Recently I cast a pewter fore-end cap for a half-stock rifle. Overall the pour went well but as I was cleaning up the shape with files I exposed a small void about 1/32" diameter. Upon probing with a fine wire I determined it is almost 1/4" deep and parallel to an outside surface. I have "puddled" pewter into small dents and voids on the surface of other forends but never anything this deep. I would rather not open up the entire void with a Dremel tool to fill with melted pewter but I wonder if I might inject some JB Weld into the void to fill it. Anyone out there had experience with pouring/fixing pewter in guns or other situations like this?
Pewter Forend Cap Fix
- Thread starter Ol' Flinter
- Start date
If you have some pewter left over, drill a hole the same size in it and puddle some pewter in it and see how it turns out. If it turns out do it to your cap. I once used Cerosafe which has a lower melting temp to repair a damage nose cap. Turned out great.
Either open it and fill it, or drill it and drive a 'rivet' of pewter into the hole and blend it to match, then finish it.
Anything else is going to show pretty well, I think.
Is looking at a half-arsed job forever going to bother you more or less than the work it will take to patch this up properly?
Cheers
Trev
Anything else is going to show pretty well, I think.
Is looking at a half-arsed job forever going to bother you more or less than the work it will take to patch this up properly?
Cheers
Trev
I have lots of pewter left over so have options. I like the "Rivet" idea because no heat is involved but I think I will pour a surrogate lump then drill a hole as MC suggested and practice filling the cavity with a soldering gun as suggested in some on-line research I did last night. I would have a lot better control of the heat with the soldering gun than with a propane torch.
Will report results shortly. Thanks.
Will report results shortly. Thanks.
X2 I should have mentioned that too.
Death and Resurrection all in one day!
So I sucked up my nerve and set out to fix the void in my pewter forend cap. I have a hobby size soldering iron and a small torch so thought I was well equipped. Also I poured a few thin strips of pewter to use as filler for the cavity. Started out by "warming up" the cap as suggested by Mooncoon and MC but must have gone just a bit too hot because all of a sudden about 1/8" sloughed off the end - just like a iceberg calving off the face of a glacier. Bad news.... except that I still had enough cap to work with so simply reshaped about 90% of the damaged area with files. Put the torch away and by now the soldering iron was hot enough - pewter having a lower melting point than solder made this the way to go. Using the soldering iron I was able to build up the damaged area slightly oversize without much trouble at all. Once it cooled I filed the surface to match surroundings and it all came out fine.
Moral of the story is I didn't need much heat - just controlled heat over a very small area to patch up that pewter flaw - the soldering iron worked perfectly for this repair and there was no need to warm up the whole fore-end cap.
So I sucked up my nerve and set out to fix the void in my pewter forend cap. I have a hobby size soldering iron and a small torch so thought I was well equipped. Also I poured a few thin strips of pewter to use as filler for the cavity. Started out by "warming up" the cap as suggested by Mooncoon and MC but must have gone just a bit too hot because all of a sudden about 1/8" sloughed off the end - just like a iceberg calving off the face of a glacier. Bad news.... except that I still had enough cap to work with so simply reshaped about 90% of the damaged area with files. Put the torch away and by now the soldering iron was hot enough - pewter having a lower melting point than solder made this the way to go. Using the soldering iron I was able to build up the damaged area slightly oversize without much trouble at all. Once it cooled I filed the surface to match surroundings and it all came out fine.
Moral of the story is I didn't need much heat - just controlled heat over a very small area to patch up that pewter flaw - the soldering iron worked perfectly for this repair and there was no need to warm up the whole fore-end cap.
