Post 64 Winchester 94 receiver hardness and case coloring or melonite

Got two 94 receivers that have been in a fire. I am assuming that there is no hardness left to them but I am going to have them tested to be sure. What is the hardness I should be looking for? I'm assuming somewhere in the range of 28-32 same as 4140 ph that most modern guns are made of.
Which brings me to my next question. Should they be soft, would color case hardening be sufficient to bring them back for use? What about having them phosphated or rust blued and them melonited? Remember these are post 64 receivers that are " graphitic steel" or Ductile Iron. Most Melonite vendors say they can melonite iron.
Anyway what are your thoughts? I would really like to turn these into a 38-55 and a 32-40 or 35-30.

General rule of thumb is, if the wood was burned off in the fire and/or the springs have lost their spring, the steel is annealed and/or "burned" and no longer any good. If the wood was only charred and the damage is mostly from the fire hose (rust and pitting from water and acidic ash residue), then the steel was probably not affected.
I do not know if the cast steel can be case colored, but it will rust blue very nicely. Black oxide "hot" bluing doesn't work on these. I used Pilkingtons Rust Blue on one and it turned out excellent.

I bought these just as actions, so I don't know about the wood. The springs still have spring to them but are very weak due to rusting,
I believe they can be color cased, I have a factory post 64 94 that is, an " antique carbine". Also many of the the color case vendors recommend annealing before color case, but don't specify post or pre 64.
If it has to be annealed before hand I may already be at that stage.
Anyway looking for a target hardness

I think your best bet is to have them Melonited QPQ. There is no need to blue or phosphate them first. the Melonite process will turn them black and the QPQ ( quench, polish, quench) will leave a smoother surface finish. The process will heat them to about 1100 deg F so taking a surface hardness before will be useless. If the springs have any life at all, they probably did not see more than that.

RWO

I had an issue hot bluing a post 64 win 94. It would not blue... Called winchester and was told the receivers were made from graphitic steel (don't remember the number) and would not blue. The hot salt blue wiped right off with paper towels... I was surprised! Winchester advised me that first the receivers are tin plated and then the tin is blued. I ended up having them blue the receiver and I took care of the rest.

Anthony said:

I had an issue hot bluing a post 64 win 94. It would not blue... Called winchester and was told the receivers were made from graphitic steel (don't remember the number) and would not blue. The hot salt blue wiped right off with paper towels... I was surprised! Winchester advised me that first the receivers are tin plated and then the tin is blued. I ended up having them blue the receiver and I took care of the rest.

Click to expand...

The graphitic receivers will rust blue. Quite nicely as a matter of fact. As you found out, hot blue, not so much! Last one I re finished I polished the receiver and prep for a blue job and leave it in the white with all the screws, gate, bolt, lever etc blued. Clear coat the receiver with Gun Kote clear satin. Looks mighty good.