Trying to post a picture.....hopefully a picture appears of an express sight being built.

It worked.....this picture shows a special cutter that I ground to make the half round shape above the pivot pin hole on an express sight I made recently.

I would rather buy this part than make it but after I got to the final stages of fitting the one from Brownells, I realized I'd cut the dovetail with a 65 degree cutter. By the time I corrected the angle using a 60 degree cutter there was a sizeable gap and a rather "loose" fit . The client requested a one standing/one folding rear sight so I had to build a larger base. I was planning on using the original blade and pin but the pin was a funny size that I didn't have any pin stock for so in an effort to get the thing done I ended up making the whole sight. Interesting project if you don't like making money .

Here are some views of it next to the original. The shop made sight is slightly longer taller and wider because I didn't want to do it twice.






Shane Thompson

Very nice, similar to a Recknagle.

Very nice. "Neccesity is the mother of invention." The crafstman works with a product, modifying this and that and one day realizes he's actually done all the steps to produce it, just not all on the same one. Then, Wa-la! He makes his own.

WOW,great pics.Thanks

Tha tis awesoem work. ANy more pics of the process you coudl share with us? Not many folks can whip out a sight that looks that good!!!

Damn, Shane - we did not learn stuff like that back at the school, eh?
Very nice!
However can you defend making this, the time it has taken must cost mutch more than a new one from Brownells?

For us folks that are not machinists I would like to ask a question to understand how that cutter worked.

Is it correct to assume that it was used to scrape the half round shape above the pivot pin hole?

Making things is fun; buying them is usually faster and cheaper, but not nearly as satisfying. That looks like fun.

Bent, Toomany Tools,

If you read in my second post I was forced into making it by cutting the dovetail with the female dovetail with the wrong cutter and once it was fixed it was oversized. Believe me ....it wassn't just for fun, it added about four or five hours to the project that I didn't get paid for. It was satisfying as you said, just not profitable.

Marc,
I'll look for more pics, I don't think I documented it very well but you can see some of the steps from the first set of pictures. I'll explain it a little more and add some picutes of the finished metal work a little later. I'm headed off to a little league basketball game.

Shane Thompson

Very nice Shane

Terry

1st photo was hard to tell what one was yours and what was factory, nice work. Thanks for showing...I'm about to atempt the same thing but with a solid standing leave only. Should be an easier job then what you have done here!
Should be...

So you are using the tool pictured as a scraper. How long did it take to cut the profile with it?

quote:

So you are using the tool pictured as a scraper

I assume you used it like a "shaper", moving the vice back and forth and raising the knee for each deaper cut?

However you did it the results are great.

Yes, it's just a scraping action. It took about 15 minutes to grind the tool from an old endmill and about 5 minutes to scrape it in.

Marc,
Here are some pics of the steps that I did on Terry's "standing only" rear sight. I didn't document this "folding sight" build very well. Basically I start on the bottom and use a dovetail cutter to get my angles. I then cut the trench for the flat tension spring that holds the folding sight in place. I then turn it on it's side and drill the hole for the leaf pivot. Turn it right side up and machine the rear angle on the same plane as the dovetail on the rear of the sight. Then I put it on parallel's and machine the top features, leaving a small square shape over the hole........then the scraping, then I machine it free from the barstock. I then mill a slot down through the top for the bottom of the leaf sight to set in and square it out with a file. Machine the leaf, stake the spring in place using the ram on the mill with another tool that I ground.






I'm using a gage pin to set the angle for fly cutting off the excess.


Flycutting off the excess.


Machining the top and setting it free.


Shane Thompson

Thanks for all this- fascinating to me.

Question- how do you drill a hole that small, and that straight?

And how do you drill the hole in the leaf? Does the leaf come from a cross sectional slice of the same square stock used for the base? Do you drill the hole, mill away, scrape profile around the hole, then use a jeweler's saw or something to finish liberating it from the square stock?

WHat material do you use for the spring? ANy tricks to this?

Is that 12L14?

I made the base out of 12L14 and the blade out of 1018. I had a little thinner piece of 1018 so I used it. I milled it to the proper thickness in the horizontal plane and left the slight step for the hole. Then I rolled it on it's side, (right side...then left side) still attached to the original piece of metal. I cut a trench on each side to narrow down the little nub on the bottom of the blade that protrudes through the base of the sight. This way I only had to drill the hole about .200 before it popped through. Then I "liberated" the blade from the stock using a hacksaw and making sure to leave the nub long so I could handfit it later. The spring was made from a small piece of an old mauser follower spring.

Here are some pictures of the finished rifle. It's an original 300 H&H in a model 70. The client had me duplicate a stock and he inlet and finished it........he then decided to doll it up a little with some metalwork. This limited what I could do with the project since it was already fully inlet. I worked within these parameters and added the bases, quarter rib, swivel stud and welded on the bolt handle.

Side view of bolt handle


Rear view












I really would like to have moved the serial number but as I said the metal was already fit to a stock so I was limited on what I could do.






Shane Thompson

Wow,, that is going to be a very nice rifle when it is finished!

Thank you very much for the extra info on how you made it