EPIC FAILS in amateur gunsmithing

S

skizzums

New member
i would love to hear some others stories of oopsies they made when first getting into "gunsmithing" as a hobby. while i listen to the others stories, i'll get my photo's uploaded and in order to tell you guys a great story of an EPIC fail i made today while learning on a lathe and a mill. i will warn you, this is some pretty stupid stuff your about to see. luckily the day wasn't a total wash, i did do something right and learned alot, but walked away in massive disappointment.

so humor me for a little while i get ready to share my day
 
As a greenhorn Gunsmith, I was given what was left of a large Morse Taper chuck, and was told I could rechoke a shotgun barrel with it. I tried it on an old Stevens 94, that had been sawed off at 26", and found that after driving the taper on, there was no getting it off. I ended up cutting the barrel off, another two inches, and installing a bead. It took forever to get the piece of barrel out of the chuck.:rolleyes:

I learned how to roll chokes after this, as this was before threaded chokes were out.
 
IIRC, some folks used a sizing die lube with those taper chucks. But I just put on a Polychoke. I also did a lot of jug choking, mainly when the rules of the shotgun game disallowed choke devices.

I can't call it a "fail" since it was an experiment, but I once tried lengthening the barrel of a Model 12 by turning the barrel (which was scrap), then sleeving an old barrel to slip fit on the stub, and silver soldering the pieces together. The fit was close enough that there was no visible gap in the bore. Draw filing and turning the barrel smoothed out the joint and the thing worked OK; I even fired it with some "proof" loads, but never trusted it and eventually threw it away.

Jim
 
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well........
as most of you know, i have been in the process of threading my barrel on my mosin nagant. i had ordered a die for 5/8x24 sometime ago. many of you gave me great links and suggested against using the die for barrel threading. problem is, (sorry, i know zero nomenclature when it comes to lathes) the threaded rod on the bottom of the lathe that turns the entire unit by crank is messed up. i was told it needed replaced, was too wobbly and was missing/jumping gear. my father was present and he was POSITIVE we could get a straight to bore threading done with the die. well.....turns out he was right!!!! sorry to make anticipation that this was the problem, it wasn't. we machined a nice .3095 rod to fit the bore and machined the top to barrel OD and the tippy top to the insode diameter of the brake. the threading went well, although the threads were shallow because the OD of the barrel was smaller than the min diameter fro a 5/8 x 24 threading, just by 2 thou if i recall. i measured the inside length of the brakes threads and when i got close i would stop and see where it indexed(terminology?) and do a little more and kept doing that until it was about a uarter turn from TDC. i figured top ceter using some levels on the recoil lug and the rear tang and it worked well. since there was no materiel to turn the barrel first, the threads had to index with the brake perfect. there was no backstop to add crush washers or whatever if it needed further alignment. but it worked, and worked great. i was perfect concentric with bore and when tighten to the max, the brake indexed exactly where it was supposed to.


 
so all is well. i found a neat little angle tool laying around and was able to figure out a perfect and recessed 11 degree target crown before installing the brake. turned out really nice. smooth sailing so far

you may notcie that even my "steady rest(?)" is missing it's top wheel as well, but was still able to true the rotation of the barrell within 1 thousandth. this old atls needs a serious tune-up. but tht's why i decided a mosin nagant will be my virgin machinists parctice rifle


 
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okay. now i have the brake on and it's just right, but that's not good enough for me. the brake is just a stright cyliner with no bevel on either side and it's a little bulky. i switched equipment over to the "smithy" which i have very little experience with. i increased the angle of the side "ports" and increased, mildly, the size of the top angled ports for better muzzle rise control. wow....this thing is looking good now. okay, enough with the anticipation.......
i wanted to shave weight from the brake and make it appear flush with the barrel, as much as possible anyway, and make a nice bevel from the bottom to about halfway up at a pretty exreme 65-70 degree angle. i wantd it to look like it was belling out from the barrel, seamless, like it was made that way. well, i hade it all in place, the brake chucked and the cutters at the desired angle, i would trim a little and my cutting jig would run into the chuck.so i would attempt to readjust the jig and pull the brake slightly out of the chuck farther. i repeated this about 3 times and couldnt relly get the cutter to do wha i desired. i had pulled the brake so far out of the chuck, it had no integrity left and i had the pressure points right where the newly oversize ports were cut. so the extreme heating of the SS mixed with the pressure i was cranking onto it with the cutter.........


 


pretty sure that ain't right.
so yes, i am out a 30$ piece of SS and walked away w/o a brake. but i did get ssome real world experience, and i do have a concentric set of threads cut. my only concern now is, sine i had to index the threads perfectly for this partiular brake. do i need to re-purchase the exact same one? or will ny brake have the exact same lengh of threads in the eact same positio. i mean, if not, i can always add more threads if it's longer, ut if the next brake has shorter threads, then i will have to take off barel length. really sucks not being able to turn the barrel down any so i can have a backstop for vrush washers or whatever. although i guess i could just add a flat 5/8x24 bolt but i waant it to look fluid with the barrel.. we'll see. ill prob just order the same one ad skip the beveling to the brake. or at least flip the cutter jig around so it's nt hitting the chuck requiring e to back the brake out of the claws.

anyways, that is all, twas a long afternoon and i was really hoping to walk away with sense of acclomplishment, but you gotta learn somewhere.......maybe i should try learning at school
 
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Classic!

A tad schadenfreude on my part but....

That picture of the compensator made me leak coffee from three of the five holes in my head. I'll let you decide which...
 
Well, I sure am glad you got such a hoot out of the streams of saltwater coming out of only two of my orifices:(

I could just get some JB weld, fill in the holes and sell it as the new tactical "cornershot'. Sure looks like it could use one of those little blue pills though.
 
I do feel a bit guilty about that. :o

It is not so much that things went wrong for you, but more that the piece looked like a crest-fallen compensator that made me chuckle.

I am sure the next one will be awe-inspiring.

Patent the corner-shot idea, just in case.
 
Best one I've ever heard was a guy who came into the shop, long ago, with a rifle his brother-in-law had glass bedded. The guy did the entire thing, whole barrel included, with no release agent. Stock had to be cut off.
Then there was the 20 something, total FNG, kid who bought a 1903A4 sans scope($175Cdn), cut the forestock with a hand saw and thought he should get his money back when it wouldn't shoot.
 
"hmm how do I get the extractor out of this Mosin bolt head..."

*tap,tap,tap*

"Hmm...Not working..."

*tap, tap, tap*

"maybe if I pry with this allen key..."

*snap*

"Oh...crap."

Ordered a new one from Finland right away.

Live and learn.
 
I can honestly say I have never even looked at it........how do you remove the extractor from a mosin bolt? Mines obviously been replaced already because its purple for some reason. Seems to work most of the time as long as I am forceful with my ejection.
 
Not with an allen key!

Mine was jammed in there pretty good, after it snapped I just drove it out with a punch, I figured out a way I can do it now by just laying it against a wooden surface, claw against the wood, and tap lightly on the back with a hammer or such, and then drive it out the rest of the way with a punch.

My new one came kinda blued, but it was really more of just a weak black coating I think, wasn't paint though. It's a Tula captured I think.
 
Mine is more black than anything else but they look the same with the exception of the different colours.

My extractor is also more worn due to I had to sand the front part,
 
Ordered a new one from Finland right away.
Click to expand...

US customs laws are grotesquely unfair!!

You can order something from Finland to the US, but if I tried to order and extractor from the US to Finland, it would be a big fat NO!! :(

Still,... glad you got the gun fixed from what did sound very much like a Pond, James Pond mistake.
 
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