]

I go through hundreds of round toothpicks cleaning old guns. You run one gently down a rib junction that looks just fine and without fail, a nice curl of old oil comes out just like off a drill bit in a drill press. And no marring of anything. Nice. Try it. You'll never go back.

[Jerry Andrews]

Thanks for that, I appeciate it, Jerry

[Marc Retallack]

Richard

Have you tried bamboo toothpicks? I would imagine they would be somewhat more durable than standard toothpicks.

Cheers
Marcus

[Richard Flanders]

Bamboo would work great. I have a few but don't generally use them for guns. I wouldn't use them on the rib joint as they are hard enough(lots of silica in bamboo)to potentially scratch the solder.

[Paul Harm]

Nice job and thanks for some tips on how you do it. I haven't run into any as bad as you have. What I've found on a number of guns is cracked, or cracks just starting in the middle of the stock as you look back at it after being taken off. Just under the top tang. I just bought a Trojan and upon taking the stock off I found a small crack just starting. After soaking in acetone for a day to get all the oil out it was super glued with the good stuff from Brownells. Should be good as new. The rest of the gun other than a couple of pits in the barrels is just fine. Someone took pretty good care of it. Paul

[Richard Flanders]

Good on you Paul. Keepem shooting. Am posting pics here of the side engraving of the VH12 of this post. What's with these heiroglyphics? Is this how they all are? Anyone see a K and an E in there somehow? Is this a "late Friday afternoon" gun or something? Was the engraver nipping on his bottle of rum that day? Looks more like PARNHR, with a dyslexic N
to me! These pics are blowups of macros taken with a newly acquired 12.1 megapixel Canon S1300 Powershot. They are selling them off all Best Buy and the box stores for $110 bucks now because the newer S1400 is out with 14?megapixels. The S1300 is all most anyone could ever want in a small digital camera; I would highly recommend getting one if you need a small digital camera; it's an incredible buy and they won't last long at that price.