Goof ups in building.

[Majorjoel]

Mistakes???  I can still hear the words of my late mentor. "Mistakes are just opportunities to show off your true skills!"   

Quote from the late J.F. (Bud) Vincent ca. 2003

[Marcruger]

I am not a gunmaker, but I have a couple of bovines worth of mistake pieces in my scrap leather box.  Many times I end up making a leather piece two or three times before I am happy with it. God bless, Marc

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Marc:  when I make a single set trigger from scratch, I almost always make some of the parts as many as four times each.  But I don't consider that a goof-up.

[Daniel Coats]

I was drilling a hole for a vent liner one time by feel. When I finally felt it go through I realized I had drilled completely through both sides of the barrel. I called that a tomato stake.

[Bob Gerard]

When I restocked the my first rifle build (a Pecatonica Lehigh County with a busted wrist) I thought I would try my hand at epoxy-bedding the barrel, for some insane reason.
I gobbed in lots of epoxy to make a nice bed along the whole length of the barrel channel.
Unfortunately I forgot about the release agent thingy...
I now have a really beautiful Cherry-stocked Lehigh County rifle with a glued-in barrel. 

[Birddog6]

The second rifle I built was a precarve. Dummy me assumed the LOP was already what it should be & I did a quick measure to be sure. 14.5” just what I want.
So i just trimmed the wood there & inlet the buttplate. I made a patchbox & toeplate. Had the rifle sanded & ready to finish. Man I was proud of this rifle.  😁. Someone asked me what the LOP was & I measured it. Yep, dead on 15.5” 😳 WHAT 😱 $#@*.  I had measured the LOP from the Set trigger instead of the front trigger. 🙄🤦🏻‍♂️🤷🏻

[Birddog6]

I have never made a mistake.

Mike, after you get a few builds under your belt you may make a blunder.
You being a newbie, you will mess up something eventually. 🤷🏻🤣

[alacran]

There always things I should have done differently or better. I worked for a guy who taught me a lot about general carpentry. He told me " You are going to make mistakes. Just make sure no one sees them".

[Birddog6]

Many years ago a older builder told me the more inlays a rifle has on it, the more the builder
screwed up & is hiding it. And it is especially obvious on oddball inlays that don't fit the style.
Fancy & long entrypipe ?  Plate under the forestock ?, really long toeplate ? etc.  He said that
was exactly what excutcheon plates are for.  To cover up the sloppy wedge pin hole cutting.
I always thought they looked nice, but to him it was to cover up things.

Thinking on that, my first build needs a Full inlay, over all of it ! 

And I keep "Ol Ugly" just to remind me of what NOT to do.  It is deadly on deer, but am still
pondering if I actually shot them or scared them to death with the rifle looks. Possible they died
of laughter ?   

[Birddog6]

One time many years ago, I was at Friendship & a guy had 3 barrels for sale at a booth. He said the vent holes were drilled & tapped on Both sides to accommodate the builder for LH or RH builder.  Put a vent on one side & a plug in the other side. I asked him if maybe, just maybe it was drilled a lil deep ?  He said Oh No, it was designed this way. 
I looked all day for a rifle built that way, never found a single one.  When I asked Rice Barrels (then it was  LC Rice & Liston)  about a Rice Barrel being designed that way ?  ol LC about went into hysterics 

[JBJ]

As a sign of both mortality and advancing years, it's really a question of which mistake on which firearm. I seem to manage one or more per project! It truly is a matter of recovery and acceptance. And please don't ask about the saga of ramrod pipes on a certain halfstock rifle.
J.B.

[t.caster]

D. Taylor...1/2" ramrod drill That's a biggun!

[oldtravler61]

  Tom it's for that grizzly bear gun....Oldtravler

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

D. Taylor...1/2" ramrod drill That's a biggun!

It is indeed!  Mostly it means I don't have to taper my Hawken ramrods, but I do it anyway.

[Hungry Horse]

 Mistakes are kinda like freckles, you just have to learn to work around them. In fact I made so many mistakes that it kind of became my super power. Before I started building from scratch I built a lot of kit guns, and screwed up my fair share. But I’d  seen  a lot of antique gun that had been messed up by the builder, or owner, and then repaired. Some of these repairs were almost invisible. So, I repaired my mistakes, mostly ramrod holes that went awry, or barrel inlets that broke out. Pretty soon I was fixing other peoples mistakes, or getting the gun given to me to fix up. It got to the point where the wife would start ranting the minute some guy pulled up in front of the house and got out of his truck with a stock in one hand, and a rusty barrel in the other.

Hungry Horse

[Dave B]

I was tapping the holes for an under rib and broke my 6-32 tap at the muzzle end hole. I had been told the carbon steel can be broken bb using a punch an the bits just fall out of the hole.  I drove the tap fragment into the bore !  6-32  taps are not a good idea. Use 6-40.

[Ken G]

Sure I've poured pewter down the barrel channel a couple of times and more than once bedded a part only to fight for days to get it loose. I also have a stock in the corner that refused to be measured and marked correctly but I prefer the enjoyment of smaller mistakes so as to get full enjoyment on every rifle.  Some mistakes I have enjoyed so much I try to work them into every build.  Off-center holes on buttplates  and counter sinking holes too deep are pretty high on my list for continuous enjoyment.  On a little different note, A Japanese pull saw will not cut through a barrel pin. 

Ken   

[Birddog6]

 On a little different note, A Japanese pull saw will not cut through a barrel pin. 

Ken

Ken,

Obviously it was not a Japanese barrel pin or it wold have cut right through it. 

[Ken G]

Should have used bamboo pins.  Those are delicate blades for sure.

Ken

[Bob Roller]

I was tapping the holes for an under rib and broke my 6-32 tap at the muzzle end hole. I had been told the carbon steel can be broken bb using a punch an the bits just fall out of the hole. 

A 6x32 is a wretched thread and way too coarse for the .130 diameter shaft accommodates it.I make my own screws and used a 6x48 on the "Hawken"I made in 1967. Taylor mentioned rivets when he put a rib on the bag grip Hawken he made.I made a few 6x32 cross screws
last winter for someone too get a  lock mounted and had to hunt for the die to thread them with.Carbon steel taps are not in my tool collection and are a guaranteed failure unless extreme care is used with them. Same carbon a pencil lead to me.
Bob Roller

[Bob Roller]

Marc:  when I make a single set trigger from scratch, I almost always make some of the parts as many as four times each.  But I don't consider that a goof-up.

A REAL single set trigger similar to the European types is a job and a half and I made my last ones about 40 years ago for German who was willing to pay for the time.He told me a lot of these were made years ago by watch makers in the French speaking section of Switzerland.
He called them Der Franzochicherruckstecher.I won't even think about making one now at any price.
Bob Roller

[JLayne]

On my second kit assembly, I installed a new lock bolt through the bolster while the cock was attached to the lock plate and in the down position. Because the lock bolt was new and had not been cut to length flush with the plate, it put pressure against the back side of the cock and the broke the square shaft of the tumbler. Just plain inattention on my part.

Jay

[Bob Roller]

On my second kit assembly, I installed a new lock bolt through the bolster while the cock was attached to the lock plate and in the down position. Because the lock bolt was new and had not been cut to length flush with the plate, it put pressure against the back side of the cock and the broke the square shaft of the tumbler. Just plain inattention on my part.

Jay

THAT is  one I have never heard of and have been involved with muzzle loaders since 1951.
Just when I thought I'd heard it all comes that one. .
Bob Roller

[Hungry Horse]

 On the bright side, if you get good at old gunsmiths workarounds, you’ll never run out of free parts from all the guys that have a cow if they make one miss lick with their file or saw. But unfortunately you wind up with a drawer full of parts that are not good enough to use, but to good to throw away. Ask me how I know.

Hungry Horse

[LynnC]

Between the knot thru the wrist, the bug damage that showed up at the muzzle and the butt after inletting the barrel then profiling the stock, then a couple of my miscalculations,  this gun has been one long correction.....