Hard Hawken Tang

[Herb]

I am building another Kit Carson Hawken copy, using a one-inch .50 GRRW barrel.  The correct plug and tang is Track's #Plug-RL-16-3, which I have used many times before.  The contour is correct for the wrist, but this one was not.  I seem to remember heating and bending it about an inch behind the face, but didn't keep notes.  I did get it to exactly match the Carson contour.  Came time to drill for the front tang bolt, I   found my center punch would not mark it.  Three centering drills would not cut it.  A file does not cut it.  So I heated a piece of 3/8" rod 1/2" long red hot and set it on the spot.  Did this seven times, expecting to anneal it.  Did not work.  Using my Dremel tool and carbide dental burrs from my dentist, I have cut the hole for the 10x32 tang bolt.  Now my problem will be how to beaver out the countersink exactly so.  Just another example of some of the bad Hawken parts out there, unless I heated that tang and hardened it.

[Clowdis]

Try heating the tang to a blue heat and bury it in sand until it cools. Maybe that will soften it some. It needs to be soft enough to countersink the screw hole and file to finish smooth with the top of the stock. The other thing is that the hard tang is likely to break if you hit it or try to bend it a little more.

[Elnathan]

Probably a bit late, now that it is fitted to the stock, but I'd be inclined to throw something like that the wood stove overnight. If that doesn't anneal it, I don't know what will...Not you are likely to be using a woodstove in July, of course.

Not to open a can of worms, but if the tang is that hard, I'd be a bit worried about what the plug itself was like. A hard, potentially brittle tang is just a pain in the neck, but a hard, brittle plug could be a potential safety issue. Might be worth checking.

[Bob Roller]

Probably came from a foundry that dumped who knows what into the pot to get the weight
up for the pour.I have had frizzens like this in the past and no amount of annealing would
make them drillable even with carbide drills."We do production,not quality contol"! sounds
right to me
Bob Roller

[Hungry Horse]

My first encounter with air hardening steel was a breechplug for my then young sons miniature trade gun. I heated the plug up to bend the tang, and upon getting the tang where I wanted it, left it clamped in the vise to cool. When I tried to bore the hole for the tang screw nothing would touch it.

  Hungry Horse

[Herb]

Thanks to all.  I inspected it some more.  The sides of the tang against the plug and the tail are soft to file.  The plug is OK.  It is only the front 1.5 inches of the tang that are hard, top and bottom.  I think I heated this white-red with an oxy-acetalene torch to hammer it a little flatter.   I have done this with all the 1 1/8" tangs I used (after cracking a couple by trying to bend them cold) and never had a problem.  I let the tangs air cool.  Is there a way I can heat the countersink area to soften it?

[Hungry Horse]

 Just the fact that these breechplugs are obviously made from carbon steel kind of gives me the willys. I make a lot of my own plugs now, and never use a high carbon steel bolt.

  Hungry Horse

[Herb]

I ground the countersink in with stones and carbide burrs in my Dremel tool, smoke-fitting it so the bolt head is flush.