Gunbroker Mess - Now making a tumbler.....

[45dash100]

Thought it might be fun to have a 32 to play with, and since I could use some skills building, figured I'd gamble with a project gun.  Not a big gamble, was pretty cheap for today's prices.  And judging from the state of the gun, my fixes, as inexperienced as I am, will be better than how it's currently cobbled together.

Here's what it looked like on the listing:


Here's how it arrived inside the hard case:




Must've needed to club something with the gun before shipping.  Ramrod was all wrapped up nicely in pieces, and the barrel was pulled away from the stock.  Oh well, was able to bend the tang back into place with no issues, and that ramrod seemed to be too skinny anyway.

This scared me for a second, but after some measurements and math, figured I had about .122" of wall thickness if the bore (I used .365 as the estimate) was perfectly centered in the barrel.  Rule of thumb seems to be that you shouldn't go below .1".  Gonna have to clean that whole area up somehow though, it's not drill remotely straight.     Also, I have more clearance than calculated, as the bore is not centered in the barrel, it's quite a bit thicker at the bottom.



Barrel was advertised as dark, but good, and for one that's actually true.  Only real rust was at the mouth, and that was mostly surface.  Looks worse than it is.  I cleaned it up really well, plugged the holes at the bottom, and filled the barrel with evaporust.  The next day left me with a very nice barrel.  I'm actually amazed at how nice and smooth the bore is.

I slugged the barrel after cleaning, rifling is nice and deep. 7 grooves, and I measure 1 in 50 twist.  I think the bore size might benefit from some .315 balls.  The fit with .310 balls and .020 patch is nice and consistent all the way down, but I'm used to guns being just a tad more snug.  We'll see, had to order some.





Lock was a bit rusty.  I didn't notice at the time, but you can see a crack in the sear spring at the bend.  I gave the lock the same treatment as the barrel.



The plate is kind of neat, can see some remnants of engraved birds.  Tumbler fit is terrible though, lots of slop.  Also quite a bit of slop on the hammer, it'l' move by 3/8 of an inch at the very tip.  The cup has also been poorly welded in the past, and is cracking in the thin sections.










After cleaning up the lock, I reassembled and testing for function.  All was good.  The next morning though, the hammer wouldn't catch.  Sear spring gave up the ghost overnight.





Gun was advertised as 1800's, and I think I believe it about the barrel, it certainly looks old.  It's also got dovetails cut into the underside that were probably attachment lugs at one point.  Dunno about the stock and lock, they most certainly weren't paired together originally.  The trigger guard certainly isn't original to the gun either.  Not sure about the trigger assembly.  It's held into the gun with a couple of finishing nails in addition to the trigger guard.  The trigger springs and parts all seem to be hand forged though. 

The lock is a mess, it functions, but the parts fitment is pretty terrible, I think It's just as cobbled together as the rifle.  There's a spot for a fly on the tumbler, but no fly, and no half cock notch.  Which is kinda weird.  Maybe someone got rid of it in the past.

So no clue what I've got aside from a pile of parts. But with a good bore, everything else should be fixable by me, even if it takes a few tries.


I've already done a few fixes, but I need to get the pictures together so I can post them.

[oldtravler61]

  This is why I never buy a gun through online auction sites. Have fun on your repairs. It will be a good learning piece.

[tooguns]

I looked at this, to do what you're doing. In the listing "childs gun" or "boys rifle" made me hesitate. Keep us posted!

[Gtrubicon]

I wonder if you could rebuild the lock with L&R replacement parts, keeping the original plate?

[45dash100]

  This is why I never buy a gun through online auction sites. Have fun on your repairs. It will be a good learning piece.

Yeah, not the kind of thing I'd want to buy online unless you're buying specifically to have something to fix.  Lots of warning signs.

I looked at this, to do what you're doing. In the listing "childs gun" or "boys rifle" made me hesitate. Keep us posted!

Haha, that's kind of what drew it to me, even though you know shenanigans have gone on to reach that point.  Figured it'd be a good gun to teach black powder on. 

The dimensions of the stock are pretty small, but it's still not a super light gun.  The barrel is hefty,  and the whole gun weighs 112.5 ozs, or 7.03lbs.  Still not terrible for a young teen.

I wonder if you could rebuild the lock with L&R replacement parts, keeping the original plate?

I was gonna ask on here about that.  See if anyone had ideas of what kind of parts might be available.  I don't know a lot about locks, either antique or modern. 

Are these things often one offs, or can a "family" of locks at least be feasible for parts swapping?  A half cock notch would be nice to have.

I bought a mini lathe this winter, after having trouble making some parts for another project.  Got it all set up, then work got busy again, and its been taking up space on my main workbench.  I need to move it to a more permanent spot, so I can get back to work on my other guns.  Since it's ready to go though, I tried working brass for the first time.

Had to modify a boring bar to be able to fit something so small, but it worked great.  Ended up with a nice snug fit on the shaft, and now the tumbler clearance is more reasonable.  Wonder if I shouldn't have made this out of steel.  Bearing bronze would probably be good.  I should probably get some assorted stock to have on hand.













With the refitted tumbler, I started on making a new sear spring.  Not something I had tried before.  When I purchased my lather, I bought a bunch of different kinds of round stock in various sizes, brass, aluminum, 12l14 steel, and some O-1 tool steel.  O-1 might not be the best choice for springs, but it's the only thing I had on hand that can be heat treated to any effect.

First one I broke when trying to bend it.  I don't have a forge, so was just using a propane torch to heat to orange.  I have basically no experience forging things, so it didn't go so well.  Didn't know how far I could push things, and worked it too cold.  Just touching the anvil with the part sucks a bunch of heat out.  Probably for the best, as I had a weak point at the transition to the screw eye anyway.






The second one started out better.  I clamped the torch to my welding bench so I could work the metal under heat with needle nose pliers.





This one broke when I was trying to get it installed in the lock.  I thought I had annealed it enough, but I probably just cooled in the air too quickly even with me feathering it with the torch for 5 minutes.  It's that, or marks from the pliers added weak points.  Or a combination.  No experience once again.





Third try seems to have worked.  I learned a lot from the first two attempts.

Been using a mini band saw (portable saw bolted to a "table").  Got a beat to heck one cheap off ebay, and added the table.  The table gets held by my bench vise, so I don't need dedicated floor space.  Works really really well for this kind of thing.  Much more fun than a hacksaw at least.

After doing the first two, I discovered it's easiest to start out with the screw hole.  Gives a nice frame of reference and is pretty easy to keep things square








Layout fluid is handy for tracing on. 




After the bulk of the material is removed with the band saw, a bench grinder works well for thinning things down, and blending smooth transitions.  Make sure to keep the part cool.  A glass of water at the bench is useful.  Details are cleaned up with files.



Found a pair of smooth pliers to not mar things, but didn't need to use them much.  A tiny hammer, and a chunk of flatstock to serve as an "air anvil" gets most of the work done.






After the last go around, I didn't want to take any chances on the part being too hard.  I have access to a glass kiln, which should be accurate enough for tempering.  I stuck it in the oven for and hour at 785 F.  The kiln seemed to fluctuate between 770-795 at that setting.  Since I never hardened the part, it should end up decently soft.  At the very least, it shouldn't break while trying to do the fitup.




Once soft, I was able to check the shape, and remove from the stock and clean things up.

If I were better at this, the part would be just about done.  I heated the part to orange, quenched in some expired peanut oil, then tempered in the kiln for an hour at the same setting.  After the quench, it was like glass.  Files wouldn't touch it, so that seems to be working.  An hour at 800ish should leave me with a final hardness in the mid to upper 40's Rockwell if charts on the internet about o-1 are to be believed.  I should get myself some sort of tester.



It actually had to rebend, and reshape the thing 3 times.  That's one good thing about O-1, supposedly you can heat treat it a bunch of times safely.  I had to tweak things to get the proper geometry, and spring tension by bending and removing metal.  First attempt didn't quite fit, second attempt fit but the spring was too strong and trigger pull was horrible even with things polished.  Third time was the charm, and I got a very nice trigger pull.

Here it is installed.  I really need to make a screw to replace that ugly modern zinc plated one.  That can be another new first project.  Never made a screw before.

[flint45]

Interesting to me watching the project come together. I rescued and old Vincent half stock project, if for no other reason, experience. Keep working !

[45dash100]

Interesting to me watching the project come together. I rescued and old Vincent half stock project, if for no other reason, experience. Keep working !

It is fun to bring things back to life that would probably otherwise never be useful again, even if it's not something particularly valuable.

I was able to get the under rib clean up, old pipes removed, and soldered on the new larger ones.  Also got a 5/16 hickory ramrod fitted to the gun.  I need to do some researching about cap guns, and see what later guns commonly used.  Right now the lock end of the rod has a simple steel fitting with 10-32 threads, and the muzzle is just wood.



The under-rib was pretty poorly attached.  The screw holes don't line up very well.  I'm thinking about welding some of the holes on the rib closed, and re drilling.

I also need to do a bunch of welding on the hammer.  I'm out of ER70s for the tig welder, so at the moment I'm using some silicon bronze rod to try and fix the slop issue.  I've ordered some more ER70s, though I'm not sure if it'l be the best for fixing the head of the hammer.  Anyone have opinions on what's best to repair the hammer tip with?  Does a percussion hammer need to be hardened?  The previous weld job was a failure, but I think that may be more of a skill issue that the material used.

[duca]

Very cool! Keep going. Looks like a fun gun to plink with

[45dash100]

Very cool! Keep going. Looks like a fun gun to plink with

Yeah, I'm thinking it will be.  Recoil will be nonexistent at the very least.


So, I originally added some silicone bronze to the hammer in order to fix the slop issue, but then realized after I had it fitted, that the hammer was too far away from the nipple (a couple mm).  This was despite the angles on the square square cuts lining up with the tumbler shaft.  I think the hammer was never properly fitted.  I tried shooting some caps when I first got it, and they fired, but I think the hammer was slightly over-traveling.  Oh well, guess that just means I need to fix it properly.

Welding rod showed up a couple days ago, and I've had a bit of free time in the evenings to get started.

First I ground off, then drilled out the old weld mess that was there originally.



Then I started adding steel back with the tig.



I also welded up the square hole.  I wanted to see how well er70s-6 would blend, so I gave the area around the hole a rough smoothing with a mill file and some 120 grit.  Then I gave it a couple coats of oxpho blue to see if the weld shows up.  Pretty darned seamless.  Will probably need to blast the area, or hit with some sort of rusting agent if I want the repaired areas to match the rest of the hammer, but that should be simple. 

The annoying part will be shaping the cup end.  Not sure yet if I should try and drill it out, or attack with a carbide burr.  A mill would be handy.



Now, after playing with everything some more, I've found another problem.  It seams that the sear is harder than the tumbler.  It's leaving scratches.  Makes be think it might have overheated when the half cock notch was ground off in the past. 




I'm wondering if I shouldn't just try and make my own tumbler that actually has a half cock notch, or if I should try and heat treat this one.  Heat treating shouldn't be a big issue now, aside from fears of hurting the tiny detail pieces like the swinging spring attachment arm.  Would be nice if I could just find a tumbler that would work, or be modified to work, but chances of that seem to be slim to none.  Nobody has good pictures online of what their lock parts look like.

After making the sear spring, I decided I needed a forge.  So I ordered a small one, which showed up last night.  Gets hot fast, should be able to get consistent hardening results on bigger parts now.  The spring was fine with a propane torch, but anything bigger would be difficult.

[45dash100]

So, after more reading, it seems that a lot of old lock parts were case hardened.  If that's the case, I'm not going to be able to simply heat treat it.  Also, I discovered that the hammer pivot cylinder, and the round bit on top of the tumbler that indexes with the bridle are off center from each other.  The whole lock really is a mess. 

Might be a little hard to tell, but the top pin is off center by a couple mm.


Since that's the case, I'm just gonna try and make a whole new tumbler.  And probably a bridle.  I don't think those two parts were originally matched to each other.  That or they were just really poorly done.  The pin that mates the two is way undersized.  Possibly done that way since it's off center from the hammer pin. 

Here's the inside face of the tumbler.




And the inside face of the tumbler from Kibler's Ketland lock.  I'm using this as a reference on how things done right look.

The Kibler has smaller sear notches, and the fly is actually on the bottom, but that should still give me enough of an idea of how the fly blocks things.



Here's what I've drawn up so far.  This first picture is CAD of just the tumbler superimposed over a scaled image of the original.



Here's with my proposed fly cutout and fly.  I matched what the fly blocks out, as well as the angle that contacts the sear as closely to the Ketland as possible.










Anybody who's familiar with lock design see anything horribly wrong?     Anything that might be worthwhile to tweak now?


Once I've settled on a design, I'll just have to figure out how to build it.  I don't think the CNC stuff I have on hand is stiff enough to machine tool steel, so I may be making a bunch of jigs and grinding by hand.  I can probably do some work on my mini lathe.

Maybe I should try 3D printing one and using that to make a mold to cast steel.  I've only ever cast things in resin or pewter, but steel could be fun.  Could make myself a hammer that matches, and wasn't half made of weld too.   

[Bob Roller]

Many old cap locks had no half cock and I have made a few on request for people who wanted Hawken locks that were made with no half cock.I still have a partly started one on my bench.
Bob Roller

[Bob Roller]

No need for tool steel except for the fly and that fly is exactly like the ones I made from 0-1..
I used 1144 for tumblers for decades.It machines like 12L14 and hardens like drill rod.
Bob Roller

[45dash100]

Many old cap locks had no half cock and I have made a few on request for people who wanted Hawken locks that were made with no half cock.I still have a partly started one on my bench.
Bob Roller

Yeah, as I've been reading, I've seen a lot that didn't have a half cock.  Me personally, I'm more comfortable having one, especially on a rifle used for hunting.  Even more so if it's a smaller gun like this that may be handed off to a kid.

No need for tool steel except for the fly and that fly is exactly like the ones I made from 0-1..
I used 1144 for tumblers for decades.It machines like 12L14 and hardens like drill rod.
Bob Roller

Good to know about the fly.   I hopeful that if I can manage to make something that matches my drawings I'll be in decent shape even if it takes some refinement.

I think I have a little 1144, just not in a size useful for a tumbler without very careful forging.  Probably beyond me to upset it into a more useful size.  Forging would probably mess with it's easy machining characteristics too.  I should pick some more up in different sizes.  I've turned and machined a bit of 12L14, and it was very nice to work with.  If 1144 does as well, my CNC router might be able to handle it at very slow speeds.

The only steel I've got on hand in the proper size that can be hardened is O-1, so I'm giving it a try.  3D printed a sear shape to use as a file guide.  I'ts just super glued onto the steel.  Once I'm done with the bandsaw, I'll glue another identical print on the other side.  Should let me get a decent outline with minimal work.

The notches are too small to print accurately , so for now, I'll just leave extra material there.  When I get closer to the final shape, I can use a regular printer to get a paper shape to glue on and use as a reference for filing.

[45dash100]

So the following is a nice display of what not to do.  In retrospect, I really got my order of operations wrong.  Should have started out with the lathe. 

I blame ignorance, and more familiarity with additive manufacturing than subtractive.   














Yeah, my bottle of dykem exploded on me...  Lost a set of clothing, and made a big mess in the process.  Cleaned up pretty well with acetone, and I fortunately managed to coat the part in the explosion. 

On the bright side, I can entertain myself for at least a week by nervously asking people if they heard anything about the bank robbery last weekend.   





And here's the problem.  I though I had left enough meat, and was able to align things well enough to avoid this.  Guess not.



It's all good.  I've ordered some  1144 and some O-1 round stock in larger sizes to make things easier.  1 1/4 inch should fit the tumbler nicely.

I suppose I could cut up that chunk of square I have and throw it in the lathe, but without a milling machine to square things up, I think my time will be better spent on other things.



Think I'll be tackling this mess while I wait for materials.  I guess I can make a really big inlay to cover up all the chips.  Could also try and add wood, but I think that'd be difficult without redoing the stock finish.  Maybe that needs to happen anyway.  The holes aren't drilled straight, they don't line up well with the hole in the barrel, that also isn't straight, and there are pin remnants on both sides.



Think I'll be doing some research and looking for period repairs.  See if anything catches my eye.