ways to decorate the muzzle of your barrel

[yip]

  just wanting to know different ways to dress up the muzzle of the barrel, other then just rounding the corners with a file. any ideas?

[David Rase]

yip,
Here are two rifles I decorated the muzzles on.  The first photo is my current build, it is a .40 cal. Gillespie rifle with engraved muzzle decoration.  The second picture is a .50 cal. SW Virginia rifle with 8 sterling silver stars inlaid into the muzzle.
David

[yip]

 Dave; beautiful, on the second pic, are those stars stamped? the first is just beautiful, but a little out of my league

[David Rase]

Dave; beautiful, on the second pic, are those stars stamped? the first is just beautiful, but a little out of my league

yip,
I used an N-graver star punch which is not available any longer so you would have to file and harden your own which is not that difficult.  The sequence I use is as follows.  After you locate where you want the star you hit the punch with a hammer to get an indentation of the star.  Then I drilled a hole within the indentation about 1/8" deep.  I then laid the star punch back over the original star indentation and smacked it with a hammer a couple more times to get some additional depth to the indentation.  The hole I drilled works as a relief for the metal you are displacing.  I then redrilled the hole to clean it out.  Next a piece of sterling silver wire is placed into the hole and left proud above the muzzle.  The silver wire is then gently peened until the star cavity is filled.  File it flat and there you have it, one sterling silver star inlay.
David

[Mark Elliott]

That is just plain showing off.    I just use a simple circle punch which is decoration that I have seen on a lot of old southern rifles.  I also have some other shapes that I mainly use on leather but could use on the barrel such as a star, moon, and heart.   I make my punches out of drill rod.  You will see concentric circles cut into a muzzle fairly frequently.    I just haven't made the cutter yet and I am not about to try to engrave on the muzzle like David.   That is beyond my abilities at this point.  The old guys had a cutter made of wood with a steel tooth that they would chuck in a brace to cut the circles.  It was kinda like a marking gauge that you spin around.     

[Dphariss]

Got the idea from a Don King Rifle I used to own

[raszpla]

nice - pleasantly

[James Wilson Everett]

Guys,

I often decorate both the muzzle and the breech ends with a molding cut on the flats.  I set a pair of dividers at about 0.05 inch and scribe a line on the top 3 flats.  Then I do the same at 0.25 inch.  I cut a groove right on the scribed line with a triangular file, then finish the space in between with a round file.  This really only takes a very few minutes and does dress up the muzzle & breech.  I can't remember where I saw this, but I think it was from some German gun.

jim

[Ky-Flinter]

Mr. Everett,

Your barrel molding looks great.  Thanks for posting the pictures and providing the how-to instructions.  I believe I will so decorate the barrel of the pistol I'm working on.

-Ron