How do I unscrew the barrel from my replica 1858 Remington .44 revolver?

[Linstrum]

I have an older but unfired replica 1858 Remington revolver that I need to remove the barrel from. I checked it out for drive pins that lock the barrel from unscrewing but didn't find any, and made sure that the barrel threads are right-hand - they are visible in front of the cylinder. After checking out everything, I clamped the part of the frame where the barrel screws into it in my big vise, put a wrench on the octagon barrel, and tried unscrewing it. At about 50-foot-pounds nothing was happening, so I quit and came in the house to write this.

Any ideas? The revolver is new-unfired even though it is about 25 years old and nothing is rusted yet. I suppose if the barrel isn't pinned then it is set with Loc-Tite, which would account for its not coming loose. Loc-Tite is easy to get loose by heating to about 350°F, which is below the critical temperature for most heat-treated steels, but before I CAREFULLY take a propane torch to it, anyone have any suggestions to get it out?

I have a real nice brand new dark-blued 18.5-inch octagon carbine barrel I want to put in, which slugs at 0.443", the same as the 8-inch barrel that is in it now. I have the shoulder stock and windage-adjustable rear sights to convert my new revolver into a revolving carbine. And yes, I'm aware of getting hit in the wrist in the event of a chain-fire.

Any ideas on getting the old barrel out will be appreciated!


rl604

[theperfessor]

Remove cylinder. Clamp barrel in vise using wood blocks. Use a piece of wood inserted thru frame window to turn frame off barrel. Worked on my SBH.

[lathesmith]

Lin, I've done this job several times, it isn't too bad once you get the hang of it. You definitely clamp the barrel in a vise--padded of course, and then use a frame wrench or similar. With all due respect, anything used through the cylinder window to gain leverage is a great way to twist your revolver frame out of alignment; you may get away with it, but then again you may not. These '58's aren't very beefy to begin with, you do need to be careful. BTW, if you like, I have a simple frame wrench, you are welcome to borrow it if you need to. Just send me a PM and I'll put 'er in the mail to you. Good luck, that sounds like a great project!
lathesmith

[Linstrum]

Hi, theperfessor, when the barrel didn't budge I figured the pistol has the barrel too tight to safely use the cylinder window as a leverage point. I did look at it and rejected doing it that way after already cranking pretty hard on it. This replica was made in the 1970s and has better workmanship than most Italian replicas made nowadays, with minimum cylinder gap and chamber indexing that has dead-on alignment, so I'm not going to take any chance of tweaking something.

Lathesmith, I have one more trick I want to try before I need a frame wrench. Thanks for the kind offer, it is appreciated. If it turns out that I need your wrench I'll take you up on it.

I've always wanted a revolving rifle. Changing out the barrel would normally be pretty easy, I would have had my carbine assembled this morning already if I hadn't hit this snag. All I need to do is machine the barrel threads and then adjust the screw-in timing so the octagon flats are square with the frame, drill and tap for mounting the sights, and I'm done.


rl605

[lathesmith]

Lin, I forgot to ask, is that a Pietta or Uberti? The current crop of revolving carbines are made by Uberti, and I must admit I think they would make a fine shooter. Of course, if you are cutting your own threads, the fact that these two use different barrel threads won't matter, but I was just curious.
Yes, a guy needs a way to turn the barrel on these(and other revolvers), as sometimes you need to shift the point of impact a little, and sometimes they arrive from the factory with the sight blade a little off.
lathesmith

[Linstrum]

Hi, lathesmith, to tell you the truth, I have no idea who the manufacturer is. It says "made in Italy" and has a cartuche, or whatever you call it, stamped on the frame that is a circle with what seems to be SM in it. Can't be sure, though, the letters are very highly stylized. I am guessing that the gun was made in the 1970s and I don't know if Pietta was selling guns in the U.S. back then.

Kind of interesting, the barrel threads are 5/8" x 30 tpi. The barrel mics 0.624", which is 15.86mm and only off by 0.006" from 16mm, and the 0.85mm thread is so close to 30 tpi that I can't tell with my thread guage which one it is; so it could also be a 16mm x 0.85mm metric thread, albeit kind of loose. Either way, I can duplicate the thread in my lathe with the metric conversion gears and all the other switch gears that came with the lathe.

I got the barrel out by very carefully heating the part of the frame where the barrel screws in. I monitored the temperature by putting a few drops of 10w-30 engine oil on it where I was heating it, wafting the MAPP gas torch flame all over the area and then backing off every few seconds to see how the oil was behaving. Engine oil starts to smoke at around 350°F, which is below the point where damage occurs to most heat-treated steels and also around the temperature that steel is hot-tank blued. I seriously doubt the gun frame is heat treated, though. When it was just starting to smoke I quickly got it into the vise and put some torque to it. Like I suspected, it was set in with anaerobic thread locking sealant like Loc-Tite, which has a very charcteristic harsh smell when heated up. Kind of interesting, as soon as the barrel began to turn I heard a loud hiss of gas blowing out of the threads and a jet of white smoke blew out! As soon as the barrel broke loose I unscrewed it by hand.

The wrench I used on the frame nose is a high-quality 20-inch Proto adjustable wrench I fixed-up for gunsmithing by squaring-up the jaws so they are parallel, chamfering the jaw edges so they aren't sharp, and polishing the jaw faces so they don't mar the finish on whatever I use the wrench on. Where possible I also use lead sheets, wood, cloth, and leather when gripping gun parts.

By the way, my lathe is a Taiwan Jet belt drive 13x60 model (I use belt slippage for certain procedures, like to keep from breaking taps, otherwise I would have gotten the gear drive model). It has metric threading adapter gears, 13" swing with 40" of useable bed length with a removable gap in front of the head stock to increase swing from 13" to 18-13/16".

I'm going back out to the shop now and start machining the threads for its new barrel, by sun-up I just might have a functioning carbine!


rl608

[Catshooter]

Excellent report Linstrum! Good idea about using the motor oil for a temp gauge. I happen to have a Fluke laser thermometer for that and it works a treat.

Keep us up to date would you?


Cat

[StarMetal]

Hi, lathesmith, to tell you the truth, I have no idea who the manufacturer is. It says "made in Italy" and has a cartuche, or whatever you call it, stamped on the frame that is a circle with what seems to be SM in it. Can't be sure, though, the letters are very highly stylized. I am guessing that the gun was made in the 1970s and I don't know if Pietta was selling guns in the U.S. back then.

Kind of interesting, the barrel threads are 5/8" x 30 tpi. The barrel mics 0.624", which is 15.86mm and only off by 0.006" from 16mm, and the 0.85mm thread is so close to 30 tpi that I can't tell with my thread guage which one it is; so it could also be a 16mm x 0.85mm metric thread, albeit kind of loose. Either way, I can duplicate the thread in my lathe with the metric conversion gears and all the other switch gears that came with the lathe.

I got the barrel out by very carefully heating the part of the frame where the barrel screws in. I monitored the temperature by putting a few drops of 10w-30 engine oil on it where I was heating it, wafting the MAPP gas torch flame all over the area and then backing off every few seconds to see how the oil was behaving. Engine oil starts to smoke at around 350°F, which is below the point where damage occurs to most heat-treated steels and also around the temperature that steel is hot-tank blued. I seriously doubt the gun frame is heat treated, though. When it was just starting to smoke I quickly got it into the vise and put some torque to it. Like I suspected, it was set in with anaerobic thread locking sealant like Loc-Tite, which has a very charcteristic harsh smell when heated up. Kind of interesting, as soon as the barrel began to turn I heard a loud hiss of gas blowing out of the threads and a jet of white smoke blew out! As soon as the barrel broke loose I unscrewed it by hand.

The wrench I used on the frame nose is a high-quality 20-inch Proto adjustable wrench I fixed-up for gunsmithing by squaring-up the jaws so they are parallel, chamfering the jaw edges so they aren't sharp, and polishing the jaw faces so they don't mar the finish on whatever I use the wrench on. Where possible I also use lead sheets, wood, cloth, and leather when gripping gun parts.

By the way, my lathe is a Taiwan Jet belt drive 13x60 model (I use belt slippage for certain procedures, like to keep from breaking taps, otherwise I would have gotten the gear drive model). It has metric threading adapter gears, 13" swing with 40" of useable bed length with a removable gap in front of the head stock to increase swing from 13" to 18-13/16".

I'm going back out to the shop now and start machining the threads for its new barrel, by sun-up I just might have a functioning carbine!


rl608

Linstrum,

Maybe that SM stands for San Marco. Armi made replica's and that was their location in San Marco.

Joe

[MT Gianni]

Thanks for the tip on how to fix a wrench. Glad you got it out.

[lebeau0]

Will this method work with a brass frame also?

[44man]

We have to get it straight from the start.
Frames are NOT that hard and need full support with proper tools. Tools are designed to prevent twisting and bending the frames.
Barrels also need proper fixtures, not a wrench.
If you intend to toss the barrel, a pipe wrench will do. But do not ever ruin the frame.

[Tom-ADC]

See if this helps to find date of mfg. https://store.bluebookinc.com/Info/PDF/POWDER/MBPProofmarks.pdf