if taken care of, maintained they can hold up ,but this is NOT a "color case hardened" rpocess with the Vaqueros, it was a chemical "inked on" procedure, as the metal used to alloy cast the frames is an alloy of 4140 chrome -moly steel thus a "complex" metal, alloy and as such cannot properly be "case HARDENED" as to the old ways of the Colts, and others, at those high temperatures, the casting can and will become "brittle", not hold up structurily, today those such as Turnbull and others use a slight variation of "case color" , with out the "hardening" so are not quite the same...companies such as the one that was here in southern Ohio, Springfield Color Case would NOT do any Rugers, never would, ,tried it and they failed, we saw what happened way back in the late 60's................
bottom line take care of it, do NOT over clean, nor use any strong chemical solutions, and as noted above, the factory no longer refinishes the Vaqueros this way, and were just "rebluing" them solid color....( black blue, much like a Dulite solution and similar to black oxide, a stronger,more durable finish finish,thus MORE "black, than blued"...................(EPA made them remove the niter from bluing solutions used in this country),others still do, so there is Belgium blues, and always the "best", rust blued...........yes, firearms "bluing" is only a "controlled oxidation" of the guns metal surface....... 8) :roll: :wink: