New project

[steelslaver]

This one may take a while to finish. First I am going on a out of town job in a couple weeks and won't be back until sometime in early May. Plus I will need to find the extractor parts and do some modifying on the arms.

A while back on another thread, I think about the 350 legend, I said something about sleeving a X frame cylinder and making a 30 or 357 Herrett. Well, Ruggyh up and sent me a spare 500 cylinder he had.

The first thing I did was some measuring and figuring out just how much I could ream out the chambers and have it one solid piece That came out to 5/8 or .625. Next I made a spud that would just slip in a 500 S&W chamber. I do this when reaming clinders because it makes repeat line ups easy. I have ones that fit 357, 44 and 22 lr cylinder. Place brass plates in mill vice jaws and clamp in a cylinder, stick spud in a collet and then once it is tight line the vice up so the spud slides in the chamber with no interference. Then replace the spud with a reamer, do your reaming steps then remove the cylinder, clean the vice and jaws. Then stick the cylinder on the spud and then run just run it down into the vice and tighten it up and it should be near perfect. Once the vice is tight I run spud up and down a couple times to make sure it is perfect, then back to reaming.

My first surprise with the 500 cylinder was how hard it is. The first chamber dulled a HSS 5/8 reamer just starting. Ordered a carbide reamer.

Now I have a X frame cylinder with .625 bores.

Between the chambers the walls the thins spot is right at .045 and on the outside walls it is .0625.

Next I have a .308 416R stainless barrel and I will tune 5 inserts at .0626 after checking the cylinder to make sure the holes it in are .625. Then I will set up my arbor press with a guide for tthe inserts, stick the inserts on dry ice which is -100f to shrink them and stick the cylinder in my digitally controlled heat treat oven at 350f to expand it. Then stick in a couple inserts. Reheat the cylinder, then do 2 more, reheat and get the final one.

Then I will ream the inserts to 30 Herrett with a reamer from 4D and turn the remainder of the barrel to fit the frame and shroud on my 500, which I already modified so the barrel and shroud are held on frame via nut. I will need get a 460 extractor and may have to modify it as the OD of a 460 case is .478 with a rim OD of .520 and a 30-30 case base is only .422 and a rim of .512

Can I fire a 130 gr 308 bullet at 18-1900 fps out of a 5 1/2 barrel revolver? We shall see. LOL

 

[racer19j]

I assume the cylinder insert are 416r stainless. I ask this question because I’ve had some welding done on a 617 cylinder and assumed it was 416 but couldn’t verify it from stuff on the Internet. Used 309 rod so I didn’t have to heat treat it.

 

[steelslaver]

Yes as I state in my post the 308 barrel I am going to use is 416R. I am going to turn the inserts from the barrel. I can turn 5 inserts from it and still have enough left to make a .308 liner.

I would be very hesitant to weld on a cylinder. But 22lr cylinders do not see much pressure. May I ask why you did that

 

[racer19j]

I could not find a early 617 cylinder for my second 616 build so I bought a new one and fit an old style 17 extractor to it. Since the shape of the new style extractor is more "square", there were voids at the tips of 4 of the "fingers" that needed to be welded up prior to counterboring the recessed area for the extractor. Functionally, I probably could of left the voids there but it wouldn't look very good.

 

[steelslaver]

Nice work. I take it you just tigged in a few spots where a few of the arms were short. You could have tigged the arm tips instead, but that is a which ever. I am going to have build up a X frame extractor at some point for my 30 Herrett revolver project. I have a recessed 327 cylinder myself, but it is blue. I was looking around in the shop for something and found a stainless non recessed K32 cylinder and for the life of me I can't remember how I came by it. I guess I need a stainless centerfire K frame to make me a 616

 

[racer19j]

Yes the 4 small spots were TIG welded but not by me. I worked in an aerospace factory for 30 years before retiring. We had a couple certified welders that were happy to help with my projects. You should go ahead and build a 616. I’m sure it would turn out great. Everyone should have at least one 616.

 

[steelslaver]

A stainless K frame 32 barrel or even some blank stainless in 32 cal (.312) would be hard to find. Having a stainless 22 barrel bores and rifled is probably about the only way.

 

[6string]

This is a really great idea!
Steve Herrett and Warren Center really did a great job a half century ago designing the 30 & 357 Herrett cartridges.
They are very powerful, for handgun cartridges, yet quite efficient for the ballistics they yield. The fact that they use cheap and plentiful 30-30 brass is a nice bonus. They body taper and shoulder angle should minimize, if not completely eliminate, case head setback that plagues the 22 Jet.
Your approach, especially the use of temperature induced contraction to facilitate fitting of the inserts is quite clever!

I'll be sure to subscribe to this thread so I don't miss your updates!

 

[xsexcess]

Another cartridge option may be the 22-30FA (Freedom Arms). It uses 327 Federal as the parent cartridge. OAL is 1.6. Freedom Arms sells RCBS dies for it. I don't know if they would ream a S&W cylinder for that. A neat variant might be a 32H&R version. Same thing, only .14 shorter case.