1860's Pratt & Whitney Rifling Machine

[zomie]

Please move if folks don't feel this works in this forum topic.

This thing is beautiful and a great piece of history that clearly made a ton of barrels in the C&R space:

Lol it is quite a bit different today's broaching, hammer or button rifling processes ...

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[Andy54Hawken]

Very cool...thank you for posting this.

Many years ago..there was a video of Jim Chambers making a Long Rifle , as in lock , stock and barrel , at Colonial Williamsburg...its worth looking up on you tube , ifin' things like this interest you.
Andy

 

[Alexx1401]

Damned impressive that they could make stuff like that so long ago. Fun to watch.

 

[Spitpatch]

It would require paying very close attention, and being proud of the outcome of your work.

Impossible today.

 

[CO136]

Wow! Great video ... amazing. Thanks for this!

 

[Member 38805]

He sets that machine up at the CGCA May show in Colorado each year, and rifles barrels during the show. No matter how often I see it run, I still watch it again. It's hypnotizing! It was there again last month when we were there.

 

[Ura-Ki]

Danny Pederson in Prescot Az. has a Pratt & Whitney "Sine Bar Rifling" Machine and he is always backed up at least a year or more, just doing new barrels.
It's a long and slow process, but super fun to watch, and many say it's still superior to todays rifle barrel making capabilities! All I know is, the few barrels I have had him make for me shoot flawlessly!

 

[zomie]

Danny Pederson in Prescot Az. has a Pratt & Whitney "Sine Bar Rifling" Machine and he is always backed up at least a year or more, just doing new barrels.
It's a long and slow process, but super fun to watch, and many say it's still superior to todays rifle barrel making capabilities! All I know is, the few barrels I have had him make for me shoot flawlessly!

Cutting like this doesn't require stress relief like we see with hammer forging or button rifling. Depending on the cutter and the time taken I could see this being super accurate. What kind of lapping / polishing / finishing Danny do post?

It also has a sin bar option for progressive twists you really could tune this for optimal shooting of particular loads and bullet design.

It would be fun to run once or twice . I could imagine doing it for a living though might wear on a guy.

 

[Ura-Ki]

Cutting like this doesn't require stress relief like we see with hammer forging or button rifling. Depending on the cutter and the time taken I could see this being super accurate. What kind of lapping / polishing / finishing Danny do post?

It also has a sin bar option for progressive twists you really could tune this for optimal shooting of particular loads and bullet design.

It would be fun to run once or twice . I could imagine doing it for a living though might wear on a guy.

Danny Runs the entire process on the machine, from start to finish, he has various cutters and jags and brushes to finish the barrel, never having to hand lap anything, the Machine can run at incredibly slow speed, so lapping and polishing is a snap!
My last barrel it's .50 cal, is a Vari-Twist, starts @1/47 and ends @1/45, the entire process starts with a core drilled blank, it runs a series of under bore cutters to "Sneak up on" the final bore, but not quite complete, after the last cutter, it then gets a "Burnishing Cut" which is like a dull button but it's made of impregnated bronze that has a type of lapping compound slathered on it, and it gets drawn through the bore instead of pushed, so that it can follow the grooves and lands super easy, that barrel took 16 pass's to get to the final stage which was to polish/clean the bore, and that was done with twisted rope and a fine polish, total time from start to finish was around 4 hours just for the bore! He then set it up to cut the flats on the octagonal profile to match my receiver, and then I turned it on the lathe to get the correct barrel taper as well as the exact transition from octagonal to round and then we did the muzzle crown with it's back cut! It was a super fun day to say the least, I could sit there all day every day and watch that whole thing!

 

[mrblond]

Very cool...thank you for posting this.

Many years ago..there was a video of Jim Chambers making a Long Rifle , as in lock , stock and barrel , at Colonial Williamsburg...its worth looking up on you tube , ifin' things like this interest you.
Andy

this one?

 

[Andy54Hawken]

this one?

Yep...that's the one...great video...and thank you for posting.
Andy