Live in the south or some other oppressively humid climate? Worried about your guns developing little blooms of rust despite your best efforts to keep them pristine? Flambeau has a simple solution. Their Zerust plastabs and plaques are a simple way to protect those precious gats. Just slip one in your case and you’re worry-free for five years.
But what about that Holland and Holland double gun in your safe? If something happened to that thing, you’d never forgive yourself. Never fear, Flambeau has the solution. Long gun sleeves. that will keep that safe queen purty and protected.
They also make an extensive line of cases; everything from the equivalent of the inexpensive clamshell boxes most guns come in to uber-tough cases like the one below. I have one and can attest that you can just about drive a Kenworth over it with nary a scratch.
“Live in the south of some other oppressively humid climate? Worried about your guns developing little blooms of rust despite your best efforts to keep them pristine?”
If you actually do live in a humid locale, relying on those sounds a bit risky. I hope those with more experience than mine in this area can chime in on strategies to keep the wet out of your secure gun storage area (and toolbox, for that matter).
I’m familiar with the GoldenRod electric heater stick and a calcium chloride product called DampRid.
My inner geek loves the concept of actually de-humidifying the air with a solid-state peltier junction device, but they invariably have small fans to move the air across the device, and they will sooner or later *fail*.
What else am I missing? (Besides hiring a nubile Israeli supermodel full-time to clean and oil the bangsticks).
I live in the metro Houston area, anything made of steel left outside (grills etc) don’t seem to last long.
My gun care strategy is twofold:-
1- Total ‘anality’ re cleaning & handling, I always wipe the steel surfaces down with a Remington gun wipe after handling as I feel my finger print ‘juices’ contain salt…..
2- I have a Liberty Eva-dry water absorbing dehumidifier in my gun safe. Every now and then you have to take it out, plug it in and it heats up & drys out the water absorbing crystals.
So far, no rust, let’s hope that continues!
Get a Silica Gel canister that you can put in the oven. Just make sure you take the cap off with the plastic viewing hole first.
An incandescent light bulb (endangered species) will keep rust off guns in a gun safe provided it is on and not burnt out. The trick to keeping rust off anything is keeping the space the thing is in warmer than the ambient temperature around it. I have a golden rod in my gun safe but I keep a 100watt light bulb on in my 6×5 vault. Works the same. I’m in and out of the vault every other day so I know if the lamp burns out. The Zerust things work. There are other forms of rust inhibiting vapor emitters on the market. Some are made out of paper impregnated with the corrosion inhibitor. There is a cubic inch limitation of each device based on the size of the emitter and an effective life. The little paper tabs have a 6 month effective life. I think I saw on one of the Zerust tabs that is was good for 5 years.
Yep. The Zerust tabs are rated for five years when placed in the appropriately sized container (case, safe, whatever).
I live in the south. The barrels of all my guns are either stainless or chrome lined. Some of the chrome lined barrels are QPQ treated.
I’m a new owner, but live by the ocean. Seems like I have some research to do…
I’ve used Calcium Carbonate dehumidifiers for over 20 years. They are cheap, available at almost every supermarket, and refillable. Once a month pour the collected moisture down the toilet and refill with fresh powder.
We use Zerust at work for international shipments of electronic systems. Stuff works for more then just steel. I have a few of the Zerust capsules in my gun collection, and also use Eezox. Haven’t had a problem since I started using them.
Here is the Zerust page with the products you might find useful, including the protective envelope that the capsules would protect in: http://www.zerust.com/diffusers
Thanks so much for posting this. Lots of choices on this page, though. If you don’t mind, do you have a suggestion for a metal gun cabinet? I rotate rifles/shotguns in and out and keep them cleaned, but Tennessee humidity is brutal and fighting rust is a tough go in the barn. Thanks for this insight, and others here.
Brand new steel parts with bluing will develop rust in central Texas just by being exposed to open air for a few months. I suppose you could put your guns in atmospherically controlled cases but its no substitute for regular inspections and oiling.
While I was stationed in Hawaii, every time there was a weapons draw, the rifles had some rust, even being inside air conditioned armories! They also wanted us to put our weapons up dry (no oil at all) which was half the problem right there. Steel parts + no oil + worn down protective coatings = rust rust rust!
I could see fancy cases being a good thing for older antique weapons, but you still better be inspecting!
Oh, and I love chrome bolts.
There’s nothing better than a wwell authored article! Thajk yyou so much for this relief, I relished every moment of the
read. Will be eagerly awaiting your next posxt 🙂