Michael Tinker Pearce
Member
- Joined
- Oct 23, 2016
- Messages
- 1,576
OK, the gun isn't that old... couple of years maybe. Originally I did this Remington 'snubby' with a bored-through percussion cylinder in .44 Colt (original.) Given that I have to swage bullets by hand for .44 Colt, I thought it would be nice to have this in an 'easier' caliber. I decided on .450 Adams- it's a mild, pleasant-shooting round and I already reload it for some of my other guns, so what the heck, right?
I started with a round bar of half-hard 4340 steel. I center-bored it and turned it down to the correct diameter on my lathe. I cut the base for the ratchet, then cut five equidistant locking notches. I mounted the cylinder in the gun and used these to index the cylinder while I line-bored it. I used a cut-off wheel in a flex-shaft tool to cut the ratchet. I reamed the chambers to .451, them reamed the chambers for the cartridge with a .475" reamer. I used the cut-off wheel again to relieve an area between the chambers so the firing pin can rest securely between the case-heads with the hammer down when the gun is loaded. A little fiddling and fussing and I had a new cylinder!
I test-fired it with my standard .450 Adams load- a 200gr LRNFP over 4.0gr. of Unique, with a Federal large-pistol primer. Worked a treat, so back home again I finished the cylinder to 320-grit, then detail stripped the gun and sanded the frame, breech-plate, cylinder-pin and cylinder-lock to 320 grit and rust-blued all of the parts. Came out very nice-
Just for giggles I made a printable label to stick on my cartridge box-
I started with a round bar of half-hard 4340 steel. I center-bored it and turned it down to the correct diameter on my lathe. I cut the base for the ratchet, then cut five equidistant locking notches. I mounted the cylinder in the gun and used these to index the cylinder while I line-bored it. I used a cut-off wheel in a flex-shaft tool to cut the ratchet. I reamed the chambers to .451, them reamed the chambers for the cartridge with a .475" reamer. I used the cut-off wheel again to relieve an area between the chambers so the firing pin can rest securely between the case-heads with the hammer down when the gun is loaded. A little fiddling and fussing and I had a new cylinder!
I test-fired it with my standard .450 Adams load- a 200gr LRNFP over 4.0gr. of Unique, with a Federal large-pistol primer. Worked a treat, so back home again I finished the cylinder to 320-grit, then detail stripped the gun and sanded the frame, breech-plate, cylinder-pin and cylinder-lock to 320 grit and rust-blued all of the parts. Came out very nice-
Just for giggles I made a printable label to stick on my cartridge box-
