flex hone smooth a barrel

NB.nagantsniper

NB.nagantsniper

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i got a brown bess smooth bore with a slightly rough barrel, anyone EVER try using a flex-hone, ( looks like a bunch of small balls on a wire rod, used to fix/smooth cylinders on motors comes in various sizes ) to smooth a shotgun or muzzleloader barrel?
barrel is .75 cal theres flex hones that size...................any info /advise / please reply.
or other fix up ideas most welcomed......and .....steell wool didnt help much.
 
I have used them several times with mediocre results. They are intended more for polishing that for removing any significant amount of material. I would suggest making up a wooden plug with a slot in the middle and mounted on a long shaft. Make the plug about .020" under bore diameter and wrap a piece of abrasive tape around it, held in by the slot and the central shaft. Use lots of cutting oil. For anything more than 1 or 2 thou you will need an adjustable reamer.
those nubble brushes come in 3 grades from fine to coarse and the one I have is a medium, I think.

cheers mooncoon
 
NB.nagantsniper said:
i got a brown bess smooth bore with a slightly rough barrel, anyone EVER try using a flex-hone, ( looks like a bunch of small balls on a wire rod, used to fix/smooth cylinders on motors comes in various sizes ) to smooth a shotgun or muzzleloader barrel?
barrel is .75 cal theres flex hones that size...................any info /advise / please reply.
or other fix up ideas most welcomed......and .....steell wool didnt help much.
Click to expand...
Why don't you make a lap and properly handlap the barrel?

It will be a bit of a pain in the ass to make without access from both ends, and you won't be able to lap to the very bottom of the bore, but you will be able to lap the bore to a very consistent diameter where you can lap.
 
cleaning up a smoothbore

automotive supply, or canadian tire stores sell a wheel brake cylinder hone which is adjustable.
simply make up an extension and chuck it into a variable speed drill,put tape on the extension so it doesn,t bang on the bore and gouge it.
long even strokes with auto trans fluid or cutting oil and dont pause at any one place or you could make a groove. the one you want to get is the three stone model....have fun:D
 
.75 is about as small as a 3 stone hone will go. They definitely will not fit 12 guage (.729) and there are 2 stone hones for that. Even so, it takes a lot of honing to remove much material in my experience

cheers mooncoon
 
mooncoon said:
.75 is about as small as a 3 stone hone will go. They definitely will not fit 12 guage (.729) and there are 2 stone hones for that. Even so, it takes a lot of honing to remove much material in my experience

cheers mooncoon
Click to expand...

I've spent days honing large cylinders at work, starting with the coarsest stones and gradually working up to the fine ones.It does more polishing than removing.
"Slightly rough barrel" not sure what you mean.I've got an original fowler with a rusty bore, I'm going to clean it up with a flapper.Cut a slot in the end of a 1/2" dowel rod, cut some pieces of 600 grit wet and dry and slip them in the slot, oil the barrel and put the other end of the dowel in your drill bit.Insert in the barrel and stroke it fully in and out, nice even strokes.
Cheers nessy.
 
I turn a piece of dowel to about .020" under bore diameter and use approx. 140 grit tape. Obviously a slot like Nessy and the section of dowel mounted on 1/4" rod. Lots of cutting oil. The abrasive wears semi smooth fairly quickly to leave a fairly smooth surface. I feel I need the coarse abrasive initially to abraid the rough surface down somewhere into the ball park of smooth.
Having said all of that, I doubt that I remove much more than .001" of metal even with changing the abrasive several times, but it does improve a rough fowler barrel.

cheers mooncoon
 
thanks when i say rough bore, when you fell the bore with your finger, it is rough to the touch , when shooting it rips up/tears up thick pillow tick patches . its a other wise all restored /replaced parts but an original barrel brown bess so im told .
any more help?
 
Another possibility is to get a 10 gauge bore mop and coat it in lapping compound. Either hand polish or chuck it in a drill and make long even strokes. Be generous on the compound.

You might have to start with 120 grit paper in the dowel first though as lapping compound will polish more than remove material.
 
Sounds more like a candidate for an adjustable reamer but beyond that I think that all bases have been covered. Bottom line is that you probably don't want to remove any more material than is necessary so that you are not cutting patches. You want the muzzle walls to be at least .025" thick

cheers mooncoon
 
I have a sunnen hone with the mandrels for honing shotgun chokes. There's no reason you can't hone a barrel but I'd be hesitant to use a ball hone. You want a rigid type hone so you can maintain some type of control over the amount of material you are removing and keep the bore concentric. If you were closer I'd say bring it over and we could give it a try but NB is a bit of a drive......
 
Tactical, could you show a picture of the devise your speaking of "if possible mind you"
I have a smoothbored percussion 61 springfield I would love to slightly hone.


Cheers!
 
A Sunnen hone is typically a rather large and heavy machine that is about the size of a small milling machine and weighs in at some hundreds of pounds. One that does shotgun chokes sounds like it's more of a desk top size mind you. Either way they are also freakin' expensive in any size. Sadly it's not something you pick up at the local autoparts store.

To the OP. You say you can feel it so it's obviously an issue for at least one finger's worth. You need to put together a bore light and some sort of feeler stick that'll let you feel for roughness further down and inspect the whole length to determine the extent of this damage and how deep it is. If it's just a bit of stubborn surface corrosion a flexhone or a simple brake cylinder hone may well do the job. But if it's something more significant then something more serious may be needed. You say you can feel the roughness so it's obviously present up near the muzzle. Why not try a little patch of something like 400 grit wetordry paper on your finger along with a bit of oil and see if you can smoothen up the last couple of inches. If this works well then a simple brake cylinder hone or flexhone with fine stones will do a nice job. But if the bit of polishing doesn't do the trick then you're looking at something far more serious.

Bottom line is that we're all offering fixes that will deal with the problem as we think we understand it. But it's entirely possible that it's something more serious. All the methods involve removal of metal or the corrosion of metal. Unless a flex or brake hone are only used minimally for cleanup you run the risk of altering the bore diameter. Or if this is patches of corrosion then it could be worse and the bore can end up egg shaped and wandering. None of this is good. If the roughness cleans up with just a few passes of a flex or cylinder hone then well and good. You'd be hard pressed to measure the difference. But if you find you're needing to work an area for 5 or more minutes then it's very likely that bad things are happening in there. Flex hones, cylinder hones sandpaper flappers and pretty much everything else offered in this thread are only intended for conditioning the surface. But used for longer than recomended they will cause the bore to go out of round and to grow out of spec in a haphazard manner. So if you need more than a quick cleanup using a dozen or so passes then you need to stop right there and carefully consider how much effect it had and if it's close to done or has a longer way to go. If it's close to done then finish it off. If you feel that you're going to be working a hone up and down for a pretty long time then it's time to stop and take it to a smith that knows their stuff before you ruin it.
 
The OP says its only slightly rough... It should be mentioned that a smoothbore will work fine without a shiny smooth bore. It realy only needs to be smooth enough for a tightly patched ball to pass without tearing up the patches.
 
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