Huvius
03-11-2019, 08:49 PM
Having looked at the BACO bore wipers and reading the posts about their benefits and shortcomings, I decided that instead of spending the $60 for the starter kit I would try to come up with my own design.
The primary complaint I read is that the squeegee component doesn't always seal as well as it should.
I'm thinking this problem stems from three things.
First, the rubber O-ring looks to be ABS which is not very pliable.
Secondly, the O-ring is rather thin in cross section. This gives one a very narrow window of bore diameters each will work in and I've read here that in some bores they can leave quite a bit of moisture behind requiring additional drying patches to be needed.
Last, if one shoots .45s and .50s and maybe even .40s, then there would be a need for squeegee sets for each caliber as there is no adjustability in the design.
With that in mind, I set out to make a wiper that can utilize the BACO or German felts, which look to be good, but utilizes a thicker silicone O-ring that also offers some adjustability to more accurately fit your bore.
My first effort was to take a nylon cylinder, like a standoff, and use a dart tip for the felt and a thumb nut to hold the O-ring.
One thing I ran into was that the O-ring sort of just floated on the threaded shaft and was not centering.
To fix this, I beveled the nylon center so as the nut was tightened, it self centered. A pleasing side effect is that the more the nut is tightened, and the O-ring is pushed up the bevel, the bigger in diameter the O-ring becomes.
This little detail allows you to expand the O-ring to achieve a perfect fit to your bore while the thickness of the O-ring is still more than adequate enough to really get into the grooves of the barrel.
Here's a couple pictures to show this.
https://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/9309BC80-D498-413B-BF16-8706D0B650E8.jpg (https://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/9309BC80-D498-413B-BF16-8706D0B650E8.jpg.html)
I threaded a brass screw into the nylon spacer which the O-ring rides on and knurled the aluminum spacer with the same thread.
http://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/1D01D202-BBF4-4C76-BBC7-4089A4185547.jpg (http://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/1D01D202-BBF4-4C76-BBC7-4089A4185547.jpg.html)
This worked quite well but there was just too much work and too many components to make a lot of them.
So, as most projects go, I wanted to simplify the design and use as many off the shelf cheap parts as I could with as little fabrication as possible.
By using the threaded aluminum spacer as the center, I am able to use a plastic dart tip to hold the felt.
At the back end, I opted for a countersunk brass screw as the beveled surface using the same fat silicone donut.
Now, simply turning the brass screw with your fingers or thumbnail adjusts the diameter of the O-ring and I can adjust this particular one to swab any .450 all the way over .500 cal barrels!
This is where I'm at now which I think is as developed as I'm going to take it.
The bottom line?
I can build these wipers for $1.14 each and all I have to do to change to .40 caliber is to use a different sized felt and swap the O-ring for a smaller one which on these adjust from .398" to .450" fully tightened.
https://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/BFC99CD4-1FD7-4EA7-9DF0-8D1362972B28.jpg (https://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/BFC99CD4-1FD7-4EA7-9DF0-8D1362972B28.jpg.html)
http://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/C6B01264-9FFA-4AC4-BD32-CF8384E0ABB0.jpg (http://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/C6B01264-9FFA-4AC4-BD32-CF8384E0ABB0.jpg.html)
This shows the adjustability of this design.
.470" on the left and .550" on the right.
http://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/4A0DB33C-764B-4A7B-823A-A2319E62FD0A.jpg (http://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/4A0DB33C-764B-4A7B-823A-A2319E62FD0A.jpg.html)
The primary complaint I read is that the squeegee component doesn't always seal as well as it should.
I'm thinking this problem stems from three things.
First, the rubber O-ring looks to be ABS which is not very pliable.
Secondly, the O-ring is rather thin in cross section. This gives one a very narrow window of bore diameters each will work in and I've read here that in some bores they can leave quite a bit of moisture behind requiring additional drying patches to be needed.
Last, if one shoots .45s and .50s and maybe even .40s, then there would be a need for squeegee sets for each caliber as there is no adjustability in the design.
With that in mind, I set out to make a wiper that can utilize the BACO or German felts, which look to be good, but utilizes a thicker silicone O-ring that also offers some adjustability to more accurately fit your bore.
My first effort was to take a nylon cylinder, like a standoff, and use a dart tip for the felt and a thumb nut to hold the O-ring.
One thing I ran into was that the O-ring sort of just floated on the threaded shaft and was not centering.
To fix this, I beveled the nylon center so as the nut was tightened, it self centered. A pleasing side effect is that the more the nut is tightened, and the O-ring is pushed up the bevel, the bigger in diameter the O-ring becomes.
This little detail allows you to expand the O-ring to achieve a perfect fit to your bore while the thickness of the O-ring is still more than adequate enough to really get into the grooves of the barrel.
Here's a couple pictures to show this.
https://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/9309BC80-D498-413B-BF16-8706D0B650E8.jpg (https://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/9309BC80-D498-413B-BF16-8706D0B650E8.jpg.html)
I threaded a brass screw into the nylon spacer which the O-ring rides on and knurled the aluminum spacer with the same thread.
http://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/1D01D202-BBF4-4C76-BBC7-4089A4185547.jpg (http://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/1D01D202-BBF4-4C76-BBC7-4089A4185547.jpg.html)
This worked quite well but there was just too much work and too many components to make a lot of them.
So, as most projects go, I wanted to simplify the design and use as many off the shelf cheap parts as I could with as little fabrication as possible.
By using the threaded aluminum spacer as the center, I am able to use a plastic dart tip to hold the felt.
At the back end, I opted for a countersunk brass screw as the beveled surface using the same fat silicone donut.
Now, simply turning the brass screw with your fingers or thumbnail adjusts the diameter of the O-ring and I can adjust this particular one to swab any .450 all the way over .500 cal barrels!
This is where I'm at now which I think is as developed as I'm going to take it.
The bottom line?
I can build these wipers for $1.14 each and all I have to do to change to .40 caliber is to use a different sized felt and swap the O-ring for a smaller one which on these adjust from .398" to .450" fully tightened.
https://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/BFC99CD4-1FD7-4EA7-9DF0-8D1362972B28.jpg (https://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/BFC99CD4-1FD7-4EA7-9DF0-8D1362972B28.jpg.html)
http://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/C6B01264-9FFA-4AC4-BD32-CF8384E0ABB0.jpg (http://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/C6B01264-9FFA-4AC4-BD32-CF8384E0ABB0.jpg.html)
This shows the adjustability of this design.
.470" on the left and .550" on the right.
http://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg312/Huvius/Mobile%20Uploads/4A0DB33C-764B-4A7B-823A-A2319E62FD0A.jpg (http://s251.photobucket.com/user/Huvius/media/Mobile%20Uploads/4A0DB33C-764B-4A7B-823A-A2319E62FD0A.jpg.html)