More underhamer stuff

[BillinOregon]

OK, so now I am thinking about buying an 18-inch round of 1018 steel from Brownells and trying to bend a chunk of it. Or I could take it to a machine shop and see if they would bend, cut and drill/tap one end of a 5-inch chunk for a 5/8 breech plug and the other end for a 3/8 stock bolt. Wish I could find a drop-in trigger and underhammer mechanism, but if not, I could try cutting and filing out the parts by hand. Would need a nice, hardenable steel though.
Barrel? Well, it isn't a DGR barrel but a one-inch Green Mountain .58 in 1:70 twist would make a resonably powerful round ball gun for deer. Another intriguing option would be to mount a Green Mountain tapered lever action barrel in a conical twist, for example a .400/.408 in 1:16, with a 1 inch round shank and a tapered octagon.
Any thoughts or advice?

 

[gmww]

If you're interested in the trigger and hammer like the H&A's contact FW (Fred) He might have some available.

As far as having it machined, IMHO I'd contact John Taylor in Toledo, Wa. He is just south of Olympia which isn't all that far from the Ore. border. Heck I drive 3.5 hrs. south from the Canadian border to see him.

I suggest him because he has experience with several types of Underhammers and can usually dig up a barrel or two in his pile of barrels in his shop. He also owns an H&A which makes it all that more important if your going to make an underhamme like that one.

I'm going to try and see him in July to finish up my latest underhammer project. He's got a contact who made a barrel for my latest underhammer. Good luck.
:hatsoff:

 

[faw3]

First lets get ya on the right size the H+As came in 1 1/8 , 1 3/16 , and the last DC kind I have most the parts for are a "hair" over 1 3/16 , this ya need to know if your going to use hammer, trigger, springs and bolts that hold them in, different sets for each frame. So do you want to build it from some factory parts or scratch? PM me if you need any help if i dont know we got some fine builders on here that will. Fred :thumbsup:

 

[BillinOregon]

Fred: PM sent to the land of Vye-eenies and Lone Star beer ...

 

[John Taylor]

I'm in the prosses of trying to figure out how to bend the steel for the action without heating it. I may try to rig up something with a 50 ton jack I have that is taking up room on the shop floor. Bending a longer piece is no problem but makes for a bunch of scrap metal when the extra is cut away.

 

[paulvallandigham]

Unless you use soft, cold roll steel, and have one heckofa hydrualic press, you aren't going to do a lot of bending without heat. Why not heat it up, save the time, and get the job done?

 

[John Taylor]

If I'm going to do a bunch of these things I need to keep the cost down, gas aint cheep. Plus the temp in the area set some new records this week and I would have to wait till winter to let go with that much heat in the shop. There is no reason to use hard steel for this project, it's got wood on one end and soft (12L14) on the other end. Cold rolled will do the job just fine. I have bent 5/8" steel plate in a 50 ton press with no problems, just need to come up with some steel to set this bending machine up.

 

[BillinOregon]

John: Hope your 50-ton press does the job. With a high forecast at 108 here in the Rogue Valley today, I wouldn't be too interested in firing up my forge either.

 

[MRW]

Bill- Metalshaper and I bend ours in a little giant metal bender AND use heat from the oxy acyt torch this works fine but we learned to heat the inside raius more than th eoutside otherwise you will get some stretch in the steel it will still work ok it is the fact that it can give the receiver a kind of funky look to it where the diameters change remember there isn't a lot of bend in these things i don't know what the exact degree is since we go by the LAR's method most of the time (looks about right)

 

[faw3]

Did you make the brass one same way? Fred :hatsoff:

 

[MRW]

Yep But brass is different than steel first we heated the brass red hot and anneled it then bent it cold, we also used a couple of scraps of heavy tooling leather to pad the brass where the bending block made contact so we didn't dent, mar, damage etc the brass surface.

 

[faw3]

Thank you much. Fred :hatsoff:

 

[wbyman]

Bill,

I am thinking about doing the same thing. I want an underhammer action that is "sized" for the 4 bore and 8 bore barrels that I made from seamless tubing. The actions deer creek sells work , but in my opinion they look to small on the large barrels. The only problem is the milling to be done on the action,and making the hammer and trigger. I am going to make the action out of thick walled seamless tubing, weld a nut in one end for the stock bolt and make sure the hole in the other end will accept the underhammer barrels I have made. I wish someone made a large underhammer action so I would not have to make one. I think Bradley Martin has a side x side 5 bore underhammer.

 

[BS]

Bill,

I am thinking about doing the same thing. I want an underhammer action that is "sized" for the 4 bore and 8 bore barrels that I made from seamless tubing. The actions deer creek sells work , but in my opinion they look to small on the large barrels. The only problem is the milling to be done on the action,and making the hammer and trigger. I am going to make the action out of thick walled seamless tubing, weld a nut in one end for the stock bolt and make sure the hole in the other end will accept the underhammer barrels I have made. I wish someone made a large underhammer action so I would not have to make one. I think Bradley Martin has a side x side 5 bore underhammer.

Where are you getting your seamless tubing from, and how thick is the wall?

Thanks,
Bruce

 

[gmww]

If you looking for a large underhammer action look at the Muzzleloader building supply underhammer action. It will fit a 1.25" and maybe a 1.5" across the flats barrel.

John Taylor is currently working on mine. :thumbsup:

Also, I was just wondering about the use of thick re-bar for an action. How think do they get? I think its soft enough.

 

[faw3]

To the above, the DC is same size as the org H+As 1 1/8 but has milled sides less stress on the pins I belive it was for, anyway the one John Is building for GMWW and me is the same one John H uses on his 2 or 2 1/2" wide 50 pound rifle ,that should do it for sure! Fred :hatsoff:

 

[John Taylor]

Rebar is not soft steel and would take a bit of time to get it smooth. There are plenty of softer steels that will work fine like cold rolled which comes smooth on the OD. 12L14 would be the best for machining and is the same stuff most ML barrels are made of. The actions that I am working on will take a barrel that is 1&3/4" with no problem. Fred's action has been cut down and the tang lowered about 3/16" to clear the rear sight. While these actions can be finished with hand tools it is much better with a lathe and mill.

 

[BillinOregon]

John: This action from Log Cabin/Muzzleloader Builders Supply -- how is the barrel attached to it?

 

[wbyman]

Check out[url] www.tubularsteel.com[/url]

 

[BillinOregon]

WBYMAN: Cool site. Wish I knew more about tubing specs and engineering standards for it. Sure seems like some of it is plenty strong enough to pull a carbide rifling button through it.