User Panel
Land of the once free & the home of the narrative.
AL, USA
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I think your idea on the aluminum insert may be what it takes. I was going to suggest shock but you tried that.
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"Whoever makes himself great will be made humble. Whoever makes himself humble will be made great." -Jesus
"if it can be destroyed by the truth, it deserves to be destroyed by the truth" - Linus from Charlie Brown |
You try any heat? A lot of factory barrels are like that as in 700s and people sometimes use heat to loosen the grip. Never did it myself but do some research and see what is said about adding heat.
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I've thought about heat, as I've used it plenty of times on stuck nuts, etc. But the amount of heat that's been required on some nuts is a LOT - like red hot or nearly so. And of course applying that heat isn't scientific, so it might be easy to apply a bit too much. I'm afraid that applying that much heat to a receiver will no doubt screw up the bluing and probably the metalurgy, too.
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People do it so why I said take a look at how and how much so you don't do any damage.
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You do NOT need to get something cherry red to remove it. A stuck nut is literally frozen in-place and should be completely different than the precision thread engagement of a receiver and barrel.
I wouldn't hesitate to put heat to that receiver. Not talking OA, but just a propane or Mapp flame. You can, conversely, hit the outside of the barrel, right near the receiver threads, with an inverted bottle of canned air (right after heating the receiver). This should "shrink" the barrel right after you "enlarged" the receiver. |
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Not up on Howa, but are you sure they didn't use a left hand thread?
Otherwise, heat to 300°f, or so, then douse with Liquid Wrench. When it has cooled down, repeat. After about half a dozen times, put your BAW (big ass wrench) on it. The cooling effect of the Liquid Wrench will draw it into the threads, and eventually break the friction/rust/scale, etc.. I've taken apart giant hydraulic cylinders, that were last serviced decades before, and had sat out in the weather, or underground. Other shops said it was impossible, the cylinders weren't serviceable, and would need to be replaced. I had them apart in less than an hour... |
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Originally Posted By User55645: You do NOT need to get something cherry red to remove it. A stuck nut is literally frozen in-place and should be completely different than the precision thread engagement of a receiver and barrel. I wouldn't hesitate to put heat to that receiver. Not talking OA, but just a propane or Mapp flame. You can, conversely, hit the outside of the barrel, right near the receiver threads, with an inverted bottle of canned air (right after heating the receiver). This should "shrink" the barrel right after you "enlarged" the receiver. View Quote |
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Originally Posted By Cressida: Not up on Howa, but are you sure they didn't use a left hand thread? Otherwise, heat to 300 f, or so, then douse with Liquid Wrench. When it has cooled down, repeat. After about half a dozen times, put your BAW (big ass wrench) on it. The cooling effect of the Liquid Wrench will draw it into the threads, and eventually break the friction/rust/scale, etc.. I've taken apart giant hydraulic cylinders, that were last serviced decades before, and had sat out in the weather, or underground. Other shops said it was impossible, the cylinders weren't serviceable, and would need to be replaced. I had them apart in less than an hour... View Quote |
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heat it up
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I'm very reluctantly giving up on it, and having the guy come get his rifle tomorrow. I tried all the above solutions. Repeated heating and Liquid Wrench. I put yet another shim in between the wood sleeve and the barrel vise, to crush that sleeve even tighter. The sleeve is a perfect fit, for max friction. Lots of rosin. Over 100 ft-lb on each of the 4 vise bolts. Soaked in PB Blaster for a couple days. More heating. I can look through the forward-most scope base mount hole and the bottom forward stock mount bolt hole and clearly see the threads. No rust, no damage, no apparent locking compound. I'd also soaked the threads for days from those 2 holes, too.
I get that barrel incredibly tight in the vise and nothing moves. When I finally apply absolutely huge forces, the only thing that moves is the barrel rotating in the vise sleeves. It's been very frustrating, and I really hate to admit defeat, but at this point I'm just doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. I simply cannot get that barrel vise any tighter, and this barrel/receiver has already withstood probably some 1200-1500 foot-pounds of torque/impact. I've taken barrels off WWII military rifles - super easy compared to this. |
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I froze the barrelled action overnight and tried heat yet one more time. No go.
I've watched some online videos of people removing these barrels. It's amazing how easily they come off. One guy was using a Brownells 4-bolt vise and wasn't even using all 4 bolts to clamp the barrel. Another was using a Wheeler vise that is less than half as wide (and thus gripping surface) as the Brownells vise. Popped right off easily. I have 2 possible options - one is to put the barrel in the pipe jaws of a very large bench vise I have. That MAY grip it tight enough, although of course even attempting it will completely destroy the barrel. I can also try chucking the barrel up in the lathe and use a cutoff bit to cut the barrel shoulder away from the action, supposedly thus relieving any pressure. My lathe is tied up right now so that would have to wait until the present job is done. This SHOULD theoretically work and would be less completely destructive of the barrel. Of course, the Browells vise also "should theoretically" work for even the tightest barrel, but it isn't enough for this application. The ironic thing about this is the guy is removing a perfectly good .223 barrel to install a McGowen 5.56mm barrel. He's coming over later, and I guess we'll decide then what to do next. |
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Land of the once free & the home of the narrative.
AL, USA
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Glad you got it.
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"Whoever makes himself great will be made humble. Whoever makes himself humble will be made great." -Jesus
"if it can be destroyed by the truth, it deserves to be destroyed by the truth" - Linus from Charlie Brown |
I would have put it in the freezer for a few hours then use a hair drier on the receiver.
The barrel would have recooled while the receiver stayed hot. Barrel can't be reused probably |
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I'm glad you got it off. For what it's worth, I think your aluminum blocks would have done the trick. I had a M1A barrel that wouldn't budge until I had about 6 feet of breaker bar on it. The aluminum blocks I was using held it tight, but it was slipping in the wood blocks.
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Potentate plenipotentiary sans portfolio
USA
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Wood barrel inserts suck. Mine are aluminum and shim with copper or lead if needed.
On terribly tight Mauser barrels, if I don't care about the barrel, I put the action wrench in the vise and use a pipe wrench on the barrel. If using heat, I don't remove the action wrench, I direct the flame at the wrench and let it transfer to the action. |
" If govt parsimony is economic madness, and debt-fuelled govt spending a recipe for riches, why aren't the Greeks bailing out the Germans?"
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Originally Posted By BigBeluga: I would have put it in the freezer for a few hours then use a hair drier on the receiver. The barrel would have recooled while the receiver stayed hot. Barrel can't be reused probably View Quote |
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Originally Posted By jntmjt1: I'm glad you got it off. For what it's worth, I think your aluminum blocks would have done the trick. I had a M1A barrel that wouldn't budge until I had about 6 feet of breaker bar on it. The aluminum blocks I was using held it tight, but it was slipping in the wood blocks. View Quote |
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Originally Posted By UtahShotgunner: Wood barrel inserts suck. Mine are aluminum and shim with copper or lead if needed. On terribly tight Mauser barrels, if I don't care about the barrel, I put the action wrench in the vise and use a pipe wrench on the barrel. If using heat, I don't remove the action wrench, I direct the flame at the wrench and let it transfer to the action. View Quote |
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Howa's are notoriously screwed on tight. I tried every trick in the book for mine and eventually had to do a parting cut to release pressure. Came right off after that
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Glad you got it off. Just a couple of suggestions for future use.
First, immediately after heating, hit it with beeswax. The stuff penetrates better than anything I have ever seen. Worked power plants for years and used this trick successfully many times. Second in my barrel vise I have used a “sleeve” made of emery cloth turned in on itself (folded) so both sides have the abrasive showing. Put this between the barrel and the actual sleeve. If it does spin, it will damage the finish for sure and really doesn’t help the finish even if the barrel doesn’t spin but the gripping power is high. |
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