Epoxy Can Be Cured

[nkbj]

That was a line from Mad Magazine if my brain is working right this morning.

Fellas, I've gotten to thinking about something.
I know people epoxy barrel liners into muzzleloader barrels.
People even do it with some centerfire barrels.
So, I've got this third hand 1858 Remington reproduction .44 cylinder that somebody really messed up the reaming of the chambers. Oh you can still shoot it but the chambers are a little out of round and they're a little different in sizes. You can start a .457" diameter bullet into the worst one. The cylinder is extra to my needs so it's just been sitting in a box for years. So, what if...

What if you wanted to stick another barrel on a 1858 frame? Maybe you would like to shoot .22 molds or .25 molds or .38 molds or whatever sounded like fun. Ah, but how do you come up with a percussion cylinder for it? Why not epoxy sleeves into the chambers and then ream them to the proper diameter for the barrel. And be smart about it and use an easily machined and corrosion resistant material such as brass or bronze?

 

[hawkeye2]

While you don't run across them everyday it isn't unusual to sleeve chambers down to a smaller caliber. I expect it would be fairly expensive to have it done. The chambers would have to be reamed to the same size first and exactly 60 degrees to each other and then have the sleeves installed. I wouldn't use brass or bronze sleeves though.

 

[The Crisco Kid]

I can't answer your question about cylinders based on experience but I have epoxied in several 22rf liners that have worked well for many hundreds of rounds, if not more. I used Acraglas but any good slow cure epoxy should work. I'd think your idea would work but if I were doing it I would use steel liners. Old shot out barrels are a good source of stock for this sort of thing.

 

[nkbj]

Maybe once you had a barrel blank in hand perhaps making the liners from pieces of it would be the way to go.

Question: Why not use brass or bronze for the liners?

 

[springfield art]

While you don't run across them everyday it isn't unusual to sleeve chambers down to a smaller caliber. I expect it would be fairly expensive to have it done. The chambers would have to be reamed to the same size first and exactly 60 degrees to each other and then have the sleeves installed. I wouldn't use brass or bronze sleeves though.

May as well just buy a new revolver(s).

 

[russellshaffer]

Are you planning on doing the work or sending it out? If doing it yourself, why not give it a try.

 

[wiscoaster]

May as well just buy a new revolver(s).

Maybe he just wants to see "if it can be done". Curiosity, not practicality. Of course, curiosity killed the cat, but it didn't stop Einstein.

 

[nkbj]

I've always contracted out work on revolvers except for fitting grips, some tuning and some pretty basic metal work. The .40 caliber 1851, .41 caliber 1858, the stepped chambers for the .44 caliber 1858, the chambers' reaming on the six inch barreled 1849... There's people who have machine shops and decades of experience. They know things, been there and they have the tee shirts.

About the most attractive idea for this bubbabused cylinder is to fix it up to use .358" diameter molds.

 

[smoothshooter]

That was a line from Mad Magazine if my brain is working right this morning.

Fellas, I've gotten to thinking about something.
I know people epoxy barrel liners into muzzleloader barrels.
People even do it with some centerfire barrels.
So, I've got this third hand 1858 Remington reproduction .44 cylinder that somebody really messed up the reaming of the chambers. Oh you can still shoot it but the chambers are a little out of round and they're a little different in sizes. You can start a .457" diameter bullet into the worst one. The cylinder is extra to my needs so it's just been sitting in a box for years. So, what if...

What if you wanted to stick another barrel on a 1858 frame? Maybe you would like to shoot .22 molds or .25 molds or .38 molds or whatever sounded like fun. Ah, but how do you come up with a percussion cylinder for it? Why not epoxy sleeves into the chambers and then ream them to the proper diameter for the barrel. And be smart about it and use an easily machined and corrosion resistant material such as brass or bronze?

What do you mean by “ .25 molds or .38 molds “?

 

[nkbj]

What do you mean by “ .25 molds or .38 molds “?

Off the shelf commonly supplied molds for .22 or .25 or .38 caliber. There's lots of them.

 

[Dusty_Traveler]

Sounds like fun to me. Just make sure everything lines up.

 

[Nobade]

The hardest part of that would be making a fixture to hold the cylinder to do the mill work, though it probably wouldn't be too tough if you used a rotary table. You'd want to use a roughing cutter to get the holes round and in the right place, then finish ream. Otherwise I don't see that it wouldn't work. And as mentioned, just buy extra barrel liner and use that to make your sleeves since you know it's good metal and already has nearly the right size hole through it. I doubt you'd want to pay a machine shop to do that work, but as a home project it would be fun to try.