Just for the record, the technique of using the mill as a manual shaper to square corners is known as the "Harry Eales Method" and works very well.
Much quicker than setting up a shaper or slotter for one of a kind.
Chuck     BTW, Merry Christmas to all

Harry, thanks for the advice, and it is much appreciated, for sure!!! We used a kind of similar method before we got the slotter, slow, but it worked!

I don't know where my boss Jim learned the technique, maybe it was even from you!!!

I have a Jet mill, with a DRO, similar machine to a Bridgeport, so I can lock it into backgear so the spindle won't rotate, and I can also lock the brake down.

I kind of figure I'll buy a 1/2" round HSS tool bit, and grind about a couple of inches of it square first in the mill holding it in a square 5-C collet block grinding it with with a cup wheel, then tilt the block in the vise to about 3deg., giving me some positive rake for the face, then rotate the blank in the collet, a few degrees, each way, keeping the 3 deg. positive rake for side clearances, then grinding the bottom for a positive rake.

I think this will work....

I'd be thankful for any advise on the design, angles, method of making, etc.

Rick4070 wrote on Dec 24^th, 2015 at 12:20pm:


Rick4070
My basic slotting tool was made from a material called Silver Steel here in England, your equivalent would be Drill Rod. I tend to see things in my mind and make them without resorting to drawings or dimensions. In this instance I took a piece of Silver steel rod put it into the jaws of a dividing head which was already mounted on my mill and machined two flats at 90 degrees to each other. I then ground the tip of the tool to what angle I thought looked right. I then hardened it and tempered it as per the instructions set out on the steel manufacturers web site. Some months later I gave it away at a model Engineering Club Meeting, it having done it's work for me, I didn't need it anymore. However, if you look at Chuckster's photo's of the Ballard he made you will see an improvement on my design where interchangeable tips can be utilised. 
See:- (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)
So your tool will never need sharpening, just a few seconds work to change the tip. I'm of the opinion that if a tool looks right it generally works. My original idea of cutting or squaring off round corners goes back nearly forty years, so anyone could have picked up on it. I don't claim to be the inventor, I just adapted a method for a mill that was usually in the realm of the vertical shaping machine. In engineering very little is impossible, the hard part is figuring out a way of doing the job. :

harry,

when squaring corners, is that tool just pushed down through the cut similar to broaching?

Thanks, Terry

Well, I got a set of plans from the archives, the first set somehow went on a walkabout, and I never received them.

Laurie was kind enough to send me a second set, which arrived safely.

I have had them enlarged to full scale at my local copy shop, they looked at me strange when I started checking the plan dimensions against my dial calipers...

Real close to right on, although the lines are pretty "thick."

Now I have had a thought after looking at the plans, I am a pretty fair machinist, and could, over time, and after scrapping lots of parts, probably do this, but, being as I have no examples to look at, and see exactly what is what, I am wondering if purchasing a set of castings from Shiloh would give me a head start.

I don't know what they would cost, I got a response back today after inquiring, that parts castings are available, and to call the foundry.

Any thoughts, pro or con on starting out with a set of castings???

cuslog,

Thanks for the encouragement!

It would be great to re-draw the parts, unfortunately, I do not have access to AutoCAD or other drafting programs.

I saw a couple of locations on the drawings where it stated "1.500" R" but with no x and y coordinates of exactly where the radius center point is, and that has me scratching my head..

Boy, would it have been neat to be a fly on the wall in John Browning's shop....

I don't have a problem with hours spent, and steel is relatively cheap.( Might could even machine "practice" parts out of aluminum to check fit and function?...)

Thank you for the offer of your willingness to share your notes, much appreciated!

As an aside, when I was in high school, my metal shop teacher had a set of full scale blueprints for a Hawken half stock rifle no author, no name on the prints.

I tried to have them copied, but they were too faint to have any detail.

I took them home, made a light table, and re-drew them on Velum, so I could have them ran off at a copy shop.

They were fairly old, dimensions were in fractions, even had contour sections through the stock. 

It took hours and hours with pencil, French curves etc.,

But I still have those masters......

Old-Win,

I did indeed have a great Industrial arts teacher.

We were able to make hunting knives from scratch, and even muzzle loading rifles and pistols, even to rifling the pistol barrels with a really neat attachment on the lathe that used a square bar, that had been twisted one in 48", that was drawn by the carriage through a plate with a square hole that was mounted to the ways of the lathe. a cutting head with an adjustable cutting tooth was used, and the cuts located by using the head gear as a dividing head of sorts.

By moving the carriage to the right, the twisted bar was pulled through the mounted square holed plate, generating the rifling twist.

Students also made complete percussion locks from scratch, and did all the stock work.

Several made percussion shotguns using DOM tubing, and well, building "lock, stock and barrel."

The teacher even had a backstop set up, and we would often test fire the black powder firearms right in the class room shop area.

He was a real mentor to me, and probably not a day goes by that I don't use some of his teachings in my job.

He also had a shop at home, and would build benchrest actions and rifles.

Yep, times have certainly changed.

Some of us were hunters, and would hunt on the way to school, and simply take our rifles or shotguns into the office for the day. The principal would usually ask how we did, and what kind of shooter we were using...

If those plans are the same as the ones being sold on Ebay they contain some serious errors! For a long time I was very impressed with that Ebay plans set after examining a set a friend bought, apparently I didn't check closely enough and it has recently come to my attention about the errors he has encountered. Notable the lever has a SERIOUS error where the breechblock link pin attaches and it positions the mounting hole to high and to far forward, this leads to binding on the hammer and a much to far over-center situation of the link pin when the lever is closed. This lets the breehblock "fallback" slightly after closing resulting in excessive headspace. This was very easy to demonstrate using the Aluminum templates he made from the plans before actually making real parts, the holes for the lever pivot, link pins and breechblock should pretty much line up (with just a very slight over-travel) upon closing. However using the parts as per the plans there is significant over-centering of the link causing the breechblock fall-back situation.

I don't know if you have this same set of plans or not but I would strongly recommend making templates of these parts with particular attention paid to that lever! He built an open "half receiver" (RH side) with a slot for the breech block, lever pivot pin properly located, a breechblock with one skirt cut away, the lever and link, etc. By doing this is was very easy to see the workings of these parts and how they interact with each other and in this case it clearly saved him a LOT of frustration by discovering this serious flaw before spending the time and money making parts from the drawings. Trying to fine tune parts that bind or are too sloppy can be a major PITA when working with an actual receiver since the parts are hidden out of sight during operation, using the templates however makes all this easy.