soldering a front sight

[canuck4570]

I have decided to solder my front sight on....
the rifle is a ruger frontier in .358 and the front sight to be soldered on is a ruger front sight from a ruger no 1 in 4570..... barrel from both rifle are the same diameter .670.... I would like to know what is the best way to do this ... and at the same time what are my chances of ruining the accuracy of the rifle....

[fishhawk]

well 3 types of solder you could use..reguler soft solder...low temp silver...or high temp silver which is more like brazeing. reg soft should work fine. clean up the bottom of the sight and "tin" it then clean up the barrel where you want to put the sight (degrease it and flux) then place the sight on take a torch and heat the barrel all of a sudden the solder on the sight will melt and stick the sight to the barrel remove heat and let cool

[canuck4570]

thanks.... I have ordered from brownell some fluxed Hi-force 44
it has the flux in in already....will this do and what do you mean by tin the sight....on top of cleaning the barrel and sight should I sand it a bit to make it ruff like you do in welding water pipe...

[fishhawk]

but "tinning" you put a coating of solder on the surface of the part, by flux and heating it untill the solder melts. you should not need to sand the barrel. the closer the parts to be solderd fit the stronger the joint will be. so a lot of solder between the surfaces is not the best for a strong bond

[danski26]

Not that fishhawk is lacking in his instructions but Roy Dunlap goes into great detail of the joining techniques used for gunsmith in his gunsmithing book. A copy is worth having around.

[KCSO]

If you order from Brownell's get some of the paste to keep the solder off the rest of the barrel. High Force 44 will hold the sighht if you tin well. I use a small V block on the bottom of the barrel to hold the sight in place while soldering. The sight will have a tendency to shift as the solder heats so you need to have it clamped so all the force is straight down.

[MtGun44]

+1 on 'shifting as it heats" - you need something with some spring in it
to keep the sight forced down. I tinned the sight, tinned the bbl, clamped
it and warmed it until the heavy tinning melted and the sight was stuck,
and slightly crooked ! I left it as it was 'close enough' but some sort of
springy clamping is recommended. Hiforce 44 is great stuff.

Bill

[Morgan Astorbilt]

Bill is right. This is a fixture I made, to hold the sight in position, and keep pressure on, as the solder or brazing rod melts. Notice the rear stud has a "V" groove, and is spring loaded to accomplish this. There's nothing more frustrating than having the part shift as the solder hardens, A simple fixture of this type, can be made by bending a piece of strap, to look like a flat pry bar, and pull it down with a screen door type spring, or if care is used, a few heavy rubber bands.
Morgan
http://i201.photobucket.com/albums/aa159/pgfaini/sightfixture1.jpg

[Southern Son]

Morgan,
That fixture alone is a work of art.

[Southern Son]

P.S.
The barrel vice in the background looks like it would be able to put some hurt on. Did you make it yourself?

[Morgan Astorbilt]

Yes, it's 2"x4" hot rolled steel, with a 2"-8 screw.
Morgan

[Junior1942]

What's the tightest barrel in general?

[Dave Berryhill]

What's the tightest barrel in general?

I've seen some rusty/crusty old Mausers that had barrels that were on pretty darn tight. When at gunsmithing school, one of my fellow students was trying to remove the barrel on an old surplus Mauser. We had a big barrel vise that used a hydraulic jack to hold the barrel and receiver wrenches similar to the ones that Brownells sells. He put a 3 foot piece of pipe on the receiver wrench to extend the length of the handle and was using just about all of his weight on the end of the bar without it budging. We finally heard a creak....creak....CRACK!! when it came loose. We thought that something must have broken but he got it apart without an damage. With that much torque you can twist the receiver if you're not careful so a proper fitting wrench is a must.

Morgan - great job on the sight fixture! The fixture that Brownells sells has the spring right where the heat is applied and the springs go soft. Your design moves the spring away from the heat and solves that problem.

Here's a trick that I learned from another gunsmith: If you use paste or ribbon solder under the sight then it can move when the solder melts no matter how tight your clamping fixture is. If your sight is large enough, mill a small pocket in the bottom of it, cut a few lengths of solder that will fit in the pocket and hold them in place with some paste flux. Apply a thin layer of flux and clamp the sight down. Apply the heat and the solder will flow from underneath the sight. Without that thick layer of solder under the sight it's a not as likely to move when the solder melts. I've never tried it with the Force 44 solder but it works great with silver solder.

[Morgan Astorbilt]

Neat trick Dave. The solder is drawn in under the edges from the center by capillary action, just like applying solder at the edge of a sight with only flux between parts, but with no need to remove excess solder. :drinks:
The method I use, is to not have the solder melt all at once, and the sight "float" on the liquid solder. I heat from front to back, and as the sight contacts the barrel on the front end, it's still held in position by the un-melted solder at the rear. At no point is the sight floating on the solder with no contact with the barrel. This is not possible with small sights, but works with ramps, express sights, etc.
Morgan

[pietro]

If it's expected that the band front sight ramp actually remain in place during use after soldering, i.e. have a good bond - then you might want to consider removing any finish from both the band/ramp's in/under sides, and the barrel surface it will touch.

The best practice would be to temporarily dry fit the band/ramp in place, plumb & clamp it secirely, then scribe along it's edges into the barrel finish, leaving an outline of the area to be "de-finished" after the band/ramp is removed for tinning.

The barrel finish can be removed from inside the scribed area via the judicious application of emery cloth.

[shooter575]

Morgan,nice jig set up. Here is my quickie made jig.Low tech and simple.Took me longer to find the stuff in the shop than it took to make.


http://img.photobucket.com/albums/1003/shooter575/MVC-004F-3.jpg

[JIMinPHX]

I didn’t think that soft solder would stick to steel. I thought that silver solder was needed. I also remember that when I used to silver solder helium manifolds on medical equipment, the temperature that I had to get up to required that the parts be heat treated after. Is there something that I’m missing here?

[Morgan Astorbilt]

Shooter, Nice, if unusual, use of a surface gage. Lots of clever people on this site:drinks:
Morgan

[leftiye]

Jim in phx, Could be that the silver solder they're referring to only requires in the range of 450 degrees (there is a cooler silver solder like that). The 1200 degree stuff has its problems like you describe, and probly would produce scale in yer bore too!

I've seen some military guns with the sights lead or tin soldered on, so there is a technique that will do that. It's probly what they were referring to, though I'm not familiar with it.

[MtGun44]

With a proper flux, soft solder sticks very well to steel and the temps are
well below anything that will affect the temp, unlike silver solder.

I can strongly recommend Brownell's 44 solder and their flux. Holds strong.

Bill

[shooter575]

I used a real nice silver solder thet came flux coated [it was blue and looked like brazing rod]
It was a medium temp rod.That stuff was great ....But I used it up and can not find more.The new cadium free stuff just aint the same. The other silver solder I have is all real high temp stuff.
So I pretty much just went back to old 50/50 soft solder.Works well on 90% of what I do.
Soldering does take some practice to get the skills down.But it is sorta like riding a bycycle....
Morgan,I think that surface gauge gets more work as a sight jig than I ever used it for its intended purpose.But I can just switch it back if needed
BTW that vice in your pic is a real honker! I have a big acme screw and nut I have been saving for just that usage.

[Morgan Astorbilt]

Well, What are you waiting for? Get some hot rolled bar stock and weld one up. Don't know what size bolt you have, but if a big'n, you can make a wrench like I did. Cut slits in a piece of square stock almost all the way through, spaced the width of the bolt head flats, bent it around the bolt head to shape it, and weld it to a bar, welding the slits closed. Wouldn't want to have had to buy a 3" box wrench$$$!

Morgan

[JIMinPHX]

With a proper flux, soft solder sticks very well to steel and the temps are
well below anything that will affect the temp, unlike silver solder.

I can strongly recommend Brownell's 44 solder and their flux. Holds strong.

Bill

Thank You! That is very useful info for me.

[bcp477]

Just to throw another log onto the fire.... If the sight you are attaching to your barrel is in the form of a sleeve, similar to the Mauser-type military sight sleeves, then you can easily attach this by use of a good epoxy. I use Devcon liquid epoxy for lots of things like this - and it works beautifully. I have bonded sight sleeves and sleeve-type scope bases to several rifle barrels...and have never once had a problem with the epoxy not bonding well or "giving up" (the bond may not technically be as strong as solder, but it has always worked for me without problems). If the sight base you are using has a large enough surface area for good bonding (even if it is not a sleeve-type), then you might consider epoxy as an alternative. The advantages are : no heat related problems to the barrel (and no heating required, of course)....and no re-bluing of the barrel or sight needed (just wipe off the excess epoxy and let the assembly set the full required time). Just as with a soldered joint, the best bond will be achieved if the sight base fits the contour of the barrel well. By all means, however, use solder if the surface area available for bonding of the sight is small - epoxy would need a larger surface area (to get a really durable bond) than solder.