Staple making jig

[J Shingler]

Made this jig for making staples. The underlugs for the barrel. They work real well if you have the barrel thickness to us them. Drill two 1/8" holes place in the staple and stake. Done. Faster than cutting a dovetail and slotting the pin hole.


Drill a couple blocks to fit a bent finishing nail. Blend the intersections for the nail radius.



Filed a step on the back of each block to set on the vice jaws. This is so when you peen the legs the blocks don't just slide down in the vice.





Here are a couple in various stages of completion. Also one finished in the blocks.

Not for every build but nice tool to have. Also works good on a gun with keys.

[Greg Pennell]

Neat jig.  The few times I’ve made those I’ve struggled with mushrooming the ends of the staples…this should solve that and make it easier to get your staples to a uniform size.

Greg

[J Shingler]

Exactly. Without something holding the staple I ended up just driving them down in the vice  This jig totally eliminated that and super quick.

Also here is a picture from Recreating the American Longrifle showing how they are used.
Jeff

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

The one change I made in the above drawing, is I made a bottoming drill bit by grinding the cutting tip off a second #31 drill bit.  this I run into the holes and take out the 82.5 deg. end of the hole making it flat.  Then the staples can rest flat against the bottoms of the holes and the barrel metal is swaged down onto the feet.  I use the same drills for rivets I make to attach under-ribs to half stocked barrels.  I use a nail setting punch to set my staples rather than TOW's tool they sell for this purpose.  TOW's tool requires too heavy a strike to move metal because of it's increased surface area - the chance of dimpling your bore is too great with that tool.  But the nail set works so nicely without the danger.

[J Shingler]

Never had a dimpled bore but I reserve this for heavy barrels. I can see a nail punch would work very well as well. Good idea on the flat bottom drill. So nice to share ideas and even make things better. Thanks Taylor.
Jeff

[rmnc3r]

Thanks for the Jig Idea - My jig is a bar with just a single hole spaced so that I can bend the nail over and then bend over the bar end, forming the 'U', then cut to suit.

I crank the vise tight when I peen the ends, but it still slips some.

I install the staples off-set, along the edge of the flat, and stagger alternately, not installed along the bore axis. This (apparently?) should give just a little more metal to minimize the danger of drilling into the bore.