Well 686 is made of stainless, but stainless my butt!

[Mity2]

So I bought this used 686. Great weapon. Accurate, and dependable(as long as I'm loading it with .38Special. But thats something S&W have to fix).

And it just has that "lean and mean, all buisness" look of 6" barrel, shine of stainless.

BUT!

appearently, previous owner never bother to clean it very much.
Specialy where it don't show...
what I discovered when I remove the grip panel!

(Not mine, but mine is EXACTLY the same way, same place, but bit worse)

Its definatly rusted. not surface rust either. its covered by rubber hogue grip, which oil and what not from your hand I guess just sits under..

It goes to tell you that stainless used on gun is NOT same stainless used on your kitchen sink.
I'm not sure what type of Stainless steel they use on the firearm, but if you do not clean it, and oil it, stainless firearm can and WELL rust!

In addition to clean where you can see, please remenber to remove grip panel and clean under it!

[shooter357]

My 686 is my carry weapon and I make sure to keep it clean, even under the grips.

[Asmodeus]

Stainless steel is rust resistant, not rust proof. Any mark that scores the surface of a stainless steel item can, and most likely will, rust, unless you keep it clean.

[normanvin]

Stainless steel is rust resistant, not rust proof. Any mark that scores the surface of a stainless steel item can, and most likely will, rust, unless you keep it clean.

What he said.

[brian]

.......... Any mark that scores the surface of a stainless steel item can, and most likely will, rust, unless you keep it clean.

false.....for the most part. scratch a sink with a steel object(non-ss) and the scratch will rust, but it's not the ss, it's carbon deposit left from teh steel object. in time the carbon deposit will go away as will the "rust".

depends on teh grade of stainless. and there are many types.
kitchen sinks are mostly 304, maybe 316. they will not rust...ever. you can get rust on them, but it's not from them.

ss is an alloy of iron(iron rusts...and is magnetic) containing a min of ~10% chromium.
the chrome will make the steel corrosion resistant, but not rust proof. they also have a nickel content, the higher the nickel% the more rust proof.
the higher then nickel, the less magnetic they are. cheap 304 will have slight magnetic pull.
gun frames are more than likely 400 series ss. higher carbon, lower chromium levels.
there is no magic metal that is super strong, never goes away, is increditably lite weight, is easy to work and cheap to produce.

not getting into why the higher corrosion resistant ss is not used in firearm frames, but there are several reasons. but it has a lot to do with ductility.

so take a magnet and see how sticky your ss frames are., then check the stainless sink insert down stairs.

[RandomTask]

Yup, what the above dudes said. Learn more here:
http://www.bssa.org.uk/faq.php?id=1

[Whiterook]

Gee well thanks for this post, now I'm gonna have to go check under the grips of all my handguns.

[PennsyPlinker]

It may also be corroding because of the acidic nature of the previous owner's personal chemistry. Some people are just more acidic than others, and I am not talking personality. I had a student once who worked for me as payment for instruction. As a Christmas present, I gave him some gold plated pens I made. Within two weeks the gold plating had corroded away to the base metal underneath! And the base metal was pitted like it had been sand blasted.

Now, these were not the best pens in the world for gold plating quality, but most people would expect several years of use before they deteriorated to the point where this guy had gotten his in a matter of days. So maybe the last owner was a sweaty, acidic kind of a guy.

[Delcoadvocate]

Doesn't matter what material you use, there is something out there that will corrode it. With SS, you need to think about corrosion, not "rust". Rust is an oxidation process. Corrosion is a similar chemical reaction that may not have anything to do with oxygen or moisture content.

Carbon deposits from burnt gunpowder is HIGHLY acidic and corrosive to ALL firearm metals if left unattended for an appreciable amount of time. Cleaning what you can see is never good enough.

When speaking of the kitchen sink, look beneath what you can see. It's a totally different story.

[Seventy4Blazer]

there are a lot of different types of "stainless" out there. they ALL corrode in one way or another. some just take more time than others...

the post prior to mine hit the nail on the head.