Gun Building Workshop

[4v50 Gary]

Good morning from Bowling Green KY. I'm enrolled in the National Muzzle Loading Association's annual Gun Building Workshop hosted by WKU. While technically I'm in the tool making workshop, I may spend a few days brass casting with Dr. Terry Leeper (sp).

Everyone is familiar with the Girandoni air gun that Lewis & Clark carried on their field trip/See America Tour, right? Well, I learned that the metallurgy was poor and the material was sold by the King's brother to Girandoni. Wrought iron for its air flask and internal parts made with wrought iron contributed to its failure (in the Austrian Army) and parts breakage.

You can learn so much from the students attending the seminar.

 

[4v50 Gary]

Today we had a demonstration of brass casting a trigger guard and a buttplate. Be careful, you don't want to breathe in zinc.

 

[Patocazador]

I may spend a few days brass casting with Dr. Terry Leeper (sp).

Is Terry a good-looker?

 

[J-Bar]

We expect frequent photos, don't you know!

 

[4v50 Gary]

I'll ask my classmate if I can use his cellphone. The Dean at TSJC also asked for photos.

I did film the ret. Prof. and a gunsmith of Colonial Wiliamsburg (now ret.) pour brass from the crucible into the forms.

I only worked on a patchbox forming jig and a forearm scraper today.

 

[Choctaw]

Cool stuff, Gary. The airgun has always interested me.

 

[arcticap]

Today we had a demonstration of brass casting a trigger guard and a buttplate. Be careful, you don't want to breathe in zinc.

Are they using an electronic melting pot?

A friend of mine had an electronic one.
It wasn't very large but it was expensive.
It had an electronic heat control and a carbon fiber type crucible.
All electric I think, possibly intended for medical casting.
He said that using it could control the melting temperature to nearly an exact degree, but it just couldn't hold a whole lot of metal.
Maybe about a quart more or less.
He said that his melting pot could get hot enough to at least melt bronze but I don't know if he ever did.

 

[J-Bar]

4v50 Gary:

You are my hero. You get to do such cool stuff!! Please keep us informed.

 

[4v50 Gary]

Brass is melted with a big propane furnace. It's well over 1900 F when its being poured from the crucible into core boxes. It's a two person job and we were spared having to do it ourselves. Prof. Terry Leeper and G. Suiter (3rd Master Gunsmith of Colonial Williamsburg, now ret.) did the actual pouring. Brass casting can be dangerous because of the zinc. Have a good hood & fan. We let them cool and then removed the sand from the mold to get our castings. Most people then hacksawed them from the sprue (I haven't had time).

I had a couple of classmates take pictures for me. I have to wait for them to get them to me.

 

[4v50 Gary]

Except for hardening and tempering my forearm molding tool's cutter bits, it's done. Ditto for the mandrel for forming the entry pipe.

 

[4v50 Gary]

We hardened and tempered our mandrels to make pipes and an entry pipe today.
Started on a marker gauge today.

 

[4v50 Gary]

Outercircle going clockwise:

forearm scraping/moulding tool. The half circle fits into the ramrod groove
brass buttplate casted during the casting portion of the class
Wood die and form - used to stamp flat sheet brass into round shape (to make curved grip caps)
brass trigger guard casted in class
sanding block - not something anticipated but since there was scrap wood and time, why not?
tracing tool (pencil not showing throw in image)
three relief carving tools. One has handle. One is skewed left, one right and the other is circular for flattening the surface
mandrels (fat one is form forming entry pipe/thimble - can do both faceted and round. thin one is for pipes/thimbles).

Inner circle:
Two silver wire inlay tools (made of tool steel
marking gauge (most labor intensive tool I made. The tool I didn't make was a bow saw or ramrod channel plane).
Hinge forming jig for patchboxes.

 

[TheOutlawKid]

Thats amazingly awesome!! Wow....just wow.