Gunsmithing Any way to run a barrel in a steady rest without marring the bluing?

[TresMon]

So I'm dealing with the customer form hell right now.

I'm at a record high amount of work right now, and this one jerk keeps calling me literally every other day with the "you dun yet?" calls. (And I'm still short of the approximate promise date I quoted.) On top of that ,this is turning out to be the sporterized Mauser 98 from hell. I swear its hexed. It has fought me like a buck toothed bitch from the first second in every conceivable way.

All I have to do, now, finally, to finish the job is to recrown the barrel. The previous gunsmith cut the barrel back in such a way I can not use my barrel vice to clamp it and take the action off. the rear sight block is entirely in the way. It's to0 short for the spiders I made on both ends of my lathe spindle. It doesn't work in my 8" long universal spider I made for the lathe to do short barrels in and to true actions and bolts in.

I rented a 11 deg. crowning tool from 4D reamer rentals and they are just being a bunch of assholes, refuse to answer the phone, and have like a 3 day lag time in responding to e-mails and when they do respond its vague and does not deal with the issue. The tool has yet to arrive and 4d says its a "billing issue" but have yet to get back to me to rectify that...and they refuse to answer the phone.

All I know to do at this point is to run the barrel in the steady rest.to crown it. But I don't know how to do that without marring the bluing, unless I make a little barrel spider for the steady rest. BUT if I do that, I'm putting at least 2 more hours and cost of materials into this jerks job that I'm already upside down in.

Would wrapping the barrel in a single layer of that aluminum foil HVAC tape stuff work to protect the bluing for a short simple job such as crowning? Any body know any other such tricks?

Thanks,
TM

 

[candyx]

Hand crown the barrel

 

[TresMon]

Hand crown the barrel

Thanks for trying for me. That's essentially the tool I tried to rent from 4D rentals, to no avail, due to the jerk @ 4D rental. To buy the tool out right is $100ish dollars.....and I've already lost my are on this job.

 

[TresMon]

Screw it.. Imma just stop the press and make a universal barrel spider. I'll certainly use it in the future. I have/had just let this customer get under my skin. Its my name on the line. By my own default, I'm going to do it right. The customer can just eat.....avocados.

 

[TresMon]

Or....just putting this here if anyone else comes to the same scenario:

I can make a quick/fast/dirty set collar out of aluminum. I can clamp it to the barrel with a brass set screw. Or two. Skim cut the collar to true it and run the collar in the steady for a quick, get rid of this %^&**^$#&* customer quickie solution. Cheers!

 

[_Windrider_]

Painters tape?

 

[RPN]

Or....just putting this here if anyone else comes to the same scenario:

I can make a quick/fast/dirty set collar out of aluminum. I can clamp it to the barrel with a brass set screw. Or two. Skim cut the collar to true it and run the collar in the steady for a quick, get rid of this %^&**^$#&* customer quickie solution. Cheers!

This one. I'd use steel - machining time is practically the same, and it won't pick up on the steady. Spend an extra 30 seconds to insure against the loss of 20 minutes....

 

[TresMon]

This one. I'd use steel - machining time is practically the same, and it won't pick up on the steady. Spend an extra 30 seconds to insure against the loss of 20 minutes....

Good call. Thanks. Its why God made 12L14! Steel...that cuts like butter!