Tuesday, August 9, 2016

Small Bore, really.

Small Bore, with range reports.


Stock shape taken from a childs .22 bolt action rifle, a Stevens Model 15, then modified to fit.
Brass pieces left over from a H&A Spanish rifle, butt, trigger guard, etc.
Cherry, 2 inches thick, a bit soft but seems to work OK.













During a rain storm today, got most of the barrel inlet.  Some of you will recognize the barrel brand, about 18 inches long of what's left.  Barrel chamber stub removed, flat filed on right side for a flintlock, yes that one.  Now breached at 3/8-16.  If this barrel does not work out then it can be bored out for a bit larger bore smoothie.















Aug/10/2016
Butt Plate installed.  More shaping done but not finished.
Trigger guard modified to fit this stock.
Barrel plugged.  Now for a hook breech tang, would be nice if it was brass but may end up as steel.



















Aug/12/2016
Went to the local metal store, AZ-Metals.  Bought a foot of 2x3x0.188 angle steel.  Turns out it's ASTM A36, whatever that is.  I also had them cut a 1 inch wide piece from that foot long.  After about 1 hour I had what you now see.  Top corners of the tang need trimming, also the tang needs a "bit" of bending.

It is going to be over 100F today and the shed gets too hot to work out there for more than 1-2 hours.  My do-rag hanky is hanging in the bathroom curtain rod trying to dry out.

It is too bad that the barrel looks like a 10-22, argh.

























































OK, thanks to an idea by Tim Crosby on the AmericanLongRifles forum, I now have a touch hole insert.  Stainless 1/4-20 and 1/4 inch long allen set screw inserted backwards, with a 1/16 inch diameter hole drilled through it.  Set screw probably needs to be a bit longer as this one only gave 4.5 full threads out of 7 threads available in the barrel.
Shown here is the hook breech partly installed with temporary screws into the Cherry stock.  Now for a barrel band or a wedge to hold the front of the barrel down.

























Aug/13/2016
Pinned the barrel front.
Folded brass soldered to the barrel.  Pinned with 3/32 inch wire (old coat hanger).
Lock comes next.



Aug/16/2016
Lock in.
Barrel in.
Trigger in.
Trigger guard on.
Flint in.
Sparks made.














Simulated left side plate.















To do:
Test Fire.
Walnut stock nose.
Side Plate.


Aug/17/2016
Beginnings of the side plate.  Still a bit large.


















Side plate hammered from the backside to "round it out".

















Range Report:
Aug/20/2016

25 yards, 10grains of Goex FFFg, prime was Schuetzen FFFg, 0.22 caliber air gun pellets that I found at the range on the ground.

Large Target
Four hits upper area, about 10 to 11 inches high from the POA at dead center of the target.

























Closer View:












During the fourth shot, it would not spark at all (argh).  I changed the flint, not needed but it had to go off so that the public range could go cold.  After about three more tries it finally went poof.  That darned frizzen again.  Time for a new one.



New frizzen ordered on flea-bay.

Notes:
I don't care about speed of the bullet, just that this rifle functions.  Since it's my first hand-made flinter I am happy with it as is.  The choice of wood is not good, this piece of Cherry is way too soft for a rifle stock, it keeps cracking and the sharp edges keep flaking away, disappointing.




Aug/22/2016
Ordered NAA black powder bullets today, 100 each.  These are made for their NAA black powder .22 revolver and they should work fine in this rifle.

Made a tool to concave the backend of pulled .22 bullets.  Lots of mis-fired ones at the range.


Aug/23/2016
Blued the tang, changed screws, etc.  Length is 33.5 inches long, that's all, butt to muzzle.




























33.5 inches long.  Camera angle shows it all wrong.















Questions about the ramrod used; what? materials?

Core of the ramrod is steel of 0.156 inch or 5/32 inch diameter, outer is 0.187 or 3/16 inch hobby brass tubing, then a .22 caliber jag, all soldered together into one solid piece, jag end up against the steel rod.  Jag is permanent.

Stainless rod with a brass brush for .22 cal, used after every shot.


Range Report: Aug/31/2016

Was able to get 16 shots before it got too hot at the range (AZ).  Shoots a bit high.  The barrel is so-so, either it's me or the barrel is not good for muzzle loading applications, too fast of a spin.  Groups of 2 to 3 inches at 25 yards seem to be normal.  This grouping is with 10gr of Goex FFFG, NAA bullets and some or no lube.  Cleaning with a brass brush after each shot seems to be required.  Using less than 10gr of Goex doesn't seem to help accuracy.  It's a bit of a pain to load 10gr of BP from a large horn, spilling more than used.

The lock works fine if the flint is kept right up against the frizzen at half-cock.  Once it wears down the lock starts to not spark.  I can work with that.  Frizzen spring seems to work fine.

The touch hole liner as it exists works fine, amazing.



Sept/08/2016
Range time today.
Have reduced the main charge to 7gr of Goex FFFg.  Groups seem smaller.
Will be picking up a can of Goex FFFFg for testing, someday.
Keeping the flint up close to the frizzen and sharp, works.  This lock is a flint eater, bummer.



Sept/15/2016
Range Report:
Benchrest at 25 yards, 7.5gr of Goex FFFg, no patches.
That 7.5gr is estimated by moving the marker to halfway between 5 and 10 on the brass powder measure.
All holes are those NAA BP bullets, except one.
The single hole just to the left of the "X" is a round-nose air-gun pellet of unknown weight and manufacture.






















I talked to one of the air-gun fellas at the range, he suggested to try some JSB 18gr air-gun pellets of which he let me have three.  The three holes to the targets left are those pellets.  The three holes on the right are 14.3gr pellets.  Same distance, same powder charge, no changes.

I rezsized the pellets through another 10-22 barrel before trying to push them down the muzzle of this rifle.  That helped to keep the pellet skirts intact and correctly sized.



























When I got home I moved the trigger pivot to the new location shown by the shiney pin showing just under the rear lock screw.  Now the trigger pull is around 3 lbs instead of what it was and terrible it was!  Trigger was flattened a bit to accomodate the internal vertical move.  Plug that old hole!


















Sept/21/2016

Removed broken rear sight and replaced it with a 1/16 inch diameter brass peep sight.
The peep hole has been countersunk on both sides to reduce internal reflections from the AZ sunshine.

























Sept/22/2016

Some embelishment on the lock plate.
Frizzen spring finished, now locks the frizzen open.



























Oh look, another one:
https://youtu.be/rFfsBZURIdQ



Building an iron flintlock lock:
http://americanlongrifles.org/forum/index.php?topic=26825.0






IdeZilla

Comments Welcomed



Monday, August 1, 2016

Making a Flintlock Lock from the parts bin

I will be using various parts from the parts bin to create this lock.

Internals from a H&A percussion lock; main spring, tumbler, sear, sear spring, screws, etc.
H&A plate will be put back into the bin.
Hammer/Cock is from a TC flintlock, old style.
Plate will be hand-made from 1/8 inch thick steel plate from the hardware store.
Frizzen from old style TC flintlock, relined, not shown.


Update 1: Aug/02/2016; All parts mounted (so far)
Update 2: Aug/04/2016; Top Jaw
Update 2: Aug/05/2016; Pan, Frizzen, Frizzen spring.
Update 2: Aug/06/2016;Clean Up, fix that frizzen!



Parts to make or purchase:

Upper cock piece.
Upper cock piece screw.
Pan.
Frizzen spring and screws.

Parts to work over:
Cock:
Needs the square hole moved or rotated, the lower jaw moved upwards (taller).



Most of the current parts

Will need another screw for the sear spring, the flat head one is temporary.

"New plate" holes marked.  Tumbler hole is done.  Plate outline is a bit larger, about 1/16 inch or so even though the pictures makes it look shorter, etc.

I realize that these parts are not very good but this lock making/creating is for teaching purposes.















Other side of those plates.  Pin is for the upper leg of the main spring.  Rear slot is for the sear spring.

There are three threaded holes for lock mounting, these will not be copied to the new plate.  New locations will be made when the lock is to be installed.









Aug/02/2016  Update:

Mounted all internal parts.
The screws are 3mm x 0,5mm  so a tap was purchased, the store did not have a #39 drill, so I used a #40.
I attempted to hot bend the cock but as you can see a crack appeared anyway.  The lower jaw was tilted downward a tiny bit.  It appears that the jaw screw may be 3/16 x 24 US, check that later.  That jaw screw is either 3/16 x 24 or 12 x 24, both work.

























The one allen screw replaces another screw, it holds the sear spring in place.  The main spring pin is coat-hanger wire. 


























Now to find or make the pan, probably brass.  Also the frizzen spring.




Aug/04/2016 Update:

Finished the upper jaw and fire-blued same.

Cheesy screw (that is all that the local Ace had), 12x24.  Turned the head to a smaller diameter to fit, drill press + file.

Started a frizzen spring, it may be too weak, but we'll see later.  This frizzen is one that was a bugger to harden so it was refaced with a piece of file.  That file piece was removed and another attempt to harden that frizzen using a compound.

Now for the pan and bolster. 

























Aug/05/2016  Update:
Pan added, not the way I wanted but ugly and functional.
Not sure if this pan metal is brass or bronze.  I purchased a large piece 3/16 inch thick for under $4, enough to make another pan.


Pan and notch to fit that pan.

















Notch in bottom of pan.
















Pan added.  It does not spark as the frizzen is still too soft, bummer.  The Map torch just does not get hot enough.  I think I'll rivet on a new face.






















Backside.. One 6-32 screw holds pan on along with that frizzen screw.






















Frizzen spring mounted.  I did get a very few sparks from this frizzen, about half of the time.

Lock still needs a lot of finish work and detailing, but it seems to work.












Update 2: Aug/06/2016;Clean Up, fix that frizzen!

Frizzen: Did one more "Red Cherry" application then re-heated (from the back of the frizzen face) that frizzen to orange and did a water plunge.  Finally, sparks, not a lot but enough.

Added pan piece, soldered with plumbers solder.

The flint (white chert) hit on the frizzen shows first hit then a gap then more hitting.  It may be that the frizzen spring is too weak.  Also who knows how long the frizzen will spark, probably depends on how deep the treatment went.








The flint is a bit short.















That frizzen spring broke itself into two pieces by lounging on the coffee table.  A new one has been made.



Aug/24/2016
New frizzen spring made.

Tried to reline old frizzen with a section of old hand saw blade, riveted on, then full tempered not drawn back.  Seemed to work OK with Arkansas chert (white).  Did not try another type of flint.  I will save this frizzen for "emergencies".

Fleabay frizzen showed up and was installed.  That chert did not work too well. So I tried a dark colored French type flint, more sparks (whew).


Aug/25/2016
The removable pan seems to get forced up at the front due to frizzen spring pressure.  My decision may be to permanently solder the pan to the backing plate.  This probably will help in stopping the binding of the frizzen pivot screw, etc.
...
Done. Pan is now permanent.


Aug/31/2016:
If the flint is kept at or touching the frizzen (half-cock) then the lock sparks fine, main charge goes off everytime.  When the flint wears down this lock tends to skip sparking.  Checking that spacing every once in a while does help.  The trigger pull is still quite stiff even though the fill-cock notch seems to be angled correctly.  Maybe another trigger pinning location would help.









IdeZilla

Comments Welcomed.