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Tuning It's just a flesh wound😆

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Hmmm, let's see, carbon fiber tube, nitro piston conversion, add a magazine, set it up with a 20 MOA Picatinny rail, folding stock, bipod, and a tactical light. Am I missing anything??? Oh yeah! I need a bayonet in case I run out of ammo while the Zombie squirrels mount a charge.

Suddenly snap to reality and answer you in a perfectly sane reply.

Oh no! I wouldn't want to diminish the gifted workmanship of those days.... However, a modern seal and a fresh spring might be called for. If I could find someone local that does laser etching I might do something blasphemous just for fun on the new tube.. 

You have to realize that one of my personal joys is to irritate collectors, so fear not. Something odd will come of this.😁

Mark
 
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I spent time the other night talking on the phone to Mark about his project. Mark is an extremely interesting and decent man. Knowledgeable. Mark, I really thought you were going to succeed with your weld. You did such a good job prepping. I do see barrel and cylinder come available occasionally from parted guns. I've seen light pattern parts like that but yours being a 30's flat top makes it a little more scarce. But who knows? It might be tomorrow. I'm going to keep my eye out for you. 





 
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Karl, 

Thanks for the kind words and I'll appreciate extra eyes looking for bits that might come available. I think the kiss of death in regards to the welding, was that silicate and I don't have a clue where it would have come from. It forced me to run more heat, causing a larger heat affected zone, leading to crazing of the thin surface, etc... Not excuses for my lack of success, just that reality bites. All would have then proceeded as you suggested originally. 

Rotten luck has now left me without any venue other than making a new tube. Such is life. Great talking with you the other night. Take care.

This thread won't grind to a halt, I'll be working on the other parts and the tubing should be here this week. I have all of next week off, so I'll have time to focus on it.

Mark
 
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Gotta love the interwebs and online shopping! 😁

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Exact diameter internal and external, 4130 normalized alloy steel. It rings beautifully just like the original. Verifying my internal threading tool is up to the task along with being nice and sharp. Let the cutting begin!

Tomorrow that is, I'm calling it an early night and I have a couple of other projects cooking right now. So I'll start fresh in the morning. If the wife doesn't nail me with any honey-do's.🙄

Mark
 
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Augie,

I was in my groove. I had industrial metal jammin' in my headphones and next thing I know, the chips are flying. No hiccups, mistakes, nothing. It was so smooth, I did all that in about 35 minutes from start to finish. The milling will need me to be a bit more careful so that I keep everything indexed correctly. However, it won't take long to do the actual cutting. I'm thinking that I will set the piston up to accept a modern polyurethane seal. It's inside, out of sight and won't offend the delicate sensitivity of purists. That 4130 tube has a beautiful surface finish inside. Smooth, but not a mirror finish and I would guess it at the equivalent of 1000-1200 grit. 

I already purchased a set of vintage sights and I have a trigger guard with the adjuster screw and a set of mounting screws on their way. The only thing left to make is the lever latch, release plunger and spring.

Definitely not a project for most tinkers unless you have the equipment for threading, but everything else could be done with a file and some patience. 

Mark
 
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Nice Mark. What thread pitch did you settle on? Man, you got lucky on that trigger guard. Not quite the original but you should be able to make it work out. The foresight dovetails vary in width on earlier models. Did you get lucky there too? It fits? I think the turret rear sight you got is for an earlier model but it should fit ok. That type also came on certain BSA .22 RF's. You can tell which gun they originally came on by the yardage numbers on the side. #100 is from a 22 RF. #50 is from a Long Tom or Sporting pattern 45 inch. I think Light pattern sight says #35. Your original rear sight is the same as a Cadet Major and an Airsporter Mk1. 

Why not make a leather seal? It's not hard. I'll show you how. You can get the leather cheap on eBag. Or I can make one for you that you have to final fit. Let me know I'll get started . I have a lot of work lined up next 2 months. 


 
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Karl,

I apologise, I forgot to note that, before the game of Twister last weekend, I made a couple of passes on a piece of steel to see what I could come up with. Amazingly, I got lucky and a scratch pass at 22 TPI looked visually correct, so I ran some threads to create a thread gauge and determine how the pitch would need to be cut. I ground my tool to sit perfectly in the thread on the trigger block. 

The reason I suggested a synthetic seal, is because it would be a way to have a sealing surface that wouldn't require much of a break in period. If you have any links to a tutorial on how to make a seal out of leather, I'll do some studying.

I'll check the markings and fitment on the sights later this morning. Thanks again for all of the information.

Mark
 
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Alright, now I have to wait for the trigger guard to arrive and then I'll drill for the screws.
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There is a leather supply just a few miles away, I guess I can give the old school a chance. I saw how to make a seal and why not give it a shot.

Mark

P.S.

Karl, 

I checked the sight it is marked to 25. The front is loose and the rear is tight due to someone trying to tighten the dovetail.
 
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I deviated from using solder to lock the threads at the barrel and used some Loctite 680. Seriously strong stuff, fills voids and needs about the same amount of heat to release as would solder. 

I also blued the tube and then went and made a new piston cup. It's sitting in it's mould and I'll let it dry for a couple of days. 

Not much else will happen until I get the trigger guard. I'll keep adding to the finish on the stock.

Until our next episode!

Mark
 
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Belated update. Due to a violent border war with my garage, all tinkering was suspended for the past two weeks. 

I can say that the struggle was successful and I reestablished territorial dominance of the workbench. I will admit that "cleansing" operations, while brutal, eliminated the resident hoard that occupied the floor of the workshop. A series of purges and reeducation camps for the remaining tools has improved production.

In the interim, the trigger guard showed up, so a few hours before I started cooking Thanksgiving, I welded the damaged dovetails. Today, I made the lever release latch and stud, fitted the sights and put the new piston seal together. 

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I was surprised to find that the mainspring is an original BSA, as it has a trace of the stacked rifle stamp on it.

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I lubed the piston and spring, proceeded to struggle to get it back together, but finally got it done.

The great news is that it has a wonderful shot cycle, very smooth and absolutely no twang with fairly good power considering I was running a very heavy pellet.

The okay news is that the trigger pull is in need of some help and I'm not sure how much adjustment can be done without compromising safety.

The crummy news is that the bore has a section about 4" long that is pitted and rough. No amount of scrubbing, JB bore paste and even Evapo-rust didn't make that go away. As seen by the 15yd target, it's not that great. Now it may behave differently with normal weight pellets, but my hastily set up and dismantled test range is not a safe thing for prolonged testing, so I ran what was at hand without digging around. I also shot my other Light to compare and it seemed fine with the same pellets. My groups are nothing stellar, just quickly snapped off while staying out of sight from the neighbors on the hillside above me. These were offhand unrested and shot between the branches of an orange tree 😁.

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So for now, other than some touch up and a bit of bluing, I'm done with this for now. I know it would be more grief than it's probably worth, but I might consider putting a new barrel on it. It's not in any kind of collectable condition, so I probably can't do anything too heretical. I just love the balance and way it shoulders..I'll need to take the other Light apart and see how the piston looks. That one has an annoying shot cycle with a twang that rings my ears. The power is almost as much as this one I just put the seal in, but I'll bet it could use a bit of freshening up. 

I hope you all enjoyed this fiasco.

Mark
 
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Thanks for the compliment. These skills are from years of doing it the hard way and eventually learning what is easier, plus equipment makes it go faster. My username is an homage to the "guncranks" of yesteryear. Decades of studying what they accomplished with minimal equipment keeps me in awe of those craftsmen. 

For my next act, I'll be reviving a CG Bonehill Britannia, No.3 bore (.25) that I just had to have. It's a train wreck that I doubt could have been fired in the past half century. I've already welded up some problems, refitted the closing latch, straightened the trigger guard and will have to make a couple of parts. The design made me decide to make a replica while I fix the original one. I have all of the steel now, except the compression tube and a barrel.

Mark
 
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By the way, I took down the other Light rifle and the leather piston cup was mushy trash. It still sealed, but barely and it was smashing the center screw into the front of the compression tube and had an imprint of the port formed on it. I have made a new leather piston cup and will let it dry overnight before I lube it up and put it back together. 

Unfortunately, I didn't chronograph it in the before condition, but it was almost as much penetration as the one I put together today. Crude at best, but it's something.

Mark
 
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