AmericanLongRifles Forums
General discussion => Gun Building => Topic started by: Dr. Tim-Boone on July 21, 2012, 11:07:04 PM
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I was up at Steve Lundgren's house this morning helping him work out his plan for building his TOTW Brown Bess.. Early Willits I believe....
In any event we started looking at the round barrel and the flat bolster on the lock. Hmm, the barrel is round..Bolster doesn't mate up well....PLUS there is a turned decorative band around the breech that prevents the bolster from sitting down on the barrel surface evenly...........
So of course the kit has no instructions...just a plan and historical notes by Kit Ravenshear!!
So what does Steve have to do to mate the lock bolster to the barrel where it belongs??
Round barrels are strange creatures.
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File a flat on the side of the barrel where the lock mates.
Usually the round bbls have a flat on BOTH sides of the bbl.
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Tim,
I went through the exact same thought process about 10 years ago when I was building a Brown Bess from a Bob Lepley precarved stock. You have to file a flat on the lock side of the barrel for the bolster to mate up to. The flat will end up being about 1/2" wide at the breech and tapering to a point where it blends into the round part of the barrel somewhere in front of the bolster. You will lose the decorative band where you file the flat.
David
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Note the flat only has to be slight. the wedding bands disappear on the sides of bbl. If your bbl has already been inlet, forgeddaboutit.
(https://americanlongrifles.org/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi12.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fa246%2FTom45-70%2FOriginal%2520gun%2520photos%2Fbreech.jpg&hash=0e9d886d872ddc0d519db8470daf911cd028cd73)
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What Rase said. ;D
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Excellent Thanks Guys!!. ;D ;D We figured it was the case but wanted to ask the experts!! ::) Thankfully when they inlet the barrel they did not inlet the decorative Rings, So filing them off on each side will not be a problem. :) :)
BTW.. this kit comes with a coned touch hole liner with a screw slot in it. Did they have liners or would he be better to use one of Tom Snyder's coned touch hole tools to internally cone a drilled touch hole?? Seems like it would be more realistic to me??
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Snyder it.
Some of the original Bess touchholes I've seen have been AT LEAST 1/8 diam, maybe more. Probably shot out, to some degree, but I'll bet they started large. Don't stand to the right of the shooter, please, Mr. Powder Burns.
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I second the Synder touch.
A liner looks bad enough, but those with the screw slot across them really look bad.
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I like the idea of just a touch hole, no liner. Then if you have problems later, (after 7000 shots, how many muzzleloaders get that much workout,) then install a touchhole liner.Just sems more PC to me.
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The touch hole on a Bess is big enough to self-prime. Very bad practice.
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Don't over do the flat, it doesn't have to be real big. Let me know how this kit goes, I'm supposed to do one soon.
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The touch hole on a Bess is big enough to self-prime.
That's because they used coarse musket powder, not 2f or 3f. It's also why they had big flints and locks with strong springs to set off the same. Size your hole for the powder "you" will be using.
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File a flat on the side of the barrel where the lock mates.
Usually the round bbls have a flat on BOTH sides of the bbl.
I have never had the privilege of taking an original Brown Bess barrel out of a stock, but I always imagined there was a flat on the left side as well, that was below the surface of the stock.
When I had to dismount the breech on my reproduction Bess, there wasn't a flat on th at side and I had t file one and then fill in the void left in the stock.
Gus
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If the barrel is already let in, I would not file a flat on the off-side.
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If the barrel is already let in, I would not file a flat on the off-side.
What Tom said!
David
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In this case the barrel channel was cut but the breech was not inlet fully so either the barrel has to be filed on both sides or the wood carved to fit the decorative ring...so its not a problem Steve will just file the flats on both sides.
BTW pet peeves... on this gun and another one I helped with this weekend the vendor encourages builders to let them install lugs and sights..... Oh ain't it fun to inlet a barrel that already has lugs and sites!!! Te good news on the bess was no sights.... On the one that had both, we knocked the sites off and inlet the breech with the barrel upside down..... I know they make a nice margin on those kinds of gunsmithing services, but hey......just sayin!!...
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If the barrel is already let in, I would not file a flat on the off-side.
I agree it was the absolute last thing I wanted to do, but I had to do it to get the breech plug out after trying a whole bunch of other things first.
Gus
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We had to heat the breech to get the p[lug out!! But then it came right out!!
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We had to heat the breech to get the p[lug out!! But then it came right out!!
Heat was one thing I had tried on my barrel after soaking it for two weeks with penetrating oil and the plug would not come out. Now I didn’t know about combining Acetone and Transmission fluid in those days.
I may not have heated the barrel’s breech enough and to be honest, that scares the $#@* out of me with barrels made from steel. I don’t know how hot you can get them without ruining them.
What finally worked after I filed the opposing flat was keeping the barrel and plug in the horizontal freezer overnight. When I pulled it out the next morning and tried again, it FINALLY broke loose.
Gus
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Now that is creative!!