Barrels/barrel blanks from Blackley

[Elnathan]

Ez,
Thank you for the link, i will read with interest.
Incidentally I do not know if I have replied to you, or the topic?

There isn't really a structural distinction on this board, as there is on some. If you want to respond to a specific post, either address your reply to a specific person, as you just did, or quote them, as I have done.

[Blackley]

Thank you for that

Kevin

[C. ALTLAND]

Hi Kevin, welcome to the forum! Always interesting projects & info here.

Chris

[Ky-Flinter]

Welcome Kevin,

We hope you will make yourself at home here.

-Ron

[blacksmith99]

Here is a link to a document that describes how seamless tubing is made.

Search on Google for "Mannesman effect" if you really want to get into how it's done.

The first few pages of the document in the link below describe the process pretty well.

http://tecmec.ing.unibs.it/reunion2004/CD/Presentations/2-1%20-%20Optimisation%20of%20the%20Mannesmann%20Effect%20by%20Process%20Simulation.pdf

Regards,

Matt

[Rolf]

Here is a link to a document that describes how seamless tubing is made.

Search on Google for "Mannesman effect" if you really want to get into how it's done.

The first few pages of the document in the link below describe the process pretty well.

http://tecmec.ing.unibs.it/reunion2004/CD/Presentations/2-1%20-%20Optimisation%20of%20the%20Mannesmann%20Effect%20by%20Process%20Simulation.pdf

Regards,

Matt

Thanks, that was interesting.

Best regards
Rolf

[Captchee]

Indeed
  Some time ago I started wondering about this very thing  after seeing a rifled barrel  from a  certain over seas company .
  The  muzzle looked like a  button of sorts had been drawn through  a  hot solid bar..
IE it looked like the effect achieved when you push   down into  a pillow .
 Since my request had been to fix the crown , which it did not really have and the barrel was also 2 inchs longer  then  the same NIB models I had on hand
 I contacted the distributor   who to make a long story short ,  called me  back “after a few hours “ and advised not to  crowning the barrel , but to send it back  for replacement . That a new barrel was  being shipped right out .
 This PDF now has  wondering  if the barrel   was made by  the process described , slipped through production without being finished . IE cut down  and crowned

[Lucky R A]

Eric,
       I hope you still have that stainless Bess barrel, Aflo can provide you w/ a nice Carbon Graphite thumbhole Bess stock w/ Monte Carlo comb....You will be wanting a wooden ram rod won't you, can't stray too far or people will talk....Lucky

[aflo]

Even better, a stock made of a bunch of old rusty 20 penny nails, piled up and pounded together.

[JCKelly]

Two subjects, Seamless tube and forge welded wrought iron barrels..

I worked some three decades at a supplier of specialty nickel alloys, also made a gun or two. In my experience the only problem with seamless tube is that it is not always so. It is not always seamless, that is. With welded tube at leest you know where the defect may be.

With "seamless" tube there can be long cracks or seams at the inside surface. I have personally seen this in Michigan produced 1018 (low carbon steel) tubing. A friend was making me a smooth bore flint pistol barrel out of heavy wall 1018. He noticed machining oil bleeding out of seams. Oh my! The cracks were from the I.D.

Have seen the same defect in high alloys at work. Once in hot extruded + cold drawn + annealed 310 stainless tube. This stuff is 25% chromium 20% nickel and it does cost a penny more than does carbon steel or 4140.

Then I ran into seams in an 18%Cr 15%Ni 3.5%Si heat resistant alloy. One mill supplier made the billet, a different company extruded it so no one took responsibility. Well, yeah, WE did.

In Olden Times, forged wrought iron barrels were proof tested in order to find bad welds, or seams in the starting iron. Hand forged barrels at Harper's Ferry had 25%, and as high as 40% loss, in proof testing. Those done at Sprngfield with a trip hammer had only about 8-12% loss in proof. Only.

I personally would not use any kind of tubing for a gun barrel. Ask guys who have worked for years around high pressure hydraulic lines.

If you want to know about those Harpers Ferry and Springfield musket barrels, get thee a copy of Merritt Roe Smith's book Harpers Ferry and the New Technology, the Challenge of Change, 1977 London, Cornell University Press Ltd.

[davec2]

There are stories about tubing with flaws, solid bar stock with flaws, drilled bar stock with flaws, extruded stock with flaws, testing methods with flaws, high strength alloys with flaws, hand welded wrought iron barrel flaws (wrought iron is often mostly flaws loosely surrounded by some iron)...$#*!, I think even the flaws have flaws.

ANY material can have defects and ANY manufacturing method can produce discrepant parts.  In the aerospace world, we pay to have materials for critical components 100% inspected (NDT..."Non Destructive Testing" like X-ray, Computed tomography, magnaflux, etc., is applied to ALL the material and ALL the finished parts) .....and then we proof test the finished part anyway.  IMHO, you can make a safe barrel out of all sorts of materials if sufficient inspection is applied to the starting material you are working with and then, as is always prudent, proof test the finished product.

If you want an absolute, iron clad, 100% guarantee that a gun barrel will never fail on you, don't load it or shoot it.

[JCKelly]

. . . "Non Destructive Testing" like X-ray, Computed tomography, magnaflux, etc., is applied to ALL the material and ALL the finished parts) .....and then we proof test the finished part anyway.  IMHO, you can make a safe barrel out of all sorts of materials if sufficient inspection is applied to the starting material you are working with . . .

One might ask what kind of NDT is applied to the bar or tubing stock from which muzzle loading barrels are made?

[TMerkley]

ACER and BOB

I found a video on Youtube and watched the entire process from a plant in Saudi Arabia.  It is just as Eric K. states.  It is truly seamless.  As a matter of fact This process was used signaficantly during WW2 for the manufacture of small arms barrels for M-1 Carbines if I am not mistaken.  It was at this time that the techniqe was developed specifcally to speed up manufacturing of barrels instead of cutting each one. 

Look on Youtube for Seamless Tubing or Drawn over  Mandrel manufacturing.  All billet steel, white hot and pierced by an mandrel and beaten with hammers until the desired size. 

I also have another project for a pistol using DOM with a seven inch barrel.  .62 cal.  I have not proofed it yet.  It is one inch across the flats.

[Acer Saccharum]

Thanks, Merk. I didn't know about seamless from billet until this thread.

Personally, I wouldn't worry about using seamless for a pistol because of the lower pressure. But for a high pressure vessel up near my face, I will choose a drilled from solid barrel.

[davec2]

JCKelly,

I have made barrels for rifles, pistols, and cannons where I have inspected the finished barrel with dye penetrant and / or magnetic particle inspection prior to final proof firing.  The raw material for barrels may easily, and inexpensively, be tested by these and similar methods if desired or required.