I Built my first M14 (LRB M25, actually) Tonight!! **Rane Report Added!!**

Got the operating rod guide installed and aligned, fit the operating rod and installed the gas system. No shims required, gas lock timed just right!



Here's the bubble level I used for final timing. The front sight was leveled dead nuts on and this is how the bubble looked when it was on the rear sight timing gauge. There's no spec on Starrett's website for this model, but the next level up from that indicates that each hash mark is 80 to 90 seconds. Let's just guess that these divisions are half as sensitive, meaning that each hash mark is 200 seconds. I'm only a half a hash mark out, so that could put me at 100 seconds past TDC.

There are 3600 seconds in a degree, so that should put me at approximately 0.02˚. NM spec is under 0.087˚.



WMMW 5/R barrel compared to a Criterion SACO Lowel reproduction medium weight NM barrel...





I still haven't reamed the chamber yet. Hopefully that will happen tonight.

Tony.
 
I was all set to get my chamber reamed today and to get my rifle shooting by this weekend. Ain't gonna happen!!

I've never reamed a chamber before so please forgive me, but I started reaming last night but I noticed that I was only getting shavings on one flute of my reamer and it was right at the shoulder. I had a few in the neck and throat but none in the body and only one spot on the shoulder.

I Skyped 82nd today and he watched me ream my chamber. I showed him the reaming pattern I was seeing. After a lot of speculation and discussion, we eventually came to an agreement that something was wrong with the reamer.

I called Art Luppino and he had not heard of this happening but threw out some suggestions on how to check my chamber. I also called PTG and told them what was happening. They told me to inspect the flutes with an opti-visor or magnifying glass. I didn't have any of those, but I do have good eyesight.

After cleaning the reamer and looking at it for about an hour, I noticed that if I hit one of the shoulder areas with light at a certain angle, it glowed differently than the others. After looking more and more, I can now see that one of the flutes was not fully machined and it left a higher cutting edge than the other five flutes.

I'm going to call PTG and see if they can repair my reamer. My chamber headspaces at 1.6305" right now, so I have a few thousandths to go. I'll target 1.633" to 1.634"

You can see the reflection on the right hand side of the reamer along the whole shoulder...


Here's another view of the same flute...


The rest of the flutes look like this one. Notice how the shoulder cutting edge doesn't glow like the other pictures...


After further observance, I can see how the machine that made that cut stopped just short of making a proper cutting edge, leaving a burr along the whole leading edge of the shoulder cut.

Tony.
 
You're welcome! I talked to PTG today and they have a 6 week back log time. I'm going to look at this with my machinist after work and see if we can just file that edge down and that will leave me with five shoulder cutting flutes instead of six. I don't think I can wait 6 weeks. I want it done by Saturday.

Tony.
 
We chucked the reamer in a lathe and measured the flutes with a dial indicator. The burr was 0.002" higher than the rest of the flutes. I stoned it down with a fine stone and took another one down just a hair. All flutes were within 0.001". I just finished reaming the chamber and it's sitting at 1.6325". I'm going to test fire it on Saturday and see how she shoots. My target was 1.633" so I'll see what it measures after running some rounds through it.

I also took an initial TE/MW reading and TE was -1, MW was 0.

Thanks for the encouragement, folks! It is appreciated. I'll get the rifle put together tomorrow and post some pics.
Tony.
 
I got her all put together and ready for the range and a barrel break-in. I wanted to just drop it in my kevlar stock but it just would not fit. I have bed my receiver into that stock. The stock is bedded for my standard LRB from 2008.

I threw it into the cheap $12 Numrich GI fiberglass stock I got many years ago and it will have to do for now. I had to clear some room around the front of the stock where the barrel was touching. I am pretty sure the gas cylinder is touching on the bottom, but I don't have time to check that.











Tony.
 
Pure awesomeness. Love the rattle can paint job on the new barrel. :)

I miss those days of the $16 USGI glass stocks from Numrich!

Cheers and keep on helping them nooobs around here! :wave:
Barney
 
Hungry said:
Pure awesomeness. Love the rattle can paint job on the new barrel. :)

I miss those days of the $16 USGI glass stocks from Numrich!

Cheers and keep on helping them nooobs around here! :wave:
Barney
Click to expand...

Thanks! What do you mean by rattle can job on the barrel? Did you mean the stock? The finish on the barrel is a bead-blasted finish, so that's the barrel's natural color. It's a dull gray but gives the appearance that it has been painted. After I have some fun with it, the whole thing will be sent to Jon Wolfe to get a salt-bath nitride treatment (melonite) which will cause the color to turn black.

Tony.
 
1-trident-1 said:
that is one sweet scope mount. tell us more!
Click to expand...

Okay, it's not a scope mount, it's an LRB M25 receiver. The receiver itself has dovetail cuts on top of the receiver and comes with a scope rail that bolts directly into the receiver. Notice that the receiver is missing the side mounted scope hole on the left and has no vertical and horizontal cuts for side-mounted scope rails...

Click on the picture to enlarge it and zoom in on the scope section of the receiver or check out the last picture in post number 1 to see a better view of the receiver.

Tony.
 
It is most pleasing to see someone build a very high quality rifle without talking any short cuts.


BRAVO!
 
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