Is it Possible to Straighten a Bent Magazine Tube?

[35 Whelen]

I have an old (1886) 1873 Winchester whose magazine tube is bent down ever so slightly starting about 6" from the muzzle. Is there a fairly simple way to straighten it? It is roughly 550" ID, so I'd thought of maybe getting a 1/2" x 24" piece of steel stock, tapering one end, then trying to tap it through the length of the tube in hopes it would straighten the bent portion.

Thanks in advance for the help.

35W

[labradigger1]

You can probably do like smiths do for Damascus barrels, round close to diameter rod, cut in half on an angle, one end threaded and the other with a bolt. When you tighten the angles climb each other.

[Col4570]

If you are able to get hold of a piece of coil spring of the right diameter you can do as the Plumbers do when bending Pipe.The Tube would have to be detached from the rifle to do this.A 15mm Plumbers Bending Spring Might do the job if it fits the Tube.Afterwards an exact size Steel Plug could be made to take care of any flattening that may occur to make sure the Bullet Rim slides easily. Good Luck.

[Der Gebirgsjager]

I'm betting that your own original idea about tapping a close-to-diameter rod with a tapered end through the tube would work if the tube is not actually kinked. You'd need a substantial bench vise to hold the tube and some non-marring vise jaws. If you can determine the center of the bent area application of a little heat at that location when forcing the rod through will help.

[Lead Fred]

Saw a friend take a tailgate dent out of his 45/70 tube by sticking a metal rod inside of it. Then anchoring one end and hitting the other with a hammer. (lightly)

[country gent]

I would go with a long spring over the tube and bend by hand to straighten. Another you might try if one is available is an arrow straightener, this is what they are desighned to do. On musical insterments with bent tubes dings and such an egg shaped plug to fit insidet ube is turned up and highly polished. This is then lubed with a good swaging lube and pushed thru the damaged area. Abov all work slow and carefully, steel can only be bent so many times.

[35 Whelen]

Good stuff so far. Thanks guys.

I've picked up a 1/2" soft steel rod and a 1/2" hardwood dowel and wi try them this evening. It's not a major bend in the tube, the last 6" or so is just pulled down from the barrel.

35W

[Skipper]

I have an old (1886) 1873 Winchester whose magazine tube is bent down ever so slightly starting about 6" from the muzzle. Is there a fairly simple way to straighten it? It is roughly 550" ID, so I'd thought of maybe getting a 1/2" x 24" piece of steel stock, tapering one end, then trying to tap it through the length of the tube in hopes it would straighten the bent portion.

Thanks in advance for the help.

35W

just in case:

https://www.gunpartscorp.com/ad/295540.htm#296170D

[35 Whelen]

Thanks. I was aware of the repro magazine tubes, But hate to put a new tube on a 130 year old rifle!

35W

[Ballistics in Scotland]

The magazine tube is probably quite resilient work-hardened steel. Why would they need to anneal it? So it will probably spring part-way crooked again once even a close-fitting steel rod is removed. You would need to bend it a little past straight, in the opposite direction, and let it spring straight again. This ought to be done in small stages, by trial and error, so that you don't end up chasing errors back and forth all day.

I'd make a couple of long blocks of wood, grooved close to 180 degrees of the tube's diameter. If you could mould them to the greased tube with epoxy. Then I would sandwich the barrel between three pieces of card or thick leather, two at the ends on the side where you want to increase the bend, and one in the middle where you want to reduce it. Then you can squeeze it straight in a large vice.

What you must avoid is inserting that rod and hammering on the outside of the curve where it is bent. Metal tubing bends by stretching on that side, and if you beat it thinner you are only aggravating the problem until it starts to kink.

[dragonrider]

Another method is to plug the ends fill with water and freeze it, then attempt to bend it back to straight using a tube bender of the correct size.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

I think the Cerrosafe we use for chamber casts is just a clever marketing ploy with Cerrobend, used by plumbers to bend pipes without buckling. You could do the same with melted lead or bullet alloy, but I don't think the amount of bending the OP describes, in steel, is enough for buckling to be a problem.

[JSnover]

Sounds like you can straighten it by hand-bending. I've seen tubes of various sizes ruined by trying to hammer a mandrel through them but if you don't have an actual kink you shouldn't have much trouble fixing it.

[Mk42gunner]

Please save yourself some trouble and do not try to force anything inside the magazine tube with a wooden dowel.

I have straightened bent shotgun magazine tubes using a close fitting mandrel driven through with a hammer, but they are a bit larger and thicker than yours.

Robert

[egg250]

Does the bend affect loading or is it simply aesthetic? My point, on this old gun, the chances of blemishing the finish or ruining the tube might not warrant the risk of making an aesthetic repair. If it was a functional issue, I'd lean more towards fixing it, but how often do you shoot it, if at all?

[44man]

Straighten it like you would an arrow. Lay it in your palm and give it some pressure and sight down it until straight.
Dents are different.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

i agree that forcing a rod down the tube isn't the best way to go. The main problem is that the bend is probably very localized (at the magazine mount?) and hand straightening is likely to bend rather more of the tube's length in the opposite direction.

What you might do is get a couple of lengths of rod which closely fit the inside of the tube. It might be 9/16in., or you could buy some 17/32in. K&S brass tubing on eBay and use ½in. steel rods inside that. Insert them until they come within a quarter-inch or so of meeting at the bend, and use them to bend it back at that point alone. You could even epoxy them in place if you like. Rapid epoxy will be removable with heat and a large caliber bore brush, with no damage to the finish.

[Ragnarok]

I fixed a .44-40 M1892 sporting rifle mag tube that had been bent and half-pecked back into shape. Got it nice straight and smooth(much nicer than the original repair).

I found that a 1/4" drive MAC deep chrome 10mm socket was a perfect fit..so I measured it and found a piece of nice round rod about 6" long the same diameter(nice fit in tube bore)...placed the hunk of rod where the bad place was and used a hard oak block and a small brass hammer and just carefully worked the tube over with the hammer until it good.

I used the same method to work a simple dent from a Rossi M92

[johnson1942]

ragnarok has the best idea,

[W.R.Buchanan]

Like 44man said,,,, I would first try to bend it back with my hands using as little pressure as possible. If there's a kink then you will have to jam something down the hole, and many of the suggestions above would work. They take dings out of brass instruments by jamming progressively bigger ball bearings thru the hole until the desired result is achieved.

What ever you do don't hold it in a vice and attempt to unbend it, as it will bend right at the edge of the vice jaws and you'll have a new problem.

This tube is probably pretty mild steel as really good stuff didn't yet exist when the gun was made. It should move easily.

Unless you have vice jaws with a hole drilled horizontally thru them to hold the tube I would not clamp it in a vice at all, as you will only crush it.

Randy