Here are some photo's James Anderson sent me the other day from a job he's doing. The whole thing started a few years ago when I contacted Shane Thompson to do a Mini Mauser for me. At first the job was going to be nice but simple and I had planned on stocking the rifle myself. I ordered a Mini Mauser stock from GAG and sent the parts on to Shane. Well, time passed and the extras kept adding up and before I knew it I had a full custom metal job in the works. When I got it back there was no way I was going to stick this barreled action in a GAG stock so I talked James Anderson into stocking it for me. But there was a small problem. I still had the GAG stock that wasn't cheap by any stretch of the imagination. By luck I found a guy that had a Mini Mauser for sale on GunBroker that wanted a .44mag pistol I owned so we worked out a trade. I now had a barreled action to put in my stock but wanted just a little work done to it.

Funny how these things work out. You add one nice thing, then you need to add another and before I knew it, I had two barreled actions that are too nice for this stock! Oh well, I'm going to have to use this one.

Here some very nice "work in progress" photo's from James Anderson. When finished the barreled action will have custom bases, a new bolt handle, a new trigger and a 3-position safety. I just got an email from James saying he was working on the safety now. I'll post some pics when I get them.

I'm not a gunsmith but I love threads like this. Something about watching a gun go together I find amazing.

The 1st ones are of the new bolt handle. This is a huge improvement over the original.





The next set are of the custom bases being built.








Soon I should have some more of the safety install. James is going to re contour it to fit the action. After that all the metal work should be complete and I'll go back to work on the stock.

A big thank you goes out to James for providing these pictures and allowing me to post them. James is a top flight gunsmith and a all around good guy.

Terry

Terry,

Not one beautiful mini Mauser, but two! Fantastic. Mine is still just a bunch of parts waiting their turn at the 'smiths.

I missed what cartridge this one is going to take?

Love seeing James' photos. Hope he'll chip in with a few comments about the job if he's not already off to Reno.


cheers,
- stu

This one is a 7.62X39. The other is a .223

I bet James will chime in before long.

Terry

Looking great Terry! I have a 270X39IMP reamer if you want to do a 270. I am about ready to send my metal work to James inorder that he can do a stock for me.
Butch

The .270X39 sounds like a neat idea! I may have to take you up on that one day. Thanks for the offer, now my brain will be spinning the rest of the day

Terry

Terry,
Just neck it down and fireform. It is a very accurate cartridge and makes a real good young kids deer rifle.
Butch

Butch-

what are the ballistics for the 7x39 IMP? I am working up a project in my mind and am considering a wildcat for the first time in my life.

Marc,
It is a 270X39IMP, not a 7mmX39IMP. You could also call it a 270PPC and make it from 220 Russian brass as we do our 6PPC. I think you could get a 110grn. 270 bullet to around 3000FPS. I know the 30PPC with 112s are running that fast.
Butch

IMPORTANT UPDATE and VIDEO

I got this email from James this morning telling about the safety install.

James Anderson:

Sorry I didn't send any more pics your way yesterday. I was in the shop kind of late. Wife & kids were at church (AWANA program) The new safety shroud stops the cocking piece in a different place causing timing problems. I knew this going into the project and am NOT asking for more $. Just giving you a little inside info. The nose of the cocking piece needed to be shortened. The problem with shortening this part is to do it correctly, it should be cut with a helix. Cutting a helix is easily done on a lathe, but the long lead of the cocking cam is way outside the capability of a lathe. Most lathes cut as steep as 4 threads per inch or .250 per revolution. The lead on the minix bolt is 1.375" per rev. In today's machine shop world, most long lead helix are generated with a 4th axis on a CNC machining center using a dirt simple one line program. The poor mans way to do this is using 100+ year old high tech. I'll send you some pictures and hopefully a small video to help explain this. I've got a Hardinge mill with a spiral milling attachment. A few years back I made a pile of change gears that change the lead of the spiral/helix being machined. The problem I had yesterday was the amount of lead "distance per revolution" I measured on your bolt was not listed on the table of change gears. I had to dig into my Machinery's Handbook for the formula to determine the right gears to install in the gearbox. This was an exercise in fractions. I was feeling a little rusty in my ability to deal with fractions while trying to figure the correct ratio for gearing the spiral head. I guess I should have payed more attention in school. Eventually I came up with the right combination and machined the end of your cocking piece off. I could have just ground it off at an angle and faked it, but I FINALLY had a reason to use my spiral milling attachment and the gearing that I spent many hours making. Kind of a fun project. Not sure most gunsmiths would agree with me, but I really enjoy the process as much if not more than the results. Maybe that's why I'll never be a millionaire gunmaker. :-)

He added a few video's to the email too.

YouTube: Hardinge Spiral Milling

Cool stuff.

Terry

A few more of the threads coming off getting ready for the install.





Terry

Thanks Terry
Installing a 3 position on a miniX is quite a bit of work. When all is said & done, it's well worth it. I know fitting & lapping the cocking piece by hand would have worked fine. I did this on my personal gun 10,000 rounds ago. I just wanted a reason to use all the gears and hardware I built that you see in the video inside the gear box on my little Hardinge.

quote:

Originally posted by gunmaker:
Thanks Terry
Installing a 3 position on a miniX is quite a bit of work. When all is said & done, it's well worth it. I know fitting & lapping the cocking piece by hand would have worked fine. I did this on my personal gun 10,000 rounds ago. I just wanted a reason to use all the gears and hardware I built that you see in the video inside the gear box on my little Hardinge.

Thank you James, It's been a real treat. I have really enjoyed watching this one come together and sharing it's progress on this forum.

Here are the last ones received. It's coming together very nicely.

Terry

James,
I like your way of thinking. Doing that exercise keeps the blood flowing to the brain. You might not do that again for a while, but you will remember it when a similar problem arise.
It is all looking good. Terry, I didn't know that it was a Remington.
Butch

Terry,

Thanks for posting.

I was fortunate enough to look at that project a couple of weeks ago while at his shop. I believe I interrupted James with a phone call the other day while he was working on some spiral thing he was doing. Now I understand.

I promise to not bug him anymore so he can get it finished.

Very nice looking metal work, as usual!

Butch-

the round sounds like a 6.5 Grendel with a .277 bullet. What advantage over the Grendel factory round are you looking for?

Hey Butch, yes this one is a Remington 799. The one Shane Thompson did is a Charles Daly. He did the G33/40 treatment on it though and now you can't tell.

I got one last email today.

Here's a few more pics
First is grinding the cocking piece sear mating surface back so the hand off when closing the bolt isn't so notchy feeling.
Second is milling the 25 deg angle on the cocking piece where the safety engages. I mill it close then assemble it into the bolt and measure how much the cocking piece falls when the safety is clicked off. Then I can put it back into the vise against the vise stop, change my zero and finish mill it. Next I mill a tiny flat on the camming surface of the safety lever that mates with the 25 deg milled portion of the cocking piece so the middle position has a detent even without the detent plunger installed. I'll try and contour it tomorrow!
James




Great stuff James!

I had to laugh at that last picture, when i'm doing a project on the mill, I have marker numbers all over the place!
Terry, think you are going to start a short action fad and pull this nation out of its crisis... Both projects are cool, and James's pictures just help add to this forums being the place to come and see neat stuff...Thank you both!
Are some of the lettering on this action going to be ground off. Seems to be a lot scratched in the metal on this action?

Thanks srtrax, it's been fun watching it come together.

These will be the last untill the parts are polished.

This set is VERY interesting. It's of the full size Dakota safety body being resized to fit the mini mauser action. This is some very cool stuff.


James Anserson writes:

quote:

First pic is profiling the flange to better fit the miniX rear bridge. I don't do this step on standard 98 projects
Next pic re contouring with a carbide ball mill into a little more Mauserly & curvy shape.
Third is using a form cutter for radiusing the back edge.
Last is the freshly machined one and my polished one with an original one in the middle. The bullet supporting the bolt handle is the winning Pinewood Derby Car for last weekend's business class for my son's Cub Scout Pack.

James

Last but not least is the finished product next to the original. It's quite a change. The big bullet on wheels is a SoapBox Derby car. Very cool



Terry

Terry

Way too cool! Really interesting are those drawings of that safety!!

Gorgeous work by James.

quote:

Originally posted by 22WRF:
Terry

Way too cool! Really interesting are those drawings of that safety!!

Gorgeous work by James.

My guess would be yes they are.

James?

The safety profile is pretty cool isn't it.

Terry

quote:

Originally posted by TC1:

quote:

Originally posted by 22WRF:
Terry

Way too cool! Really interesting are those drawings of that safety!!

Gorgeous work by James.

My guess would be yes they are.

Terry

The doodle in the left corner is from Pete Grisel's original prints that were done in Bend Oregon. I assume that the current production available from Sturgis is very similar. I can't make them with my limited machinery for the prices that they are sold today. I can however whittle on them a enough to create something you can't just buy "off the shelf". Adding the extra flat for the middle position really makes them function through all 3 positions as they should.

On an earlier thread about this project, I expressed some concern about the size of a three position safety on this rifle. Needless to say, I shouldn't have been worried in the least. James, you have extraordinary talent and a great eye for style.

Thanks to you and Terry for taking the time to share your photos with us.

Also interesting is that "custom" set of parrellels for milling safeties. I am curious what that tool is that has those two red knobs on it.

That looks to be a standard off the shelf vise stop, aka work stop from Swisse Precision (SPI).

James, that is very impressive work and top shelf photography. This is evidence of a skilled creative well trained mind. Congratulations

quote:

Originally posted by 22WRF:
Also interesting is that "custom" set of parrellels for milling safeties. I am curious what that tool is that has those two red knobs on it.

Like Roger said the black, white and red all over widget is a vise stop. I use this so I can machine something, take it out to check the fit and replace in the vise without having to pick up my zero again. In this project I used it to save my X zero for the drilling and counterboring operation as well as milling the front & rear bases. The cocking piece pic above shows it is well. Makes it much easier to fit the safety without guessing how much more to remove. It's one tool that I would recommend to anyone that uses a milling machine. Wish they taught me this trick in school.

The fixture holding the shroud is one I made at Trinidad for installing 2 pos swing safeties on original Mauser shrouds. The hole that the threaded portion of the shroud goes through has a counterbore in it to fit the shroud extension. The school had an interesting K&T vertical mill that you could offset a small end mill and rotary mill under power feed a larger pocket than the size of the end mill. Since this thread has some machining using old high tech and newer high tech I thought some here might be interested in another old high tech machining method. Here's a few pics I found of a similar machine on a machining forum. Very solid machine, but I wouldn't trade it for my 2 axis Prototrak.

A Boeing seafoam green monster horizontal/vertical rotary table like mine.

I take the chuck off before carrying it around the shop.

quote:

there was no way I was going to stick this barreled action in a GAG stock so I talked James Anderson into stocking it for me. But there was a small problem. I still had the GAG stock that wasn't cheap by any stretch of the imagination.

I really think this is a neat project, Thanks for sharing and keep em comming...

For a little highjacking, I too had gag special build me a stock. Use to be there British Stalker was made in short action only untill now. I had them make me one in a large ring mauser, so anyone wanting such, they should have the copy there. Shouldnt be a set up fee now. I like the form but not sure i like the wood I picked for it...



This is a neat project, could we get a peek at the GAG rifle you bought, and is the blank that the action is setting on going to be used for that rifle?

quote:

Originally posted by srtrax:

quote:

there was no way I was going to stick this barreled action in a GAG stock so I talked James Anderson into stocking it for me. But there was a small problem. I still had the GAG stock that wasn't cheap by any stretch of the imagination.

I really think this is a neat project, Thanks for sharing and keep em comming...

For a little highjacking, I too had gag special build me a stock. Use to be there British Stalker was made in short action only untill now. I had them make me one in a large ring mauser, so anyone wanting such, they should have the copy there. Shouldnt be a set up fee now. I like the form but not sure i like the wood I picked for it...



This is a neat project, could we get a peek at the GAG rifle you bought, and is the blank that the action is setting on going to be used for that rifle?

Here ya go. The first one is still in the rough in this picture. The schnabel tip has been removed and I have a few other things in mind. I just hope it turns out.




Here is the blank James will be using for the other one.



This one will be a full fledged English stalker with the distinctively ebony forend tip and a lot of drop in the back. I also want the stock stained English red. James keeps trying to steer me away from this but I'm holding firm!

Here is an original W.J. Jeffery rifle I want him to pretty much copy and add a cheek piece to.




Terry

Yes. It's a beautiful piece of wood, it's only flaw is it lacks color.

Terry

quote:

Originally posted by gunmaker:
Adding the extra flat for the middle position really makes them function through all 3 positions as they should.

I'd love some more detail on that. Beautiful work James.
Don

There is some nice work here but that old KT mill gave me some flash backs that had me smelling sulfurised cutting oil. Maybe I need to speed up the refresh rate of my monitor.

Finished







Now my part begins




Terry

Very neat. Great thread.

Terry,
That is going to be a hell of a rifle. How long will it take you to finish it? I'm sure glad you're posting photos.
Butch

Not really sure about the time. My life is a three ring circus right now. I would guess sometime this summer though. It's been a lot of fun so far.

James is about to start on the "high end" one.

Terry

Mine is supposed to go to him for stocking when he gets back in town.
Butch

quote:

Originally posted by TC1:
Not really sure about the time. My life is a three ring circus right now. I would guess sometime this summer though. It's been a lot of fun so far.

James is about to start on the "high end" one.

Terry

Terry,

I am really looking forward to seeing the "high end one" come to life....I wondering how that wood will turn out

Very, very nice, indeed!

Terry,

Wow! The rings you sold me are now fixed and on a ZG with a ground bolt - pity they don't make rings like that anymore!

This project looks great. Will the high end one have an obendorf style release in guard bow? That would be really cool. To me the wrist could be a little slimmer but then I have small hands

Well, now my part begins.

Terry