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Horrible is in the eye of the beholder as guns are generally not something many want to see fiddled with by just anyone, unlike cars. I personally cannot think of anything I made worse or even devalued other than a 10-22 stock I blinged up on request for another, then he wasn't able to keep it. Most were preferring the new plastic stocks anyway so no harm no foul there.
On the other side of the coin; Among many other things over the last six decades, I've reconstituted two rusted shotguns now, (12ga & 410)that still work great, one had no stock.
After finding no sample or drawing, and after several years, designed, and finally produced a working multiple use main spring for a 25 acp arista auto pocket pistol that I acquired without a spring to copy.
Made new firing pins from drill bits for two simple old 22 single shot rifles.
Got an old trench gun back to working condition for my daughter.
Straightened a bent frame, and made a new spring, then reblued an old Stevens 22 single shot pistol.
Filed from a saw blade an extractor for another 22 single shot rifle that had an unavailable broken one.
And even though it took two different ejectors, and a ton of fitting filing and refitting, I finally got a 1911 that was severally denting the brass on ejecting to not dent the can and even got it to throw it where I wanted.
But all in all, I don't recall ever screwing up a gun.
My opine is if you enjoy such things, follow @ilikegunspdx advice; find stuff of "little monetary value" do your best and you will learn and better yourself and abilities exponentially over time. (and maybe even surprise yourself)
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Gorgeous wood on that shotgun! The other ones look great too.

Speaking of ruger 10/22s, ruger used to paint the aluminum receivers with a grey paint to "match" the stainless barrels (probably still do?). If you remove the paint and polish the receivers/bolt/etc they look a lot better imo. Here is one I did with the original birch stock refinished to a more blond color and receiver/bolt polished. 2BE8626C-84AA-4FED-962A-81D2F37BD444.jpeg
B94995D9-585C-4EAC-A9CA-739ECF510E49.jpeg
 
Private property is private. Don't care if a person cuts down the stock and barrel and welds rails to a genuine 1894 Winnie or whatever. Their circus, their monkey. Someone else can play Karen. Never understood why some gun owners go ape ess over that.

Though it IS funny to see those things posted for sale with the description of rare, custom, or one of a kind.. lol.
 
I just think of how many threads got boogered up because someone didn't have a thread pitch gauge etc. or drilled holes without a drill press when you should have.
I love the Hayes special fastener chart, never saw that before. It contains some items I could've used over the years. Like the one for holes not square. I've done a few of those on wood framing projects involving lag bolts. Not too critical, but I've actually seen a "hole not square" with a bolt in it on an engine intake manifold before. I wonder how they got a torque value on that. What's a torque wrench? I know of two Ford dealers who use mechanics who have no idea what one is.

Drilling holes in gun parts without a drill press. For sure, that takes a very steady hand.
 
Private property is private. Don't care if a person cuts down the stock and barrel and welds rails to a genuine 1894 Winnie or whatever. Their circus, their monkey. Someone else can play Karen. Never understood why some gun owners go ape ess over that.

Though it IS funny to see those things posted for sale with the description of rare, custom, or one of a kind.. lol.
A buddy of mine told me about a couple of his uncles cutting up a model T frame and selling it for scrap back in the 90s .
It was supposedly a complete car with no body or motor, but it was just in the way so chopchopchop
 
Private property is private. Don't care if a person cuts down the stock and barrel and welds rails to a genuine 1894 Winnie or whatever. Their circus, their monkey. Someone else can play Karen. Never understood why some gun owners go ape ess over that.
Once they buy it, it's theirs to do with as they will. I've sold collectible cars before, you don't know what's gonna happen to them. My philosophy has been, once the money is in my hand, I don't care what happens to it. They can drive it straight into the Sound if they want, it's theirs.

A buddy of mine told me about a couple of his uncles cutting up a model T frame and selling it for scrap back in the 90s .
It was supposedly a complete car with no body or motor, but it was just in the way so chopchopchop
This was how my cousin used to get rid of unwanted cars. 1937 Ford sedan, 1944 (yes, they made them during the war but they were rationed) Ford ton and a half flatbed truck; a couple of 67-68 Mercury Cougars and others. He had one of those Ford Model TT trucks, he may have done the same with that too. Funny, my dad once started to cut up a 1962 Lincoln Continental sedan with a jig saw. That approach didn't last long before he asked a friend to come over with a torch. Those Lincoln sedans weighed over 5,000 pounds and there was a lot of metal in the body.
 
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I too did the sand and polish on this 10/22 receiver. The trigger was what I half messed up. After watching some videos online, I decided to do a pretty aggressive trigger job. In the end, I actually came on the other side with an incredibly nice trigger pull (sub 2lbs, no take-up.) The only problem was that is would double tap every once in a while.

I also did the stippling thing once. Eh, I've seen worse.
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And of course, who doesn't like to polish one out every now and again.

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I dont mind tinkering on something that's cheap and broken, gives me something to practice on.

Though I did attempt to powder coat a Savage model 1905 in a dark green. I must have sprayed it too thick because it had some sags. Though it wasn't a nice example anyhow, the barrel had been chopped a bit too short and I welded a flash hider on it to make it legal.

I ended up giving it away, didn't want to see it.
 
Teenager + L.C. Smith shotgun + hack saw = Bad idea
I was at a friend's house many years ago, and his teenage boys excitedly showed me a .22 rifle that they had found in a junky vehicle they bought for parts. It was a Winchester semi-auto of some kind, that someone had taken a hacksaw to the barrel.

They were absolutely unbelieving when I told them that it was a felony, to get rid of it asap, at least remove the barrel completely. They just couldn't comprehend how it had been legal as a rifle, still longer than a pistol when chopped, but not still legal. I had to explain some basics about the NFA that I suspect most people don't know. I helped them remove the barrel then and there, but have no idea what they did with it or if they ever found another barrel. They were not happy with me for spoiling their cool new toy, but I think their dad was appreciative for helping them avoid potential legal trouble.
 
I used the remchoke threading system to turn old shotgun barrels off ebay into barrel extenders.

The really bad part, was I tried to take it in the house. It bumps into things.

Shotgun extensions 12 ga handi rifle DSCF0103.jpg
 
I wanted it to be like a silencer that needs no paper work. MY shotgun shell loading skills are poor.
But I came up with a different way to get the same thing done.... my wildcat, the 50cb

It uses 2 presses to seat and form the Lead ball.
It would kill big game and sounded like a BB gun.
I was going to measure how loud it is vs powder chare and velocity, but the wife took back her Fluke 289 meter with peak detect. She was sore I blew up another one of her Voltmeters while trouble shooting the magnetron in our microwave.

I had screwed up our microwave with burning popcorn.
I had a job once where the building was evacuated after I burned popcorn in the microwave.
They got new microwaves that only stay on for a minute.

2.8 gr Red Dot, .500 in ball 50CB not over squished 6-26-2012.jpg H&R 16 ga lower, 50CB barrel, .495 in inside diameter tube b  6-25-2012.jpg Two presses to seat and squish a 50 cal ball into bullet shape with ram and home made die 8-6-...jpg
 
I'm just now seeing these last few posts.

But I came up with a different way to get the same thing done.... my wildcat, the 50cb
Now that's very adventuresome. We get to see some off-beat stuff here, but this has to be toward the top of the list.

As to the .50 CB and the post above re. the shotgun barrels spliced together. I have to wonder if at some point about the friction encountered by the payload over the duration of travel in an overly long bore. Does it cut substantially into exit velocity in your experiments? I've mentioned before the German 4mm training rifles that have only an actual bored distance of about 12 inches, the rest of the barrel being overbore wherein the ball freebores to the muzzle. This design due to the relatively low powder charge vis-a-vis barrel friction.

It's not the same physics, but with vacuum cleaner attachment hoses, or a shop vac for that matter, you can only go so long. The internal friction of the air against the hose material multiplies, and the longer it gets, the lower the velocity of the vacuum at the business end. You could say that really sucks, but it doesn't, because it no longer sucks as it should. Said another way, length isn't everything.

I will say, as to the silencer effect derived from bore length, that's right on. A .22 CB cap fired in a 22 or 24 inch rifle barrel is on the level of a CO2 BB gun, but the same CB cap fired in a 4 inch revolver bbl. is fairly loud. Strangely enough, I've never chrono'd the two before to compare. I'll have to put that on my to do list for better weather.
 

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