I like to use straight pins for various things because they’re very strong, very hard and perfectly uniform sizes. I’d love to use them for visible bolts on a model as the heads are perfectly shaped. Problem is that paint doesn’t stick too well to stainless steel. I’d like to be able to use a blackening product on them if it would work okay, but “Blacken-It” doesn’t work too well on stainless steel.
Well, I was searching on the Internet and found a product and I thought I’d give it a try. It is from Caswell and is specifically called Stainless Steel Blackener. The stuff comes in a kit that includes a blackener in gel form, a sealer and a pair of gloves, all for about $20. I got some and boy does this stuff work great! This is the BLACKEST metal I’ve ever gotten with any metal or any metal toner.
I originally bought this to blacken some stainless steel ball bearings I got for cannon balls and that worked really well.
Next, I tried it on some straight pins, and “instant iron bolts!”
I’m not sure if you can buy this in stores. I looked on Amazon, but I didn’t trust the product description of what was being sold there because when I looked up stainless steel blackener, the product that came up specifically had in its description “Not for use on stainless steel.” Go figure.
I bought mine direct from the Caswell web site here.
Ship Modeler 