Any idea what's up with my Nighthawk Talon's finish?

[milosz]

~2yo Talon II in 9mm, never carried, it spent a little while in a leather holster but has mostly been in and out of a range bag. I'd guess 3k rounds at this point.

My cleaning regimen is pretty... lax. I only field strip guns when they're ready for new springs (or a stoppage), and I leave the bore alone unless accuracy suffers. Regular lube and wiping down the exterior with BreakFree or similar.

I noticed the dot pattern below before but attributed it to dirtiness. The pattern seemed worse today and I wiped it down with some M-Pro7 cleaner and with BreakFree CLP, neither appeared to do anything and I can feel the pattern with my finger.

Wondering if it's possibly something with the finish (I believe they were still doing Cerakote at the time) or if I should just be more aggressive with a cleaner first?

[Littlelebowski]

Looks like they laid it down on something while the finish was still curing. Call them, they'll make it right. I know from personal experience.

[steyrman13]

Is it stored in a soft case that has foam on the inside egg crate shaped or just foam? It almost looks like the foam is being deteriorated by the breakfree/whatever and coming off onto the finish. Best I can tell it looks like it is on top of the surface of the slide and not corroded away from or something like that. I would call like stated above, but some steel wool might remove it for you

[milosz]

Thanks, guys.

I'm going to call on Monday and see what they think, if they want me to get more aggressive with cleaning or just send it in.

The case is the gun rug Nighthawk includes - it's not with me right now so I'm having a hard time recalling if that's exposed foam or covered in cloth.

[R0CKETMAN]

Looks like some sort of outside influence and odd that the pattern is uniform. It goes beyond the flats onto areas that wouldn't normally see pressure from even the weight of the gun itself....more perplexing.

[Dave Berryhill]

Yep, looks like an impression. Cordura/nylon from your range bag maybe?

[Nytcrawler93]

The chemicals and bag combo left for awhile will do that.

[JonInWA]

It also looks like you've got some rust developing at your front sight base area...

Best, Jon

[blriehl]

If that is the Permakote finish, it looks like it isn't fully cured, in which case, you should either have NHC refinish it for you or send it to a Cerakote finisher and have it fixed up.

If it is the new FCN finish, and it was exposed to an acidic cleaner (I believe they specifically warn against it in the manual), then you will need to have it blasted and refinished.

It looks like the former to me. The word around the campfire is that NHC had a period where they didn't cure the finish at the right temp (too low), leaving partially cured coatings. If that were my gun, I'd have it Cerakoted by the shop that Cerakote recomends.

[milosz]

Embarrassing addendum - with more time today and a healthy application of cleaner and elbow grease, the dot pattern came off. I guess it was gunk taking on the pattern of the gun rug. I don't leave a heavy amount of lubricant on the outside when I put it away, but I guess I leave enough to get the pattern.

Thanks, everybody.