Make a pistol Trigger Guard from sheet brass

[ChuckJonesWagon]

This is my first attempt to make a pistol Trigger Guard (TG) from sheet brass. I know it's comparatively less costly (if you factor time in the equation) to just buy a cast brass TG, but I've not had good success with those as both a buttcap and a TG have voids in them that caused cracks. Then, they won't solder back together which indicates they are not truly brass but some other junk metal.

Anyway, my initial piece making I was just going to bend this lollipop piece 90-degrees and brass color solder it to the trigger bow. But then after holding parts together, I realized my thinking was wrong.

Here's pics of the initial pieces I made (broken cast pieces at top, my sheet brass pieces at bottom. And just to back up and clarify I made the trigger bow from bending (anneal first) a cut piece of brass around a wooden form I shaped from scrap maple. :

Well, after I made the bow and the front "foot" piece, I realized it would not be correct. I needed the inside of the TG to have a "foot" pieced in there.....like this TG from TOTW:

So (and I hope you can follow my explanations here) I took my original piece that I cut (lollipop and foot) as in 1st pic below and bent it\filed it to attach as I show in the second pic below, and finally in the third pic below, I cut a slot in the foot so it will fit over the top of the bow and snug up against the lollipop bend.

Now, the trick will be to hold these three pieces together in order to solder....and then on the inside of the bow, solder on a fourth piece so I can get the foot shaped right. I may solder on the inside piece with the others.....not sure yet.

 

[Phil Coffins]

You’re on your way, keep at it.

 

[Clark Badgett]

This is my first attempt to make a pistol Trigger Guard (TG) from sheet brass. I know it's comparatively less costly (if you factor time in the equation) to just buy a cast brass TG, but I've not had good success with those as both a buttcap and a TG have voids in them that caused cracks. Then, they won't solder back together which indicates they are not truly brass but some other junk metal.

You couldn’t get the parts to solder because you didn’t prep the joints correctly and per you earlier mention, you went too hot.

So long as the area to be soldered is clean, prepped properly and the metals to be joined do not have a melting point lower than the solder, they can be soldered.

 

[ChuckJonesWagon]

Well, I have the 4 front pieces brass soldered together. I don't think I have any voids once I file it down and clean it up.

These two pics are the "outside" and the inner foot. Now, for the other half it's a matter of cutting\shaping\soldering that piece on. In addition, I have to solder on a tab on this front piece. Tabs don't need to be soldered all that strong and you won't see it. So, I'm going to just solder the tab on with some plumbers solder as that way I won't accidentally un-do the current work.

 

[ChuckJonesWagon]

You couldn’t get the parts to solder because you didn’t prep the joints correctly and per you earlier mention, you went too hot.

So long as the area to be soldered is clean, prepped properly and the metals to be joined do not gave a melting point lower than the solder, they can be soldered.

That may be. I think the "brass" in those cast parts have a lot of alloy's in them. I did some reading on soldering "pot metal" and a very low temp solder is used to repair that kind of metal....like the solder melts at 350-degrees. The brass solder I'm using melts at 1,350 degrees.

 

[Clark Badgett]

That may be. I think the "brass" in those cast parts have a lot of alloy's in them. I did some reading on soldering "pot metal" and a very low temp solder is used to repair that kind of metal....like the solder melts at 350-degrees. The brass solder I'm using melts at 1,350 degrees.

You are not soldering at 1350, that is brazing. Hard silver soldering is similar. Regular soldering is low temperature.

 

[bud in pa]

Try Brownell's Hi-Force 44 solder. melts with a propane torch and is extremely strong. That's what I use on my muzzleloaders and sights on friends modern pieces.

 

[ChuckJonesWagon]

Try Brownell's Hi-Force 44 solder. melts with a propane torch and is extremely strong. That's what I use on my muzzleloaders and sights on friends modern pieces.

Mapp has temps are roughly 3600F. Propane is roughly 200-degrees less. Both can be used for the higher temperature of melting silver solder. I prefer Mapp.