doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Epoxy Repair Barrel Pits?

I wasn't trying to rain on anyone's parade Stan. I was merely giving my opinion from the perspective of a lifetime of fixing things, and my knowledge and experience with epoxies. I'm glad Ted mentioned the thermal insulating properties of the space shuttle thermal tiles.

I'm also glad you provided the temperature and pressure tolerance data on the Belzona epoxy, which I have never used. You will note that the pressures are well below what would be encountered in the rear portion of a shotgun barrel, even though the duration would be as brief as the temperature extremes of hot powder gasses. Then you also have the added component of friction from the shot column and wad moving across your epoxy repair at 1000 fps or more, and powder residue from previous shots scoring the epoxy, which is much softer than steel. You would not encounter this in any centrifugal pump, and even those temporary repairs are not intended to equal normal pump life expectancy.

I also considered the repeated thermal expansion and contraction, and the very real possibility of separation or delamination causing a partial barrel obstruction, and resulting in a bulge or burst. Of couse, if that happened, we could always have one of those fun entertaining barrel burst analysis Threads!

Even if this experiment worked OK in the beginning, would you want to be the unsuspecting buyer of this gun several years down the road.. not knowing that you'd better check the bores after each and every shot??? And that brings me to the same thought I share with Bill Shodlatz. How many unscrupulous individuals might try to do a Bondo job on pitted barrels to sell a gun that has questionable pitted barrels?

At work, we are constantly tossing out and debating ideas. Many are shot down after a little debate and consideration of the ramifications. Some sound very good on paper, but are not at all good in practice. Some end up creating worse problems that they were intended to solve, and some are downright dangerous. Then we have the winners that make us keep trying. I think this idea is just dangerous, and best shelved permanently. In the final analysis, many guys simply worry way too much about minor pits that look much worse than they are. And some barrels reach a point where they need to be removed from service.

Forums are the table at McDonalds where the old guys get together to bull shit in the mornings.
I have an 1882 Remington with pits in the steel barrels, if I can afford the epoxy I'll try 1 barrel with gunsmith Rick Dunbar's help and very careful shooting and checking.
I have no intent to dupe anyone, that's not the way I roll.
Thanks all for the thoughts and ideas (over coffee)!

Yep, it's fun discussing stuff like this. I have grave doubts about the efficacy of this type "repair" but if Mike's willing to give it a go I'm all ears as to the results.

I doubt if Mike, or anyone else here, would try to salvage, in this way, a barrel that was deemed unsafe because of extreme pitting. I certainly wouldn't. If it were to last for any considerable length of time it might spark an idea for a repair on something else one day down the road, that we would never have thought of otherwise.

If it doesn't last indefinitely it doesn't mean the idea was a failure. It just means that potential method/product has been eliminated by actual trial. That's often how useful discoveries happen.

SRH

az, let us no watt appens...

This is just so much fun....

This has got to be just about the silliest crAp I've ever read on the internet.

Stanleys Belzoni Balogna epOxy.

And ole E D chopping at the heels to see if it'll work to go along with his torch jobs.

Fire an E'poxy don't mix...

There seem to be a host of high temp cements, epoxies, and various other coatings that may very well fill in pits. Some of them may be more costly than a new gun I suppose, but perhaps several have some utility for this purpose.

http://www.sauereisen.com/ceramic-assemb...FBoCuiEQAvD_BwE

Didn�t Teague stop putting liners into barrels because they had problems with the adhesive system? Not clear if the problem was as getting an even, end to end coverage, for and barrel and liner or was it the bond broke down over time? It would be interesting to try pit repair as described above. What do you really have to lose?

jOe's approval?