Sunlight seen between lock inlet and barrel

[rootnuke]

Here is a problem I ran into. I was in the process of inletting the barrel channel just a "hair" to lower the barrel in such a manner as to have the barrel tang level drop 1/32 of an inch to the top of the stock. What I thought was inlet compound turned out to be a 1/16 wide by 1/4" long break between the barrel channel and the lock inlet. Tiny break between lock inlet and barrel indicated within red circle.

The problem is illustrated here (see very last photos on page. Red circles indicate location of problem...

http://www.rootnuke.com/index.pl/tang_barrel_inlet

So the question is,
Do I need to worry about this?
or..
No I don't need to worry, just fix it, if so how?...
or
Don't worry about it and don't fix it...

I was thinking of taking a thin sliver of maple and glueing it on each side. Then once dry sanding it smooth. However all I have is wood glue and their may be something better. Maybe some high strength epoxy or something. Whatever I use I must repair it in such a manner as to not seal out stain so it will not leave a light mark where the stain cannot penetrate.

By the way, the stock lock inlet was done at the factory and I'm not sure but it looks like that the lock inlet "slipped" and cut a little deep, so I don't think it was all me. I should of been paying attention, but with the stock chucked up in the vise I did not see it.

 

[Zonie]

It would obviously be great if this void didn't exist.

Several of the guns I have built have similar voids often caused by the need to remove "just a little more" wood to keep the mainspring from interfering with the stock in the fully cocked position.

The little bit of wood that isn't there would not add any real strength to the stock so I wouldn't worry about it.
IMO it is more of a cosmetic issue, one of those DARNs that happen.

I'm not sure exactly what your question about inletting the tang was. It looks like your doing what needs to be done correctly.
The main difference between you and I is I don't remove or gouge out any wood except for where it is hitting the barrel.
With the tang bent to the wrist shape, and a slight taper or "draft" filed onto the sides and ends, I use inletting black on the bottom and remove the blackened wood.
When the sides of the tang are against the wood, I use an Exacto knife to cut around the tang and then chisel out to the cuts.
This obviously takes a while, but slowly the tang sinks into the stock with a perfect fit on both sides.
At the rear of the tang, I remove about 1/64 (.015) more wood than an exact fit would give.
This is to allow for wood growth/shrinkage due to humidity and more importantly to assure that the barrels recoil is taken by the stock at the barrel breach and not at the end of the tang.
Failure to do this and permitting the end of the tang to actually contact the wood can crack the stock when the gun is fired.
Happy Building!!

 

[robinghewitt]

I have the same problem.

If someone else has worked on my gun it doesn't matter what sort of havoc they have caused because I can stand back and look at the whole thing.

OTOH if I, personally, remove one slither too far I seem to develop tunnel vision with x10 magnification and can see nothing else.

Although in this case you will require xray supervision to see it when the gun is together, I think you still have to glue in a slither of maple. The less obvious the fault, the sooner you can forget it's there, stand back and appreciate this fine gun you are making. ::

 

[LRB]

You are being entirely too anal about this. I have seen worse on guns made by pro's. You have lost no strength, no one will see it, and its not worth patching, just go on and finish your gun and enjoy it. My rifle has no wood over the ramrod for the last two inches. So what? Mine was made by a pro. Doesn't hurt a thing, it looks good outside, and handles well. Sometimes things happen when making a slim rifle. Forget it. Move on.

 

[robinghewitt]

Well, I suppose it could be worse ::

 

I wouldn

 

[Slowpoke]

Are you going to bed the barrel with Acraglas? If so you need not worry for it will fill in. I use acraglas all the time, it fills in my mistake and you'll never see it when you stain the stock.

In this picture if you look at the nose cap you can see where it isn't flush (see the little brown compound). Again, you'll never see it after I stain the stock.


Acraglas is great! Isn't it Robin....

Chuck

 

I have never built a rifle but strengthening, repairing and building RC airplanes is something I do know. After your barrel and lock are fitted to your satisfaction if you're worried about strength of the wood you can use some of this stuff, it's extremely strong and at .007th thick it does not getting away.

The carbon fiber shown below can be picked up at most hobby stores that sell RC supplies.




This is a 5.5' Carbon Fibre Strip from Dave Brown Products. FEATURES: Used to strengthen radio controlled planes, model rockets, sail- planes, etc. Any balsa, foam or wooden structure may be laminated to increase their strength up to 300%. Typically applied to opposite sides of wing spars, ribs, fuselages, and other structured members. Bonds well with epoxy resin or CA glue. INCLUDES: One 5.5' Carbon Fibre Strip. SPECS: Length: 5.5'........Width: 1/2".........thickness .007"

 

[jh45gun]

If you do not bed the barrel with acraglas using it for repair jobs works great if that bothers you that much. You can buy it in the gel that works great as it stays where you put it. ( Comes in a Green Box) The Regular acraglas is in a red box and is more runny until it starts to set up. Either will work though. I prefer the gel easier to work with. If you do not want to spend the 15 to 18 bucks for a acraglas kit you can use regular epoxy to fix it with but I will tell you now if you the acraglas is real handy to have if you do any self gun or stock repairs. I would not be with out it. I also reccomend glass bedding your barrel channel if the fit is not good as it takes care of any imperfections. The 2 under hammer guns I am building now I glass bedded the channels as I had to convert the stocks from octagon to round barrel channels. The glass did a perfect job making a perfect fit. Some may disagree with me but with the heavy barrels involved with muzzle loading I feel you do not have to float the barrels as in some of the thin barreled centerfires. The glass bedding works great and gives you a good looking barrel channel. Jim

 

[tg]

I do not consider myself a gunbuilder but a novice gunstocker, It appears to me that with the lock installed this will not even be visible, out of sight/out of mind, you should have seen the lock inlet on an in the white gun I got from a guy in Mississippi, it looked like he smeared truffels on the lock panel then let the hogs go at it....I would not bother with it if indeed it is not visible with lock installed.

 

I used Acraglas to bed my newly built Jaeger for a smoother barrel channel fit and to strengthen the slightly cracked fore stock and NOW I CAN'T REMOVE THE BARREL! Dammit! Every step of the way with this gun build has been.............challenging. I applied 3 thin coats of release agent on every surface to make contact and I even filled the hole in the breechplug lug with modeler's clay etc. and it still stuck like cement. Hell's Bells I'll just leave it in! I think this may be my last gunbuild, I'm not cut out for it. Sorry folks, just had to vent.

 

[Herb]

Rootnuke- you got some good advice here. It is not a problem, and forget it. Sometimes mainsprings inlet through the side of the channel. You can't patch it with epoxy from the inside of the barrel channel, there is no thickness to work with. I usually grind down the side of the mainspring after I've inlet it through the barrel channel. No one will ever see it but you. And then there is the lock inletting into the ram rod hole as Wick says, maybe a 2 inch hole. As Neill says, "It shows the hand of the workman". That tang looks thick enough that it could be filed down to be flush with the wood.

 

[jh45gun]

I used Acraglas to bed my newly built Jaeger for a smoother barrel channel fit and to strengthen the slightly cracked fore stock and NOW I CAN'T REMOVE THE BARREL! Dammit! Every step of the way with this gun build has been.............challenging. I applied 3 thin coats of release agent on every surface to make contact and I even filled the hole in the breechplug lug with modeler's clay etc. and it still stuck like cement. Hell's Bells I'll just leave it in! I think this may be my last gunbuild, I'm not cut out for it. Sorry folks, just had to vent.

\
I bet it will come out it just appears to be stuck! I felt the same way with the last 2 barrels I did they appeared stuck, but were not. Heat the barrel so it is hot to the touch and the barrel should pop right out. Not red hot just heat it until you can pop out the barrel. a dowel the size of the bore will work as a handle on the barrel. A gunsmith buddy of mine told me this trick so it must work. :winking: I Never had to use the heat yet the last barrels of mine did not want to come out and I gave them just a slight twist at the breech end of the barrel with a tape covered screwdriver and they popped right loose and used the dowel to finish lifting them out.If you put 3 coats of release agent on they should come out you just have a tight fit is all. My barrel set up at the breech was different as they were inline barrels and I had a flat end to work with. Before the heat try tapping the barrels with a rubber mallet and then lifting the barrel out. If you use the heat first I do not think it takes much just enough to heat the barrel kinda hot I do not think it has to be so hot you cannot touch it. I suppose just get it as hot as a barrel gets when you use hot water in it to clean. Jim

 

[LRB]

J James,make a simple cardboard trough down the length of the barrel and apply dry ice to it. If it is not locked in some way by the bedding, it should come loose. If you have acess to a large enough freezer, that may be even better, or at least easier, but don't give up building guns, you will learn by your errors. We all have. The only way to avoid all mistakes is to do nothing.

 

[Birddog6]

JJames: Accruglass is famous for that.... Here is the fix & the same for using Microbed. Now this is if you are SURE you didn't leave a bolt hole unfilled or groove or whatever to lock it in.

Pull the top baskets out of your deep freeze. Put a lil plug in the bore & put the rifle in the deep freeze muzzle down. If the lid won't close don't worry about it, not going to hurt the food... (you see freezers that way every day at the store with open chest freezers). Leave it there for about 45 min to an hour. Take it out & let it sit for about 20 min or so & then rap the barrel all over with a or plastic mallet.. You will HEAR a different ring with a plastic mallet when the barrels starts to come loose. Beat on it for about 15 min & if it don't come loose, let it warm back up, go back to the freezer & do it all over. Sometimes it takes 3 times to sweat the barrel out this way, but the expansion & contraction of the steel & condensation on the steel will bring it loose & I have yet to have one stuck for good & I have probably bedded 100 barrels of all different types in the past 30+ years.

Just take your time, don't beat the H out of it, be patient especially with the forestock & it will come out. Make SURE you are trying to remove the barrel from the stock correctly, and if you are not sure, email me & we will discuss it. Otherwise you may break the stock or a chunk out of the tang area. [email protected]

Custom Muzzleloaders & Custom Skinning Knives

 

[Zonie]

JJames: Give Birddog6's method a good try. It sounds like the easiest and safest way so it should be the first one to try.

As was mentioned above, heating the barrel would be my second try.
Epoxies don't take heat well. They loose their bonding strength.
It does take a lot more heat than just heating the barrel until you can barely touch it though.
Many epoxies are good up to about 260 degrees F before they stop working. At these temperatures, the epoxy will loose all of its grip.
Based on this, use a big dowel inside the barrel for a handle and heat the barrel slowly with a torch. Protect the stock with aluminum foil and direct the heat against the top flat area of the barrel.
Apply the heat to the entire length so the barrel is uniformly hot. You don't want to just heat up a local spot because when the heat leaves the barrel, the epoxy will tend to reharden.
Good Luck to you and let us know how things are going.

 

Thanks gentlemen, I believe I could follow either of the two methods without ripping a chunk of wood out or setting my stock on fire(True oil is probably flammable and with my luck my stock would incinerate 'cause I apparently do not have the patience for this craft). What is the down side to leaving it alone? Water shouldn't be able to get under the barrel due to the bedding compound and wouldn't the above mentioned removal methods work even after a period of time........ if for some unforeseen I should need to remove the barrel? The effect of firing many shots could work it loose,no? I just don't want to chance busting anything.

 

[Zonie]

Gol Durn it! It jus ain't rite fer a barrel ta be stuck in the wood. Iffen the Lord had a wanted em thin's ta be growed tagather He wood a made um that way from the start!! :: ::

Now that I've lived up to my grumpy image I have to say that I guess leaving the barrel semi-permanent glued into the stock isn't all bad.
If you sell the gun, I would hope you would tell the prospective buyer of its problem, and if you are just going to keep it, then why not? (Oh, that's your question.)

I remove all of my barrels when I clean the gun, but there are many here who say removing a pinned barrel is asking for trouble. Based on this, your guns situation just gives you one more reason for not removing the barrel.

Bottom line? If you don't have a problem with a glued in barrel, who are we to say it should be fixed?
(Actually, I didn't hear anyone say you had to remove the barrel. The posts were, in the tradition of this Forum, good, honest, experianced words from a great bunch of members.)

 

[robinghewitt]

Carry on as if it was okay, practice lots and enter competitions. When you take the shot that will make you champion the barrel will drop out. Works every time ::

 

[Stumpkiller]

When you take the shot that will make you champion the barrel will drop out. Works every time

Ain't it the truth.

I always use a generous coating of paste wax in place of the release agent Brownell's sends. Even that won't help if you managed to glass in a feature that allows a 'rivet' or 'dovetail' of glass to form somewhere that holds the barrel in place. Did you perhaps get some on a pin lug (forming an epoxy pin)? You might be able to snap it out with a sharp smack from a rubber mallet - or snap the stock just as easily. :curse: I've only bedded one M/L, and that was my first (and last) kit that I got overly enthuiastic with a gouge at the plug shoulder.

With breechloading bolt actions and single shots I only ever bed the action and one nickle sized spot just ahead of that if there is a barrel bolt with clay dams everywhere. I've bedded enough boat and model airplane hardware in epoxy to know that it gets everywhere, want it to or not.