Ronryan: I just did a search for coning reamer on the site, and found what I remembered reading. Contact Joe Wood, The Firelock Shop, 5311 Briar St., Amarillo, Texas 79109, phone: 806-452-3032, or email him at
[email protected]. He makes or has the reamers you need, and they are caliber specific. Run about $40.00. If you have the handles to use in holding Taps, they can be used to hold onto the reamer for turning. Have a wire brush fitting for your ramrod, and some 0000 Steel wool to wrap around the brush. Use this to take any burrs off the edges of the lands after reaming is done. Then you may also want to use a couple of patches, and load them with a valve grinding compound, or JB Bore cleaner, and work that through the area that has been cut by the reamer to smooth out the sides and grooves. Take your time, Cut a 1/4 turn, then back the reamer off, then go another 1/4 turn, etc.,and clean the flutes frequently and reoil often. The cleaner the flutes on the reamer, the less chance you take in having scratches to the land and grooves of the barrel as you cone the muzzle. You will have to flush the barrel with alcohol to get the oil out, and with it, any steel chips that have fallen down the barrel during your work. Then run a patch down to catch anything that might remain, and do that several times until you are convinced that you have no more chips, or filings down the barrel. Check the muzzle with a large patch and ball to see if it is coned deep enough for you to start the ball with just thumb pressure. Then pull on the patching to pull the ball out of the muzzle. oil or lube the barrel for storage until you are going back out to shoot the gun. Someone suggested that there be an exchange started on this forum so that people could loan or swap reamers to others to use for different calibers and guns, but I didn't see anything come of that. That kind of idea would cost Joe money, and I think you will find enough friends at the firing line who see you not using a short starter, and will want their guns coned, too, that you will get your money out of the reamer in time. I need to order a couple of reamers from him myself.