Might interest some here

[historicalarms]

From another forum I visit daily....The man is a true "artisan" in the truest form of both manual & CNC machining. Some of his other projects that have been covered include Falling Block rifle actions from a billet ( I would put them in the same "wow" class as the fishing reels we have seen on here). His present project is a double headed home built deep hole boring & rifling machine.
Another, related project I've recently completed is to build a "steady" that will allow me to support long skinny work pieces such as this 1" NC thread I turned down and cut @ 24" long.
(should be very handy for contouring barrels)

Basically, Its a heavy wall tube(loaded with sand) that mounts to the machine ways behind the chuck and between the carriage and tailstock.

It has two "vices" each with independent jaws. The jaws have replaceable "pads" that support the work piece and the cutting tool can cut right on by.

As the tool passes by the first vice, thereby reducing the part diameter, the jaws are adjusted to compensate. By having two vices next to each other, the work piece is never unsupported.
Seems to work pretty slick!

 

[kylemp]

That's a pretty slick addition, may have to consider adding that to my machines.
Link to the original post?

 

[PeterT]

Yes, post some deets. I'd like to lurk on the forum too just to see the machine setups & metalwork.

 

[RobinHood]

Very nice addition to your lathe.

The jaws have replaceable "pads" that support the work piece and the cutting tool can cut right on by.

Do you contour the pads to the diameter you are after before you clamp the part? What stops the part from being pushed in the X direction away from the tool? Are there pads on the vice bed as well?

Do you indicate the part along the Z axis to make sure the jaws don’t inadvertently lift or drop the part out of alignment while you snug them up?

Nice gravity feed coolant set-up, btw.

 

[historicalarms]

Very nice addition to your lathe.



Do you contour the pads to the diameter you are after before you clamp the part? What stops the part from being pushed in the X direction away from the tool? Are there pads on the vice bed as well?

Do you indicate the part along the Z axis to make sure the jaws don’t inadvertently lift or drop the part out of alignment while you snug them up?

Nice gravity feed coolant set-up, btw.

I wish I could claim ownership of that baby but you know as much about it as I do...the first paragraph of the post is mine , after that it is a "trapped" item from a gunsmith forum in CGN. Don't know much about him other than he's young, a journeyman machinist, just newly married and from somewhere north- central Ab. The stuff he post's where I see them is "after work hobby stuff" but using all the commercial machines available at work....I can only dream!!

I will find some more from the lad to re-post.

 

[historicalarms]

This is just a start of this project....from CGN


I year or so ago i decided it was high time i made something from scratch. one of our customers once showed me his grandpas old single shot and it had intreagued me. i asked if i could borrow it to use as a sample and my Highwall project was born!

Im not quite finished yet but i figure i could start posting process pics if anyone is interested...

Im building a pair of them because it'll help me to use a "production" mind set (locating parts with jigs and fixtures/ working out the math instead of eyeballing things etc......) and because, after all this time and labour, i may as well end up with two right?!

Working on the hammers... they're 4340 and for whatever reason this chunk of material was abnormaly gross to work with. I ended up making another set but this gives the gist of it...






Ive been using locating fixtures as much as possible. here you can see ive already made several other small parts using this same aluminum block...


some small parts and some sketches...

Last edited by leelad; 09-06-2018 at 04:49 PM.​

 

[historicalarms]

some of the technical info he provided for the tech boys here...


The mill I'm using is just a Micro cut retrofit with a Proto trax programmable DRO(X,Y). Its a toy really but its a step in the right direction. Our shop is mostly manual with the exception of a couple single tool CNC lathes. A Weiler(my machine) and an old VDF.

I started this project as soon as we got the micro cut and quickly learned what it could/couldn't do. (day job side, we'd only used it for things like drilling bolt patterns to that point.) I had no CAD program so I did everything with paper and calculator. Then I downloaded Qcad and my life got a lot better!

 

[historicalarms]

And some more....


Here's another pic of hammers...


Some chunks of 4140 that will become the recievers...

Again, I made fixtures where ever possible. In this case, so I can cut through the piece into my fixture(W/O setting it on shims/blocks).
But because the front/top don't need to be profiled here, it still maintains its locating ability as well.

Pic of the program...

That machine is working hard enough using a 3/4" rougher hence the steps...

Finish passes all around and its looking sharp!

One receiver Ready for the slotter...

More pics to come... Tommorow

 

[PeterT]

Is CGN CanadianGunNutz by chance?
I haven't poked around any firearm forums since me & my son plunked around with 22's. But that was a long time ago. I was always on the lookout for gunsmithing sites & subforums more to absorb their machining projects, but I haven't gone looking in a while. If you have any favorites please post them.

 

[DPittman]

Yes very interesting stuff. I'll never get into the cnc stuff but I certainly can appreciate it and the gunsmithing.

 

[YYCHM]

Is CGN CanadianGunNutz by chance?
I haven't poked around any firearm forums since me & my son plunked around with 22's. But that was a long time ago. I was always on the lookout for gunsmithing sites & subforums more to absorb their machining projects, but I haven't gone looking in a while. If you have any favorites please post them.

That's where it's from alight. Some real talent post there.

https://www.canadiangunnutz.com/forum/forumdisplay.php/91-Gunsmithing

Craig

 

[historicalarms]

Another chapter....

we go!

Roughing out the breech mortise...




In a perfect world, a wire EDM would be the tool for this job(ahh some day...) but I am very fortunate that we have an old(very tight!) Prat+Whitney slotter in the shop.

Typically we just cut large metric key ways in coupling halves with this machine. I was nervous I'd break my spindly little tool in there or else have chatter issues. But it worked out well...



They turned out quite good. I cut the mortises and then made the breech blocks size on size, filing the mortises till they just fit ever so slick-ly. This way, I wouldn't end up cutting a mortise over size for a pre-made breech block, and yet the nice square and true breech block would serve as a go gauge for the mortise. It worked well.

Stay tuned...

 

[historicalarms]

Is CGN CanadianGunNutz by chance?
I haven't poked around any firearm forums since me & my son plunked around with 22's. But that was a long time ago. I was always on the lookout for gunsmithing sites & subforums more to absorb their machining projects, but I haven't gone looking in a while. If you have any favorites please post them.

Yes as YYC indicated "Gunnutz" it is... The gunsmithing forum has some very interesting topics covering methods of set-ups for metal working guns but most of it is "I was fixing grandpa's 1880's family heirloom...now how do I remove a broken screw from grandpa's antique" or where to source parts for simple repairs.
there are a couple more threads by the same person that I am bringing over now and will include some of them.

 

[YYCHM]

A stock maker that posts on that forum that is truly talented and a pretty good machinist to boot. Another fellow does some beautiful case hardening/coloring projects, just incredible. That forum is well worth checking out.

Craig