doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Off-Face -- When is it bad enough to fix?

Some of you American amigos are brave beyond belief. It's obviously well past it's best if used by date! I would not even glance on this wobbly ole' thingy. How much is it going to be worth after professional tinkering job $200?

Many years ago I heard of an older gentleman on his way home from town in an old Chevy with poured bearings. One of the rods "Shelled" the babbit. He pulled her over to the side, got out his tools, carefully dropped the oil pan so as not to spill the oil, found the loose rod & took off the cap. He then proceded to cut the tounge (leather) out of his shoe, wrapped the journal with it, put the cap back on & proceded to drive her on home. Sometimes one just does what they have to do & leaves the Theories for others.

This has been an interesting thread. Good discussion.

"Tool kit" comes to mind. There has been discussed a series of fixes for off-face. It should be fairly clear that they range in permanence from a few shots to a new life on the gun. They range in cost from a few cents and a few minutes of low skilled work to several hundred dollars and highly skilled work. Seems to me there is room for all the "tools." One only needs to match the "tool" to the gun, shooting conditions, intentions, and wallet.

2-piper a true backwoods craftsman such as my Granpa would have used a "Meat Rind", and keep a various sized collection on hand.

For loose shotguns, he seemed found of brazing.

Larry, you're exactly right. Not just Winchester but some Brit makers followed that practice. The removable pin is made in a way so that a new one can be a few thous. thicker and still have the same shoulder and head diameter as the original. If you remove one of these pins and examine it you will see that the actual bearing diameter where the hook contacts is smaller by about .020" than it's other diameters thereby allowing several increases of size before the frame needed reaming. Even then only the portion of the holes supporting the pin need to be enlarged, not the cap size nor the thread diameter. Obviously a great advantage for guns used heavily for driven shooting and usually overhauled every few seasons. I've never understood why this aspect of good design isn't more widely known and appreciated. It's lack in the average Brit boxlock is a flaw that's not often heard about. The Spanish took note and even their low end guns corrected the error. AYA used to advertize that all their guns had replaceable hinge pins. Of course if one is dealing with a "monstrous horrendum" one's options are limited. Fire up the TIG or break out your shimstock and solder. A perfectly acceptable solution but not one you would be happy to see on a really fine gun. If I were limited to that fix I'd spend the money and send the gun to Ken Eversull and have it lazer welded.
nmp

Rocketman nicely summed up how many of us see this. Yesterday the cheapest, most fleeting "repair" filled the bill nicely. It may do so again, or, I may move to a temporary soft metal shim before shooting that gun again. Will see how this evolves.

Hopefully, this gun will go hunting at least a few times next season -- it has lots of plusses for me. Previous owner(s) in Sweden used it lots and kept it well repaired (other than off face condition). My last bag of ducks and geese fell to a newer model of much the same gun, as all others have this year. Maybe next year, awaiting shooting light, I will hear hunting stories in a Swedish dialect I understand..................

Niklas

As a former machinist and toolmaker, I find it very difficult to accept hand filing of the "hook" which is the bearing of the barrels. While I believe it is possible to file a welded up hook to fit well on the hingepin, I think it is more likely that small contact area is the result leading to premature looseness (off face). I believe this is a job for a jig boring machine to ensure full bearing of the contact surfaces. JMO.

BTW, my BSS has a replaceable pin between 2 endcaps which are screwed in, then the slotted head is filed off to blend with the frame and engraved. Replacing the pin means replacing the caps, but it's still better than some other systems.

Chuck,

Given that both hook and hinge pin surfaces are likely (certain?) to have some wear, should not both have their surfaces machined to fit each other? Would not fitting a new hinge pin also require recutting mating surface on hook?

Thanks,
Niklas

Chuck H, It's so nice to hear form someone who has experience and understands exactly the problems involved but at the same time lets not miss out on the good in pursuit of the perfect. How many smiths are going to have a jig borer? Or even a plain old miller? I always wanted to set up the barrels in a milling slide on my Myford lathe and mill the cut perfectly square across the lumps but what I've found is that cross pins are rarely perfectly square to the frame. Perhaps in newer guns made on modern machinery they are but certainly not on Brit guns from before WW2. I'm sometimes convinced they used jigs made of lead. Their screws are all over the place with no standard diameters except a love affair with 26 TPI. You can't even assume the threads will be Whitworth, perhaps something near Whitworth but a lot of 'em seem to have made their own taps. 26 TPI was the old British Bicycle standard. So you see the problem. The only thing to do is fit the new pin as polished as possible, then smoke in the hook as best you can. I use tiny smooth stones mounted in a Foredom handpiece and won't be satisfied until I'm getting full contact with every surface polished . A good bit of judgment is called for because you have to estimate the wear on the hook and how much metal will be removed before you know what size to make the pin. All of which makes me look askance at people who will do the job for a few hundred dollars. I mean, would you do it for a few hundred?
npm

acually it does, on a really nice gun. I have had luck with lapping the hinge in, with a properly sized lap,made the same size as the replacement pin.
The people that think this is a complicated method,should either go to a good machinist school(where they teach how to cut things to the 100 thousanths) or take it to someone who does.Personally, it does not take me anytime at all to make the part. I generally make 2 or three while I am at it for that make of gun, and have some oversized one on stock for the time someone comes in with a gun of that make. To take the gun in the back, have him wait while I remove the old pin and install a new one, and hand him back a perfect gun in an hour or so, has gotten me many friends.So far everyone has been happy, and that is many people, as I ran a shop for many years. Now getting them to freely pay for the work is something else! They want to turn a worn gun into a new one, for almost nothing. That is why I just do work for a few people now. I got tired of the cheapskates and the farmers.