Sometimes in life you do something for no other reason than, “Hey, that sounds cool.” When a company like KG Coatings offers to bake on a custom camo scheme that matches the area you hunt, the answer is, “Yes!” Always. Forever . . .
Maybe I should back up. Above is a photo of my trusty hunting gun. A Ruger M77 Mark II in .243 WIN. I’ve taken to the field for nearly a decade with this gun and have taken down countless tasty animals with it. Upgrades over time have included a Leupold VX-II and a Timney trigger. I’d never really considered painting/coating it until the KG crew offered to coat it. But as you can see below, the gun has some scuffs and wear so a coating job seemed appropriate.
But the thing that really pushed me over the edge was the assurance that their in-house paint guy could craft a scheme that would match the Kerrville/Fredericksburg area of the Texas Hill Country where I hunt. My shoulder was sore from all that arm twisting, so I finally handed over the gun with little hesitation.
Several months later, I got my gun back from the paint shop and I’m simply floored. This gun looks AMAZING. The colors are rich, deep in texture and blend in perfectly.
Cool colors aside, this whole project is completely worthless if the gun doesn’t function or the coating doesn’t stick. Great news on both counts: the gun performs exactly as it did before and the coating seems to have handled a decent amount of abuse so far. You’ll notice below that it has worn off slightly in the high wear area in the receiver where the bolt slides back and forth. I’m not too concerned and I really don’t expect any coating to hold up to a high friction area packed with grease and dirt.
One caveat: KG is pretty busy coating guns for large corporate clients and by COO Chris Fazio’s own admission, coating guns for individual customers isn’t their primary source of business. They can do it, and they will, but if you call they might refer you to another coating company who uses KG products.
Specifications: KG Coatings Camo Rifle Coating
- Type: 2400 Series Gun Kote
- Turnaround Time: 2 weeks to 6 months
- Contact: 800-348-9558
- Price: Varies
- Handguns – $150
- Rifles & Shotguns – $195
- Rifle Barrel – $85
- Barreled Actions – $135
- AR-15 Receivers – $85
- Additional Colors – $25/color
Ratings (subjective & based on five star maximum)
Durability * * * *
Even though I don’t expect a coating to survive life inside a rifle action covered in grease and sand, doing so would be perfection & would get five stars. Otherwise this coating is durable as all hell and seems to hide dirt, scuffs, and scratches very well.
Camouflage * * * * *
This rifle blends in perfectly with the foliage at my ranch. I mean, absolutely perfectly. I have no doubts that it would stick out like a sore thumb in San Angelo, but where I hunt, it looks perfect.
Since it is a bake on I assume it’s able to hold up to the temperature changes in the barrel? It looks great but I wonder how it stacks up vs. a few cans of krylon. Durability vs. cost ect.
When you send in a firearm for something like this do you need to completely disassemble it first for them or something? Say I want to get my CZ-82 refinished or painted, how much do I need to do before I send it off in the mail?
It’s all about baby steps.Right now, even if the antis had the support to ban guns outright in the US, there’s too many guns for them to account for.
$1000 x 300 million = one big azz number.
So, they’ve got to make it smaller.Step one is to make buying guns difficult:that cuts down on new people buying arms and reduces the circulation as old guns break and get seized.Increasing FFL regs gives DC more power to arbitrarily revoke FFL licenses, which curtails supply.
Regulation is the enemy of freedom, and this administration loves regulation.
If I laid that rifle down for a few moments, I might never find it again, given the number of non-camo pencils I’ve lost after setting them on my desk….
Deer cannot see color, however they do spot things that don’t match. A sharp outline will definitely get their attention. I have seen then stare at empty deer stands for minutes more than once.
Anything that makes the edges disappear is good.
Words cannot describe how deeply and on how many levels this angers me.
How about we end tax funded education, eliminate “gun free zones” and let the parents and tuition funded schools decide how best to protect their students/customers? Oh, that would be freedom, which is being progressively banned in Amerika.
In another news source : “The liberals don’t like me because I’ve disrespected the dead. The conservatives don’t like me because of the gun-control message. The conspiracy theorists don’t like me because it risks informing people of what happened. And the trolls don’t like me because it wasn’t edgy enough,” he said via Twitter.
The guy just doesn’t get it. No one like you because you are a twisted psycho. “Conservatives” or “liberals” or even most tin-foil hat people, generally have some semblance of humanity that balks at making a game out of killing children. This is the sort of guy that someone, normally gentle and calm, will have to punch in the face for being a jackanape. A disgusting cancer on the body of humanity.
Why would leave the protection of children to someone whose job description has been held by the courts to NOT include protecting people?
They are criminal enforcement – and will go around looking for criminals to en-force themselves upon.
Then there is the financial problem. Would it be smarter to pay a lot of money to invest your security in a single gun/single target, or to let all gun-owners exercise their rights and gain many guns/many targets for free? You don’t have to have a degree in cost/benefit analysis to figure this one out
Here’s what I’d like to see:
A game that counters this, where you play as an unarmed teacher who has to run from the gunman and try to save the kids.
Then, after watching the gunman kill you, you get a firearm and get to shoot back. But, when the shooter sees you with a gun, he immediately puts his rifle to his head and shoots himself, which seems to be the most typical reaction of school shooters.
And Cody Wilson gets Kirsten Joy Weiss’s digits… damn.
“throwing newly legalized handguns into the mix could have tragic consequences”
Translation: Innocent concealed carriers are going to get shot by hot-headed cops.
“Dart said he expected more shootings to occur — including those that are ruled justified”
Translation: After an officer shoots an innocent concealed carrier, the appropriate paperwork will be completed to absolve the officer.
Whether or not deer can see color, I can see that rifle. It looks darn good. now just find the idiot that put the black sling on it, smack him around and get a camo sling and you are set. Even better would be to get some kind of cloth sling and camo it to match the rifle. Its almost fall you better hurry.