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Your first attempt at gun smithing
remingtonoaks
Member Posts: 26,245 ✭✭✭
I remember my first attempt at gunsmithing. I was six or seven years old, and had been sick for several days with the measles. Needless to say I was bored stiff, the day before I took apart my dads binocular's and made a Fred Flintstone type of a ca with it, and tongue depressors. I even took the focusing adjustment wheel and fashioned it into a steering wheel. My dad didn't find out about that for several months.
Anyway onto my first attempt at gunsmithing.my dad had a Winchester model 94 that he had won in a big buck contest several years prior. I wanted to see how it cycled and what made the ammunition go off....
A Little while later, my mom walked into the room to check on me. And there I sat with dad's 94 torn completely apart and every part taken off of it. Needless to say she gave me the belt repeatedly, and not just on my butt. Oh It started out that way, but after a while I bolted trying to get away. Being chased around the house with my mom flailing that belt, I think she hit every inch of my body.
After she got too tired to whip me with the belt anymore, she said her usual think she would say. Wait until your dad gets home. And I knew I was going to get beat by him also!
Now mom wouldn't just tell dad about what I did wrong as I was growing up, that would have been too easy on me, no she even made it worse. She would tell me that I had to tell dad what I did wrong, that was the worst part of any punishment I ever got.... having to tell him myself, The man I idolized and tried to do everything to make him proud of me!
Anyway when dad got home and and the whole family was sitting around the dinner table eating supper, and dad was talking about work with mom, mom finally said, "Ed has something to tell you Elmer" (Elmer was my dads name). My heart stopped pumping and I started sweating and shaking with fear. And dad asked me, "what do you have to tell me Ed"?
That's when I mustered up just barely enough courage to tell him. Of course he started yelling and hitting his fist on the table. He was hitting the table so hard that every glass was knocked over and every plate was flipped over. That went on for about 10 minutes, then he told me to go get his prized Winchester that he won in a big buck contest and show it to him...
No I was surprised that he didn't take the belt to me. So I got up from the dinner table, walked past him hoping he wasn't going to punch me, which he didn't. And went to my bedroom where I had put the gun all take it apart laying on my bed spread. I picked it up bedspread and all so I could make it one trip, and brought it into the kitchen so my dad could see it.
I think he figured I had only taken up the stock of the receiver, but when he saw it laying there with every part taken a lot of it, he blew up again. He didn't tell me to go get the belt like he usually does so I could with me, he picked up the Stock And started beating my butt with it.
Now it's hard to say he was hit me with that stock I thought for sure he was gonna break it in half, thereby angering him more... By the grace of God he didn't break it. After receiving my beating, he told me to go with my bedroom because he didn't want to hear my crying!
After I cried myself out, not so much from the pain, but from disappointing him. he called me to come back out of the bedroom. Yes me if I learn my lesson, which of course I did!and asked me if I wanted to join him out in the shop to help him put it back together.and of course I said yes with a smile on my face. Because that was my favorite thing to do in the world was to go out to the shop and help my dad work on things.
We got out to the shop, and he took off his work hat and put it on me, And we talked man talk as we called it, as I handed him tools and he put his rifle back together.
That was one thing about my dad, he would blow up quick, but as quick he blew up he got over it.
So all was right in my little world Again.
Oh, I almost forgot to tell you about the butt tanning I got several months later when dad found out about his Binocular's [:D]
Anyway onto my first attempt at gunsmithing.my dad had a Winchester model 94 that he had won in a big buck contest several years prior. I wanted to see how it cycled and what made the ammunition go off....
A Little while later, my mom walked into the room to check on me. And there I sat with dad's 94 torn completely apart and every part taken off of it. Needless to say she gave me the belt repeatedly, and not just on my butt. Oh It started out that way, but after a while I bolted trying to get away. Being chased around the house with my mom flailing that belt, I think she hit every inch of my body.
After she got too tired to whip me with the belt anymore, she said her usual think she would say. Wait until your dad gets home. And I knew I was going to get beat by him also!
Now mom wouldn't just tell dad about what I did wrong as I was growing up, that would have been too easy on me, no she even made it worse. She would tell me that I had to tell dad what I did wrong, that was the worst part of any punishment I ever got.... having to tell him myself, The man I idolized and tried to do everything to make him proud of me!
Anyway when dad got home and and the whole family was sitting around the dinner table eating supper, and dad was talking about work with mom, mom finally said, "Ed has something to tell you Elmer" (Elmer was my dads name). My heart stopped pumping and I started sweating and shaking with fear. And dad asked me, "what do you have to tell me Ed"?
That's when I mustered up just barely enough courage to tell him. Of course he started yelling and hitting his fist on the table. He was hitting the table so hard that every glass was knocked over and every plate was flipped over. That went on for about 10 minutes, then he told me to go get his prized Winchester that he won in a big buck contest and show it to him...
No I was surprised that he didn't take the belt to me. So I got up from the dinner table, walked past him hoping he wasn't going to punch me, which he didn't. And went to my bedroom where I had put the gun all take it apart laying on my bed spread. I picked it up bedspread and all so I could make it one trip, and brought it into the kitchen so my dad could see it.
I think he figured I had only taken up the stock of the receiver, but when he saw it laying there with every part taken a lot of it, he blew up again. He didn't tell me to go get the belt like he usually does so I could with me, he picked up the Stock And started beating my butt with it.
Now it's hard to say he was hit me with that stock I thought for sure he was gonna break it in half, thereby angering him more... By the grace of God he didn't break it. After receiving my beating, he told me to go with my bedroom because he didn't want to hear my crying!
After I cried myself out, not so much from the pain, but from disappointing him. he called me to come back out of the bedroom. Yes me if I learn my lesson, which of course I did!and asked me if I wanted to join him out in the shop to help him put it back together.and of course I said yes with a smile on my face. Because that was my favorite thing to do in the world was to go out to the shop and help my dad work on things.
We got out to the shop, and he took off his work hat and put it on me, And we talked man talk as we called it, as I handed him tools and he put his rifle back together.
That was one thing about my dad, he would blow up quick, but as quick he blew up he got over it.
So all was right in my little world Again.
Oh, I almost forgot to tell you about the butt tanning I got several months later when dad found out about his Binocular's [:D]
Comments
I got swatted with a razor strop; 2 pieces of leather meant twice the fun!
Only happened twice, the third time I was big enough to apologize and avoided physical discipline. And I put his Bearcat back together.
Hard lesson learned !!!
Thanks !!!
I Grew Old Too Fast (And Smart Too damn Slow !!!) !!!
Seems your Old Man blurs the line between discipline and a beating.
I got swatted with a razor strop; 2 pieces of leather meant twice the fun!
Only happened twice, the third time I was big enough to apologize and avoided physical discipline. And I put his Bearcat back together.
Not really, times were different back then. He never crossed the line.
This PC BS of not being able to spank your kids is why this country has gone to poop.
And by the way, I wish my dad had a razor strap, the thinner the belt the more the pain. Trust me, he made me bring his belt to him to spank me. I always picked the widest one I could find. Which was 1 inch wide. I doubt I would have felt a wide razor strap
My first "gun cobbling" exercise at about 14 YO was fully sanctioned by parents and gun owner. It involved melding parts of a couple of Remington 11's with other parts from a Browning A-5 that had been run over by a vehicle. Considering what I had to work with, the final product came out better than anticipated by the owner--it functioned, although only with high brass shells for the 100 or so. If kept virtually dripping with Singer sewing machine oil, it would chunk out empties at an admirable rate.
I bought a 110 barrel in .270 Winchester here on GB, got the wrenches and Go/No Go gauges and went to work. Once we had I had it all assembled we took it to the range and strapped it to an old tire and tied the tire to the concrete shooting bench. We tied a string to the trigger, loaded it up, and went around the corner of a CMU building. We set up a video camera to record the event should there be a catastrophic failure.[:0] That's when the argument as to who would pull the string ensued![:D] I said since it was his gun, it was up to him. He thought that since I'd done the work it was up to me. He finally grabbed the string and gave it a tug... BOOM! We peeked around the corner of the building half expecting to see his gun in pieces but to our surprise it was still in one piece! Woohoo![^] We shot it three more times that way and then remounted the scope and got it sighted in. It now shoots 1 1/4" groups as a .270 and has taken a couple deer.
Bent the spoke into a handle, screwed the ferrule almost off, filled it with crushed match heads and capped that off with a small pebble. Pointed it at large leaves and held a lighted match under the "barrel" until it fired. Poked a small hole clean through that bad boy leaf!
as for the guns I really do not remember the first one maybe a old double barrel shotgun I bought at a auction about 40+ years ago stands out I stripped it down used cold blue on the barrels and receiver refinished the wood turned out ok for what it was.