Forging a buttplate

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Dan, are you saying that as you forge the lateral crown in the plate, it takes on a crescent curve at the same time?  I want to take a crack at making a two piece forged butt plate and trigger guard for a southern rifle as well, and this is all good advice.

[dannybb55]

Wire will hold up just long enough, use lots of wire. I use it to weld multiple small pieces together op a tang to a hacksaw frame. It stands welding heat well enough and brazing heat is much cooler.
 Anyway Shelton Browder showed me the trick before he went off to Williamsburg. It works.

[Dphariss]

Dan, are you saying that as you forge the lateral crown in the plate, it takes on a crescent curve at the same time?  I want to take a crack at making a two piece forged butt plate and trigger guard for a southern rifle as well, and this is all good advice.

We wer forming the "crown" on the buttplate using a piece of shafting as I recall and it forming it around the shaft hot it just formed  the crescent at the same time
I had been doing it differently previously but decided they would look better with more crown.
Partly from holding it with tongs I am sure but it did bend to a pretty nice crescent  I did another for a TD I made into a Gemmer type and it worked the same way.
These are not that tough to make.
Make a paper pattern of each piece and make sure the will make what you want.
John Baird wrote a series of articles in Muzzle Blasts on Hawken rifles and one had a illustration of the two pieces needed to make a sheet iron buttplate.

Dan

[dannybb55]

Once you get the paper pattern just right, trace it out on some 35 Ga sheet metal and drill a hole in it to hang it above your vice.

[dannybb55]

26 ga I meant, kitten walked over the keyboard again

[eagle24]

Build a fire in the forge put some borax and scrap brass in the cavity and heat until the brass flows.
Dan

That's the way I had in mind to do the braze.  Cut up a brass shell casing, fill the pocket and heat until the brass flowed.

On forging the butt piece.  I watched an artist blacksmith forming some leaves for an ornamental piece a few weeks ago.  I was thinking the whole time that his method would work perfectly for a buttplate.  He forged the piece to shape using the cross peen on his hammer.  Then he drew a heat and forged the "crown" around a piece of pipe about 2-1/2" diameter.  He then drew another heat and flipped it over and formed it around a larger pipe (maybe 5" diameter) which would have been the crescent on a buttplate.

[Dphariss]

Build a fire in the forge put some borax and scrap brass in the cavity and heat until the brass flows.
Dan

That's the way I had in mind to do the braze.  Cut up a brass shell casing, fill the pocket and heat until the brass flowed.

On forging the butt piece.  I watched an artist blacksmith forming some leaves for an ornamental piece a few weeks ago.  I was thinking the whole time that his method would work perfectly for a buttplate.  He forged the piece to shape using the cross peen on his hammer.  Then he drew a heat and forged the "crown" around a piece of pipe about 2-1/2" diameter.  He then drew another heat and flipped it over and formed it around a larger pipe (maybe 5" diameter) which would have been the crescent on a buttplate.

You mis-understand the crescent will form automatically with the crown if the metal is held right and the hammer is used right when the crown is done so is the crescent or at least very close.
Forming the crescent after the crown will deform the crown.
Dan

[eagle24]

Dan,

I don't think I misunderstood, but rather was trying to explain something I watched this blacksmith do a different way.  I have not tried either method, so don't have any idea what will work best for me.  I just know that what I saw him do would have made a good buttplate if he had left the leaf veining off.  Then again, he seemed to be pretty good at what he does.  Probably easier watched than done.

http://waltersforge.com/index.html

[Dphariss]

Dan,

I don't think I misunderstood, but rather was trying to explain something I watched this blacksmith do a different way.  I have not tried either method, so don't have any idea what will work best for me.  I just know that what I saw him do would have made a good buttplate if he had left the leaf veining off.  Then again, he seemed to be pretty good at what he does.  Probably easier watched than done.

http://waltersforge.com/index.html

But he was not making a buttplate.
In my experience trying to form the crescent after the crown is done will change the crown since the metal has to go someplace when the crescent is formed and this will flatten the crown.  BTDT.
The bending pulls the edges more than the center.

Dan

[eagle24]

I get what you are saying Dan and don't disagree.  I think this guy could forge one using his method (he basically did it for me while I was there), but I may not be able to.  Your method is probably a better way.  Another thing that impressed me was how he could shape a round bar into a flat plate and control the spreading using the cross peen to get whatever shape he wanted.  I'm sure you guys with smithing experience know this, but I saw enough to know he was far more accurate with his hammer blows than I am.  He heated a 5/8" rebar and started beating it with the cross peen running parrallel to the bar to spread it in width without lengthening.  I thought that in itself was pretty impressive.  I don't think I could hit a target that small with a full hammer blow.  I'd probably beat up a good anvil.

[John Archer]

If you want to see it done by forming the crown first then drawing the crescent over the horn of the anvil, buy/rent a copy of the DVD 'Building a Hawken Rifle with Hershel House' He demonstrates the process of making the buttplate from the pattern to forging the two pieces to rivetting and then brazing them in the forge.

John.

[B.Barker]

The butt plates I have made, I always put the cessant in after the crown. I loose very little of the crown you just have to be gentle. Not all blacksmithing require brute force. Many times you need to be very gentle. Also how much heat you put to the steel/iron will make the differance.

[J.D.]

The crescent on the very few BPs I have done were forged at a bright orange heat. At that heat, the metal becomes so plastic that the edges of the crown will bend to the shape of the crescent without flattening.

I just cold forged one of a piece of .110 bar stock, that did not distort the crown either. That piece of bar stock worked like hot rolled, so it worked much more easily than I had anticipated.

God bless

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Thanks for that heads-up John.  That gives me just the excuse I needed to buy that video.

[John Archer]

It's worth having Taylor....I handled the gun that was made in that video while I was having a barrel inlet at Dave Rase's shop....didn't want to put it down.

John.

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Yes I've handled it too.  Dave had it at Heffley in '08.  Quite a piece for sure.