Dang bro, YOU ARE GOOD! 
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Blackhawk Restyle
- Thread starter Sharps40
- Start date
The new ejector rod housing is on. ... It should be fine as frog hairs so time for getting to the ejector rod. Simple job woulda been ta install a ruger rod, shortened to fit....but like many parts installed on much of the ruger product line, its got fugly features......just a small button on a green steel shaft. It works but...Ick. So, brass I think....tie the front to the back and some other shape.
This was a very hard part to make....not complex....but I studies bowen, Cimarron, ruger, colt, Bullseye buttons, Freedom Arms super ugly wraparoundundercutgianttail buttons....nothing struck my fancy.
So, I grabbed a nice chunk of half hard brass rod I been carvin parts out of fer years and started grindin some shapes in the end of the shaft.....ya can see a rough S shape traced on the end where I'm sawin off a slab to work with.
Not a bad start....kinda follows the barrel and a bit bigger than factory but not a giant button with a hole in it.
Lookin at the junk on my bench, I saw a pleasing shape....so a bit more refining of the ejector button....course I don't know that ta call it now, it ain't no button.....pusher thingie?
Now....the shape on the right is getting my positive attention. The shape on the left is destined for the garbage.
Yep, I think so. When its to install the brass pusher thingie on the rod (don't know yet if it'll be the ruger rod or a section of suitable drill rod) I will have to see if I can cam it just a bit more clockwise so the nose of the brass pusher thingie is centered up over the centerline of the shaft.....I'll play with it...nice part about solder is ya can heat, twist and in a moment, check the look.
This was a very hard part to make....not complex....but I studies bowen, Cimarron, ruger, colt, Bullseye buttons, Freedom Arms super ugly wraparoundundercutgianttail buttons....nothing struck my fancy.
So, I grabbed a nice chunk of half hard brass rod I been carvin parts out of fer years and started grindin some shapes in the end of the shaft.....ya can see a rough S shape traced on the end where I'm sawin off a slab to work with.
Not a bad start....kinda follows the barrel and a bit bigger than factory but not a giant button with a hole in it.
Lookin at the junk on my bench, I saw a pleasing shape....so a bit more refining of the ejector button....course I don't know that ta call it now, it ain't no button.....pusher thingie?
Now....the shape on the right is getting my positive attention. The shape on the left is destined for the garbage.
Yep, I think so. When its to install the brass pusher thingie on the rod (don't know yet if it'll be the ruger rod or a section of suitable drill rod) I will have to see if I can cam it just a bit more clockwise so the nose of the brass pusher thingie is centered up over the centerline of the shaft.....I'll play with it...nice part about solder is ya can heat, twist and in a moment, check the look.
Time to get busy with the flame wrench.
Heat till the seal is broken. For such a small part, a propane torch provides all the heat needed.
Occasionally a twist with the plyers until scroink, off comes the very ugly ruger ejector rod button. Hmmmmmm.....musta been a hot press fit or something cause I see no silver braze or even solder....ah well....at least it mikes .138ish inches and that's about perfect to drill a #29 hole in the new brass button for soldering it on....oh yeah, orientation.....the button centerline faces up, same direction as the flat milled on the ejector rod. So, for putting on the new button, flat facing up......button facing up and the inside curve of the button oriented so the pointy part is to the left, like the last picture in the post right above.
Time for pepperoni pizza then off to the shop to drill a hole and solder the new button in place on the original ejector rod.
Heat till the seal is broken. For such a small part, a propane torch provides all the heat needed.
Occasionally a twist with the plyers until scroink, off comes the very ugly ruger ejector rod button. Hmmmmmm.....musta been a hot press fit or something cause I see no silver braze or even solder....ah well....at least it mikes .138ish inches and that's about perfect to drill a #29 hole in the new brass button for soldering it on....oh yeah, orientation.....the button centerline faces up, same direction as the flat milled on the ejector rod. So, for putting on the new button, flat facing up......button facing up and the inside curve of the button oriented so the pointy part is to the left, like the last picture in the post right above.
Time for pepperoni pizza then off to the shop to drill a hole and solder the new button in place on the original ejector rod.
Got the pusher button drilled out....#29 drill and the fit was a tap on with a light hammer. So, lined it up with the flat as discussed before and checked it on the gun, rotated it a bit more clockwise to line up the flat of the rod with the cylinder wall and then soldered it with flux.
Next step was to do some shaping of the button around the rod to fit the old ruger rod housing....(its bigger inside than the one made in Eyetally for Cimarron, so it was a good starting place for fitting.)
After the rod fit the ruger housing, I tried it in the Cimarron housing.....smaller bore, tighter fit....some bind on the spring too...so....extending the flat so that the rod will extend further back/not stop against the face of the cylinder. Also, I had to do some tapering and thinning of the rod overall, to allow the spring to slide more freely back and forth without bind. (as of this evening, I think I have it about 90%, so just some tweaking and polishing and it should be good to hook.)
The ejector rod installed in the Eyetalian ejector rod housing.....looks pretty cool. The button needs the sharp edges knocked off and smoothed up and polished.
And the ejector rod button camming up and out of the way for easy removal of the cylinder base pin....this is what I was lookin for.....tear down with out havin to yank the ejector rod housing off every time. This is good, no tools needed to get the cylinder and base pin out for cleaning and maintenance.
Next step was to do some shaping of the button around the rod to fit the old ruger rod housing....(its bigger inside than the one made in Eyetally for Cimarron, so it was a good starting place for fitting.)
After the rod fit the ruger housing, I tried it in the Cimarron housing.....smaller bore, tighter fit....some bind on the spring too...so....extending the flat so that the rod will extend further back/not stop against the face of the cylinder. Also, I had to do some tapering and thinning of the rod overall, to allow the spring to slide more freely back and forth without bind. (as of this evening, I think I have it about 90%, so just some tweaking and polishing and it should be good to hook.)
The ejector rod installed in the Eyetalian ejector rod housing.....looks pretty cool. The button needs the sharp edges knocked off and smoothed up and polished.
And the ejector rod button camming up and out of the way for easy removal of the cylinder base pin....this is what I was lookin for.....tear down with out havin to yank the ejector rod housing off every time. This is good, no tools needed to get the cylinder and base pin out for cleaning and maintenance.
A little better view of where its at right now....
And a slight back and outward cam on the ejector rod, cylinder base pin slides out and between and off the gun, release the ejector rod and drop out the cylinder!
And finally, the first test.....it lifts the cases just enough to get to em and pluck em out. We'll see how it does with fired cases, these are resized but coming out of a filthy dirty cylinder with no troubles. The function of the rod is pretty good, could be smoothed up a bit. Sharp edges in the ejector rod slot need rounded and smoothed and I gotta dig into the spring pack to see if I have a stiffer spring with less coils.....if so, I might be able to get 1/8 to 3/16" more ejection with out spring stack. Like I said, some smoothing and tweakin to do....but, bluin this dude sooooooonnnnn. Slow rust blue I think....ol time finish for an old timey gun.
And a slight back and outward cam on the ejector rod, cylinder base pin slides out and between and off the gun, release the ejector rod and drop out the cylinder!
And finally, the first test.....it lifts the cases just enough to get to em and pluck em out. We'll see how it does with fired cases, these are resized but coming out of a filthy dirty cylinder with no troubles. The function of the rod is pretty good, could be smoothed up a bit. Sharp edges in the ejector rod slot need rounded and smoothed and I gotta dig into the spring pack to see if I have a stiffer spring with less coils.....if so, I might be able to get 1/8 to 3/16" more ejection with out spring stack. Like I said, some smoothing and tweakin to do....but, bluin this dude sooooooonnnnn. Slow rust blue I think....ol time finish for an old timey gun.
95%. Time to find the time, place and humidity for final polish and blue.
Tonight I tweaked the ejector system. I don't have suitable spring stock on hand but I'm comfortable with the ruger spring now that its shortened and the cut end is slightly crimped and placed at the head of the ejector rod....this keeps the cut tail from slightly binding in the hole in the back of the ejector rod frame loop when the spring is fully compressed. Full compression gives me plenty of case to pluck out and I am anxious to try it on test fire. Short of finding a spring with fewer coils per inch and not too much spring rate, I think this will be as good as it gets. Its all I can do not to press the new front sight in and head to the range....but all in good time I think.
For now, tryin to get most of the occasional stickeyness out of the assembly. For starters, a final shaping of the once half round rod to a bit smaller in diameter, more triangularish and a 120g polish. And some rounding of the edges of the brass button with a nice polish on the buffing wheel with red rouge for a smooth shine, no more sanding marks. (Note the razor sharp milled slot in the ejector rod housing....I'll be tackelin that next, its also part of the roughness in the system.)
With the thin safe sided file and some 220g paper I worked on the inner and outer cut edges of that slot....beveling off the saw tooth edge. Its about 90% now and the rod and button slides back and forth pretty nicely. Once I break it down for bluing, I'll finish polishing that slot smooth, get the final milling marks off the edges for some better function all around.
And the final increase in smoothness, specially at the bottom of the stroke, was flippin the spring around so the factory flat end (uncut end) was bottomed in the loop of the frame. I slightly crimped the cut end so it would grab onto the ejector rod, up at the full diameter portion just behind the brass button. Its workin pretty slick front to back and then returning front all by itself when it should. I'm pretty happy at this point.
Note the brass button.....the beveled edges are all in. The initial bevels were sanded in with a small drum on the drill press, a kiss and a steady hand to make a slight bevel, sorta like the bevel we put on the outer circumference of the cut off barrel, but by hand and eye, no fancy tools. After that, a cotton wheel at 3000 rpm, some red rouge and a gentle hand to polish out all the tool marks and blend those cut bevels into soft and smooth flowing bends and curves.
Oh yeah, that stud in the barrel with the threaded nut to hold on the ejector rod housing? Just the berries! I like it lots better than a screw that goes in and outta the barrel every time ya take off the rod housing. I recon that stud'll get a droppa loktite to secure it in place for the long haul....even red loktite is fine cause when ya want it out, just heat it to ouch temperature with a soldering iron and it'll unscrew jes dandy but it won't come out till then with either red or blue sauce in the threads.
That's it, Ol Porkums is lookin pretty trim these days. Guess I'll haveta see, if the humidities good, maybe strike and start rust bluing the cylinder and small parts this weekend.
Woo Hoo! Ruger soup comin up!
Tonight I tweaked the ejector system. I don't have suitable spring stock on hand but I'm comfortable with the ruger spring now that its shortened and the cut end is slightly crimped and placed at the head of the ejector rod....this keeps the cut tail from slightly binding in the hole in the back of the ejector rod frame loop when the spring is fully compressed. Full compression gives me plenty of case to pluck out and I am anxious to try it on test fire. Short of finding a spring with fewer coils per inch and not too much spring rate, I think this will be as good as it gets. Its all I can do not to press the new front sight in and head to the range....but all in good time I think.
For now, tryin to get most of the occasional stickeyness out of the assembly. For starters, a final shaping of the once half round rod to a bit smaller in diameter, more triangularish and a 120g polish. And some rounding of the edges of the brass button with a nice polish on the buffing wheel with red rouge for a smooth shine, no more sanding marks. (Note the razor sharp milled slot in the ejector rod housing....I'll be tackelin that next, its also part of the roughness in the system.)
With the thin safe sided file and some 220g paper I worked on the inner and outer cut edges of that slot....beveling off the saw tooth edge. Its about 90% now and the rod and button slides back and forth pretty nicely. Once I break it down for bluing, I'll finish polishing that slot smooth, get the final milling marks off the edges for some better function all around.
And the final increase in smoothness, specially at the bottom of the stroke, was flippin the spring around so the factory flat end (uncut end) was bottomed in the loop of the frame. I slightly crimped the cut end so it would grab onto the ejector rod, up at the full diameter portion just behind the brass button. Its workin pretty slick front to back and then returning front all by itself when it should. I'm pretty happy at this point.
Note the brass button.....the beveled edges are all in. The initial bevels were sanded in with a small drum on the drill press, a kiss and a steady hand to make a slight bevel, sorta like the bevel we put on the outer circumference of the cut off barrel, but by hand and eye, no fancy tools. After that, a cotton wheel at 3000 rpm, some red rouge and a gentle hand to polish out all the tool marks and blend those cut bevels into soft and smooth flowing bends and curves.
Oh yeah, that stud in the barrel with the threaded nut to hold on the ejector rod housing? Just the berries! I like it lots better than a screw that goes in and outta the barrel every time ya take off the rod housing. I recon that stud'll get a droppa loktite to secure it in place for the long haul....even red loktite is fine cause when ya want it out, just heat it to ouch temperature with a soldering iron and it'll unscrew jes dandy but it won't come out till then with either red or blue sauce in the threads.
That's it, Ol Porkums is lookin pretty trim these days. Guess I'll haveta see, if the humidities good, maybe strike and start rust bluing the cylinder and small parts this weekend.
Woo Hoo! Ruger soup comin up!
Experimenting with the try sight....just in case the final brass beaded sight needs to be reshaped before installation.
Factory square shape.
Rounded front for a more traditional sail shape.
S shape to mimic the shape of the left and right sides of the sight.
Factory square shape.
Rounded front for a more traditional sail shape.
S shape to mimic the shape of the left and right sides of the sight.
Dang.............
Seriously sexy!
