• Friends, our 2nd Amendment rights are always under attack and the NRA has been a constant for decades in helping fight that fight.

    We have partnered with the NRA to offer you a discount on membership and Muzzleloading Forum gets a small percentage too of each membership, so you are supporting both the NRA and us.

    Use this link to sign up please; https://membership.nra.org/recruiters/join/XR045103

A Thread Thread

Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
That's right....its been a long time since grd 12 shop, but I remember cutting threads onto a shaft with a lathe. It was to make the thread for a 'c' clamp. I still have and use that 'c' clamp. The 'c' part was cast from aluminum in the shop.
 
You guys are lucky.
In a number of schools they don't even have a shop, let alone a teacher who knows how to teach the subject. :(
I think the thinking goes :
"We don't need kids to know how to do this kind of wood and metal stuff! Everything is computerized these days and besides, we will just ship all of that kind of work over to India or China.
By the way, the front door on my house is about to fall off of the hinges. Does anyone around here know how to fix it?...ANYONE AT ALL???"
zonie :)
 
A few years back, when they had all those Ships on the West Coast that they couldn't get un loaded. The Machine Shop that I work for sure made a lot of money making those parts, that they had to have, that they couldn't get from CHINA.

Robert
 
Zonie said:
By the way, the front door on my house is about to fall off of the hinges. Does anyone around here know how to fix it?...ANYONE AT ALL???"

LOL...if you are serious about that, yeah, I know how to fix that!!
 
Mike Brooks said:
I was one of those guys who never took shop in high school. :redface: I took four years of art instead. I think my education in art was probably more helpfull in my present occupation. I wish I would have taken both.

I didn't take either... :redface:

:hmm: I wanted to be a chef :haha:
 
The "...front door on my house is about to fall off of the hinges..." was just my way of saying that many people don't have the slightest idea of how to fix or build stuff.
My door doesn't really need fixing, but thanks for the offers.

Getting back to threads, I know that some of you will need to thread a brass or bronze part and the sulfated cutting oil is recommended for tapping holes in these metals too.
If you are threading these materials with a die (external part threads), you don't need any lubricant at all.

zonie :)
 
Beg to differ with you there, chips of brass and bronze, aluminum and magnesium always pop off better with a flow of water-soluble oil mixture. when cutting fine threads lube is essential. :v
 
paulvallandigham said:
If anyone wants to see a good example of an uncommon thread type, and understand why they are used, you need to go no further than your bench vise. The main screw shaft on a good vise will have square topped and square bottomed threads, because of the torque that is placed on that screw when something is clamped in the jaws of the vise.
Paul:

That is an ACME thread type and it's main purpose (as you stated) is to impart torque without deforming it's own thread form. Yes, these are machine cut.

Also, the thread on machine vices are reverse threads ... don't ask me how I know :redface: !

As my GE machine shop teacher once said "Be very careful ... the 'Add On' tools don't work nearly as well, nor as fast, as the 'Removal' tools do ... " :rotf:
 
"Machinist handbook" is an awesome book - I have the 19th Edition (1974), and it covers everything from trigonometry to heat treatment - over 2,400 pages. It's kinda expensive - over $40 I think, last time I checked (several years ago) I found a real handy-dandy book that has most of what the vast majority of us would use, called the "Machinist's Ready Reference", a little pocket sized spiral-bound book, with trig data, threads, drill sizes and metallurgy, that runs about 5 or 6 bucks. Industrial supply stores or some vo-tech school bookstores may have it.
 
Thought I would repost this thread (har-har-har...get it? thread! :rotf:) for some of you new folks who are thinking about building your own gun.

Most if not all of the "box of parts" style of kits require drilling and tapping holes for the lock and the barrel tang bolts so hopefully you will find this post helpful.

Now that I've read thru the old thread I realize I really didn't say much about the actual threading process for making a tapped hole.

Of course the first thing to do after locating where the tapped hole is to drill the hole.

If the hole doesn't go all of the way thru (blind hole) the part, it must still be deeper than the needed depth of the threads. This is to accommodate the "lead" (pronounced leed) on the tap. This is an area where the cutting threads have been ground off to make a tapered area that will start into the tap drilled hole. Most of the taps you will find at the store are "taper taps" and this lead area will be quite long.
If the hole is blind and you need threads going all of the way to the bottom (like for a nipple in a drum) you will need to buy a "bottoming tap" or make your own as I described above.

After drilling the tap drilled hole you need to "start" the tap into the hole.
This is the most critical part of the process. The tap must be held exactly parallel with the tap drilled hole.
With the tap mounted in the tap wrench, align it with the hole and give it about 3/4 - 1 1/2 turns. You should feel it cutting without too much resistance.
Add a little oil and back the tap out 1/4-3/4 of a turn, add some more oil and screw it back in. Then following the instructions I gave up above finish tapping the hole.

If I'm tapping a hole that is for a screw or bolt that is going thru some wood, like a lock bolt or a tang bolt I use the hole in the wood to guide the tap.

To do this, I first drill the hole thru the wood and the metal part using the TAP DRILL.
That way the metal part is ready for the threads to be cut.
I then remove the metal part and use a larger drill that is the same size or slightly larger than the finished thread size to enlarge the hole in the wood so that it will clear (and guide) the tap. It will also clear the screw or bolt.

For instance, for a #8-32 UNF tang screw/bolt (.164 diameter) I will use a #29 (.136) diameter drill to drill thru the tang, the wood and the trigger plate.
Then removing the trigger plate which I want to thread, I enlarge the hole thru the tang and the wood using a 11/64 (.1719) or 3/16 (.1875) diameter drill. This will provide the clearance for the screw and the tap.

Removing the barrel and reinstalling the trigger plate I use the clearance hole to align the tap with the hole in the trigger plate and "start" the tap into the metal as I described above.
Usually, I run the tap in about 1 turn, back it off 1/2 turn, then run it in another 1 turn.
Removing the tap and the trigger plate I then can start the tap into the "started" hole, add the thread cutting oil and finish tapping the hole thru the trigger plate.
Doing it this way the tap will be lined up with the tap drilled hole even if it is on an angle and the thread cutting oil will not get all over the wood.

I would talk more about using a die to cut external threads but most of the thread cutting involved in building a rifle doesn't require cutting external threads.
The only exception might be a need to "chase" some finished size threads further onto a part which doesn't have sufficient threads on it.
The hardest part of this is starting the die onto the part without crossthreading it.
The rule to remember here is you should be able to screw a die onto a threaded part without needing any force at all until it gets to the partially threaded area.

Have fun!
 
Back
Top