Touching-up minor blemishes on firearms...

Over the years, I've often repeated the simple wisdom that, "Scars are just visible memories." I've managed to collect my fair share of scars over the years... top of my head from a brick... both knees from surgeries for old ACL injuries and meniscus tears... left elbow from the horn of an angry black angus... right hand from a steel band on a pallet... below my right eye from a hockey puck... abdominal scars from hernia repairs... right foot from dropping some farm equipment on it with tractor... and many more.

It seems our firearms collect a lot of scars and blemishes over time through use and age too. Some folks prefer the look of a beaten-up, well-worn gun while others keep their mechanical friends as pristine as the day they left the factory. While I have undertaken several extensive firearm restoration projects over the years... sometimes we just want to touch-up a small blemish, scratch or mark.

There are a lot of great products and home-grown techniques to help keep our guns looking good, so I thought this might be a good conversation starter. Sometimes we get a small scratch or wear-spot on our blued firearm barrels, receivers, and frames and one quick way to touch-up a small area is with the Birchwood-Casey Presto Gun Blue Touch-Up Pen.

This Gun Blue Touch-Up Pen is not a black Sharpie... but a true, penetrating, chemical bluing in a pen. I've had good success with cold-bluing small areas with this product. From my experience, the touched-up area seems to hold it's bluing well... even with repeated cleanings and oiling.

The Birchwood-Casey Super Black Touch-Up Pens come in both glossy and flat black.  They work great for touching up items that are painted like scopes. On a side note, the Birchwood-Casey Super Bright Touch-Up Pens are great for adding a bright color to your front sights if you're tired of using Testors model paint or fingernail polish.

For those of us with good ol' wood stocks and furniture on our guns, sometimes those scratches and dings are memories that were unavoidable through regular use and we just want to give the guy a little bit of respect with a quick touch-up. The gals and I have had good luck with the Guardsman Furniture Markers.

You can choose a color that matches the wood finish, but I've found it best to start with a slightly lighter color and work my way through progressively darker colors until it matches. A little gun stock wax or stock-finishing oil and you're looking like new again.

While there are some very specific products available for those black aluminum and polymer items that need a quick fix... sometimes it's hard to beat the ubiquitous black Sharpie marker. Sharpies have endless uses and you'll almost never find me without one... they're in vehicles, range bags, BOBs, GHBs, the gun room and the kitchen drawers.

So, what are your tips for... Touching-up minor blemishes on firearms...