Have to confess!! Brain cell misfire

[rockrat]

LONG.

I am no gunsmith by any stretch ,but I do tinker and have put on a few barrels over the years, on my guns.

You hear the saying " measure twice, cut once" , well it should be "measure 10 times, cut once"!!

Bought a couple Shaw, pre-chambered barrels, the 8mm mauser went OK, but after a couple of years, finally decided what to do with the 7mm BR barrel I had on the shelf.

We shoot, at our range, a varmint silhouette match, every month in the warmer parts of the year. I have shot my xp100 I rebarreled to 22-250, but just not enough HP, so been shooting rifles for the last few years, but really like my XP's. Was going to put on a 243 barrel, but decided on the 7mm BR.

Started on it yesterday afternoon. Got out my depth mike, my micrometer, calipers, ect and started measuring. Figured out what to do and stuck the barrel in the lathe and cut. Installed barrel, bolt wouldn't close. Hmm. rechecked measurements, still no go. Gave up, came inside and watched football.

Went back out this morning, measured again, everything looks good. Bolt still won't close. Cat wants attention and is bugging me, cat gets tossed outside. Cut a few thousandths off chamber end on recess and thread length. Bolt still won't close. Look for Dyekem(sp?), remembered knocking it on floor years ago, go into town to try and find some. FINALLY, find some, head home. Pull barrel off of action (again, for the umteenth time), put dyekem on, reinstall barrel, work bolt. Pull barrel off again. Maybe a little smeared off of end of chamber end. Cut about .010 off, do all over again, bolt still won't close. look at parts and think "dimension on one of the parts I have written down does't jive with the MKI eyeball. Pull out calipers for a quick measurement. WHOA!!!

I am about .026" off what I have written down. Pull out micrometer, looks OK, then I look closer. I read the micrometer wrong, I was off by one mark (.025":oops::veryconfu). No wonder the bolt won't close!!!

Now things make sense. Re-do measurements, recalculate, re-cut chamber end of barrel, bolt closes!!!:bigsmyl2:

About 3 hours down the tube so far. But guess what, after all that cutting, the deep chambered barrel is now a shallow chambered barrel!! I need to re-cut the chamber. Luckily, I had ordered a 7mm BR reamer from Midway a few weeks ago and it came in the day before Christmas. Barrel back in lathe to deepen chamber. Cut a little, clean and remeasure and calculate how much more I need to cut. Re-cut, check headspace, way off, too deep now, sigh!!. Must have had a shard of metal in the chamber when I put my gauge in and threw off the measurement. Recut some off shoulder of barrel, reinstall, measure, recut. Do this 4 times. About .012" alltogether

Finally got it headspaced. Now to polish a bit, put a little cold blue on it, cut off the barrel to length and crown. Going to make the barrel about 20" long, kind of like one of those long range handguns I have read about. Gun looks strange with its funky aluminum stock. Action is clamped in the stock.

Bad thing is, too cold to go to range to shoot the thing, not supposed to get above 25 degrees all week. At least its almost done. Will be interesting to see just how it shoots.

Can't wait till the matches start, going to suprise a few guys out there with it. If that does't work, I also got in a 30-223 reamer and may have to have a switch barrel gun.

[David2011]

It's a good thing none of the rest of us do things like that! :? Glad you got it worked out without too much grief.

David

[10x]

Better to cut it too long than to cut it too short, once it is cut too short, you can't cut it longer...

[William Yanda]

You cut it twice and it's still too short?

[bedbugbilly]

Hey . . .we all have days like that so don't feel too bad about it.

Many years ago, when I had my custom woodworking/millwork shop, I got a call from a VERY desperate general contractor in a nearby city. My name had been given to him as I did quite a bit of commercial cabinet work, etc.. He wanted me to come into the city as quickly as possible . . if I could. He had a very BIG problem he said. He gave me the address and I dropped everything and drove in. It seems he had the contract to restore and remodel an old Victorian mansion for a large law firm to use as their offices and they wanted to keep the mansion "original" if possible. I'm talking 15 foot ceilings, beautiful raised panel doors that were close to 9 feet in height . . . each room a different species of millwork - oak, walnut, butternut, cherry, etc. Evidently, it was in very good shape when the law firm bought it but it just needed some repairs and restoration. They wee to the point of having carpet laid . . . but the carpet layers determined that the large beautiful doors would need some cut off of the bottom so it would clear the carpet when opened. Well . . . they took them off . .. . took them outside and proceeded to trim the doors so they would clear. BUT . . . everytime they brought them back in and rehung them to see if they would clear, they still needed to remove more. They weren't the brightest bulbs in the package as hey say . . . and finally they discovered their error. They were not cutting the bottom the doors off . . . they were cutting the TOPS OF THE DOORS off! The contractor was kind of a jerk anyway . . . I'd run into him before. He was yelling at the carpet layers and finally demanded to know what I could do about the doors to "fix" them. I was almost laughing so hard that I was about to roll on the floor. I finally told him that adding a piece to the top would be very noticeable as you had rails and stiles of the doors to contend with. It was either add a piece though or make new doors. When he asked how much, I gave him a price that was reasonable for the work and he went ballistic with me. I finally reminded him that it was not "my" error and that "he had called me" . . . I hadn't called him. He was so PO'd that he fired the carpet people on the spot and then started ranting on me. I finally just shrugged and suggested that he probably had better go look for a "#2 door stretcher". I later learned that the contractor was not only fired by the law firm who owned the mansion but was sued as well. What can be said other than on some days, things just don't go right! :-)

[Geezer in NH]

Getting old eh? Know the problem well. :bigsmyl2: :kidding: