Rick, if you were a hummingbird, flitting here and there, stopping only momentarily, for sustenance , Mike and I would be sea gulls floating on thermals, effortlessly above the same stretch of beach all day, studying it again and again until every grain of sand and it's location was memorized. I think we have similar goals, but a vastly different approach in attaining them. Get the heat lamps and fan going, cure that paint Rick. We wanna see that Double-Banded Brooke! I bet it will look great!
We cut the first and the second tapers today. Not really exciting stuff, but the third taper, which lies under the applied Trunnion Ring, is only 9/10ths of one degree and we have to remember to leave the taper attachment set up to cut that exact taper, so when we make the Trunnion Ring next, it has exactly the same taper as the Tube so they will mate perfectly. Pics of tapering follow:
Tracy
The stair steps of the roughing cuts and the marked, muzzle cut line.
The taper attachment is set for 7 degrees and the tops of the stair steps are cut off.
More metal is taper turned and a continuous taper is close to appearing.
Bingo! A smooth surface goes all the way to a small segment of a 12" Radius, about 3/8" long, which transitions that nice taper to the face of the second tapered surface. Mike got tired of dialing in all those numbers so he ground a form tool to do this in 4 minutes instead of 40. The only rub is you have to run the lathe at about 25 RPM, it's lowest speed, to avoid chatter in the cut.
This is the second taper, about 5 degs. It has approx. another inch to go to the left, then comes taper number three, the .9 deg. one.
