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[Idaho Sharpshooter]

Helpful (?) Upgrade...

The Spring 2012 Issue of the Black Powder Cartridge News arrived today.

"For Catalog: Email wes@frontierarmory.com or www,frontierarmory.com. Call 405-794-9171 evenings."

hope this is of assistance,

Rich

[oldred]

Thanks for the info. I have emails sent to one of the maufacturers...


Could be a great project.

Do you have a set of drawings? The fellow I mentioned earlier that also wants one of these kits got a nice set of drawings from E-Bay for about $30. I looked them over and they are large, very high quality and seem to be complete, heck of a bargain for the price.


I'm not sure if posting a link to an E-Bay seller would be in violation of forum rules but a search there for 1885 highwall will bring up the listing if anyone is interested.

[Multigunner]

I wonder if Zamac alloy would be suitable for a .22 rimfire drop block receiver?

[trevj]

Y'know, it'd probably work just fine, but there are stronger materials available that machine as easy, like some of the higher tempers of 7075 (a zinc alloyed Aluminum) in, say, a -T6 or higher state (seen up to -T11 listed).

Or just go with what has worked for a hundred years and use steel. The cutting it out is the least of the worries in the grand scheme. It takes all the same time to set up, lay out, and generally carefully create the breech block, in whatever material you choose.

Anything with a bunch of zinc in it will rot if left to it's own devices, so consider that too. Goes for 7075, in spades. Lots of effort goes into corrosion prevention on airplane parts made of the stuff!

Cheers
Trev

[oldred]

The 45/90 Highwall I built and the scaled down "baby" Highwall I am building now are made from 4140 HT, this steel machines beautifully and has a hardness of 28 to 32 Rc without further heat treating. 4140 is extremely strong and IMO the perfect choice unless color case is desired, in that case 8620 should be used. I am almost sure the casting kits are 8620 (ALMOST sure anyway) so if color case is wanted for the receiver it should be no problem. I bought a 1 1/2"x3" bar of the 4140 alloy and machined the receiver, breechblock and most of the internal parts from that (the hammer and sear are O1 tool steel), I may get some disagreement but I don't see where that casting kit will save all that much work except for maybe the external contours of the receiver. In my case I modified the internals to eliminate the screw heads and sear pin ends from appearing on the outside of the receiver and to allow for easy trigger adjustment so there are a few more parts inside and the design is somewhat different but basically it still follows John Browning's/Winchester's design. This receiver is fairly easy to make since all internal points can be machined from the bottom and top with no inaccessible areas that would need to be clearance cut free-hand with a grinder. I don't yet have a mill (still looking for that Bridgeport deal) so I built mine on my 14x40 lathe using a home-made milling attachment and a couple of other tools I cobbled together for this project, with a mill it would be a bunch easier!