etch o matic

Lee,
Email your phone number again and ill give you a call, ill help ya out.

James
 
RJM said:
Al,
How long did this deep etch take? (Looks like I can't avoid spending some money on this!)
Regards,
Ron
Click to expand...

The actual etching, maybe 2-3 minutes, 5 at most. It smokes and crackles and hisses, you can feel it shake....... it's a fairly potent reaction going on. The transformer weighs several pounds.

There is a learning curve in making the stencils...... I made a tall 6ft by 6ft rollaround from a Lowe's kit and have the entire kit and kaboodle laid out in order so's I can set it up where and how I want to work. For instance I'll wheel off into a dark corner to develop my stencils and then out into the light to do the etching. I bought a covered glass Purex cake pan for my developing tray.... some totes for storage, got a cord and some lights cobbled on, files and directions and stencil folders all laid out on top....


But it's handy now.

al
 
alinwa said:
Proper crush-fit fireforming.
Click to expand...


Does that mean every chamber you cut is short of the go gauge by .006"..? I guess I have never heard of setting one up for crush fit...unless it was a wildcat and the parent brass needed to fit tight for the fireforming...can you elaborate.?


Thanks
Eddie in Texas
 
eww1350 said:
Does that mean every chamber you cut is short of the go gauge by .006"..? I guess I have never heard of setting one up for crush fit...unless it was a wildcat and the parent brass needed to fit tight for the fireforming...can you elaborate.?


Thanks
Eddie in Texas
Click to expand...

I set every chambering up for crush fit. And it's a real pita making false shoulders, therefore I chamber short.


Shoulders do not, CANNOT "blow forward"...... ever. "Seating long" doesn't work.......ever.


Just one of the details required for making 1/4moa hunting rigs.




IMO


BTW, This rifle does accept most factory rounds.

al
 
alinwa said:
I set every chambering up for crush fit. And it's a real pita making false shoulders, therefore I chamber short.


Shoulders do not, CANNOT "blow forward"...... ever. "Seating long" doesn't work.......ever.


Just one of the details required for making 1/4moa hunting rigs.

IMO

BTW, This rifle does accept most factory rounds.

al
Click to expand...

But, Al, it (RED above) HAS worked - quite well - for me . . . and for multiple barrels/chamberings, over a 35+ year span, of collecting 'fake wood' in registered BR tournaments. I have come to the conclusion that, "the ONLY absolute is that NOTHING is absolute." ;) RG
 
R.G. Robinett said:
But, Al, it (RED above) HAS worked - quite well - for me . . . and for multiple barrels/chamberings, over a 35+ year span, of collecting 'fake wood' in registered BR tournaments. I have come to the conclusion that, "the ONLY absolute is that NOTHING is absolute." ;) RG
Click to expand...

Yeahh, greasing cases "works" too ;)

And, because you're a careful guy I can state with fair certainty that you've never actually measured up cases fired that way and that you've never actually TESTED to see if seating bullets long makes a difference. If by "works" you mean "seating long will hold the casehead against the boltface" then sooner or later someone else WILL TEST IT and then they too will know that it doesn't work...... I useta' go round and round with Skip Otto on this subject but I'll give The Skipper this, HE DID TEST STUFF! Skip was a great proponent of truing caseheads on the lathe, he wrote articles on the subject. He KNEW the problem.......And he came onto this board and set the whole world straight after he'd actually TESTED it. Skipper was a proud man but I'll give him props, he knew how to apologize when proven wrong. It wasn't about opinions with Skip, it was about truth.

All's you've got to do is kill some primers and drop the hammer on some long-seated bullets and you can just relax. Seat however you want....

And still win just as much wood. :)

BTW Harold Vaughn never won ANY wood, but it doesn't invalidate his work.

al
 
At risk of de-railing the topic, as usual, I arrived late, to the party - I don't know WHAT you're measuring . . . but, what I mean, by "works" is this: I have NEVER experienced a case-head separation; generally, my competition barrels a worn to death using 25-30 cases; my brass does not become excessively tight (see last line). Oh, and the barrels shoot well enough to garner a enough hardware to keep me trying. ;) So, what's wrong with that ? My own BTW would run along the lines of, "I can't help it if I'm a red-neck," and my experience does not invalidate my "work" either . . .:p got to end with my favorite cliche': there's always more than one way . . . RG
 
Last edited:
Well, Skip was obsessed with vibration. Skip Otto was ringing barrels, setting pennies on barrels, hanging cups of water on barrels, quantifying deflection and oscillation of fluted VS non-fluted barrels and finding "nodes" while most people were just talking about it.

And Skip measured stuff, skip looked for WHY.

Bolt Slap

Barrel Droop

Joint Flexure

Case Slop

Side Flex

Skip was of the opinion that vibration had to be consistent. And since there are many sources of bad vibrations, CASE FIT being a biggie, and controllable, then it stands to reason that it should be controlled.


And I agree, I think proper casefit is the missing link, the single biggest problem in the accuracy world today. Guns are better than ever, Barrels are better than ever (well, in most people's opinion :) ) BULLETS are definitely better than ever....... but how one makes cases is in many cases unchanged.


Skip measured casehead runout. One of the things he was adamant about was that the casehead had to be parallel to the boltface so he turned caseheads. He "trued" caseheads....He built fixtures to measure and remedy casehead runout. And he wrote about it. So one day I asked him "why don't you just eliminate the source of runout and make your cases square from the git-go?" "Jim Borden showed me how to do it, has been doing it on his PPC's for years...... so why make work?"


Ka-BOOOM!!!!!


This was back when we could actually argue here on the board..... "pre-liberal" as it were......and The Skipper had OPINIONS!!! And was not afraid to VOICE THEM!!! (I'll probably get in trouble here for YELLING, it might make some residents UNCOMFORTABLE!...)




wahhhhhh




And The Skipper used testing to form his opinions.


Long story short, I think Jim is a bright man. If he thinks it's important, I believe him. It gave my argument enough weight that Skip tried it. And Skip Otto became a believer. And I'm a believer to this day. Crush-fit fireforming is a big deal TO ME.


And to maybe a few others :)


So, that's my opinion.


That's why I do it.


They say "time will tell." Well, in my short association with accuracy, "time has told" as the records have been crushed countless times in the last ten yrs. I remember pre-ordering Brennan's "Precision Shooting At 1000 Yards" and when the book hit the presses it was already out of date! The guns and techniques that the book relied on were no longer cutting edge and the little 6MM's were coming on.....


Then I built a .243AI........ and it was HOPELESS.



And then the 6BR and the bastardization of the "Dasher" into a 6MM and the development of 30 cal bullets that re-set the paradigm, and the 30BR starting a whole new class of shooting and, and, and.......now we're at a place where a setup from ten yrs ago won't even PLACE in any discipline..... and a clean, tight setup is more important than ever.......


So I believe in square ammo.



I use YOUR BULLETS Randy to show people this :) I've got 7 different 30cal setups based on the "308 base-case" and 7 different ways to make cases ranging from shortened 308's and to 300Sav to 30X47L to 30BR and it's dead easy to illustrate the importance of straight brass.


For me.


Yes, I actually do make cases of different fittages, I actually DO make cases different ways, fireform different ways and TEST IT.


And it is MY OPINION that brass fit is a Big Deal.

opinionby



al







Ohhhh, and back to the days of Brennan's "Precision Reloading" there has been talk of setups where "the best groups occur while fireforming".......... Not from you Randy, I'm talking in general. The subject gets bandied about. I've seen articles in Precision Shooting, posts here on this board and I gotta' say,


Dude!



If your best groups occur while fireforming YOU'VE GOT A PROBLEM!!!



And it's probably crooked brass.
 
alinwa said:
Well, Skip was obsessed with vibration. Skip Otto was ringing barrels, setting pennies on barrels, hanging cups of water on barrels, quantifying deflection and oscillation of fluted VS non-fluted barrels and finding "nodes" while most people were just talking about it.

And Skip measured stuff, skip looked for WHY.

Bolt Slap

Barrel Droop

Joint Flexure

Case Slop

Side Flex

Skip was of the opinion that vibration had to be consistent. And since there are many sources of bad vibrations, CASE FIT being a biggie, and controllable, then it stands to reason that it should be controlled.


And I agree, I think proper casefit is the missing link, the single biggest problem in the accuracy world today. Guns are better than ever, Barrels are better than ever (well, in most people's opinion :) ) BULLETS are definitely better than ever....... but how one makes cases is in many cases unchanged.


Skip measured casehead runout. One of the things he was adamant about was that the casehead had to be parallel to the boltface so he turned caseheads. He "trued" caseheads....He built fixtures to measure and remedy casehead runout. And he wrote about it. So one day I asked him "why don't you just eliminate the source of runout and make your cases square from the git-go?" "Jim Borden showed me how to do it, has been doing it on his PPC's for years...... so why make work?"


Ka-BOOOM!!!!!


This was back when we could actually argue here on the board..... "pre-liberal" as it were......and The Skipper had OPINIONS!!! And was not afraid to VOICE THEM!!! (I'll probably get in trouble here for YELLING, it might make some residents UNCOMFORTABLE!...)




wahhhhhh




And The Skipper used testing to form his opinions.


Long story short, I think Jim is a bright man. If he thinks it's important, I believe him. It gave my argument enough weight that Skip tried it. And Skip Otto became a believer. And I'm a believer to this day. Crush-fit fireforming is a big deal TO ME.


And to maybe a few others :)


So, that's my opinion.


That's why I do it.


They say "time will tell." Well, in my short association with accuracy, "time has told" as the records have been crushed countless times in the last ten yrs. I remember pre-ordering Brennan's "Precision Shooting At 1000 Yards" and when the book hit the presses it was already out of date! The guns and techniques that the book relied on were no longer cutting edge and the little 6MM's were coming on.....


Then I built a .243AI........ and it was HOPELESS.



And then the 6BR and the bastardization of the "Dasher" into a 6MM and the development of 30 cal bullets that re-set the paradigm, and the 30BR starting a whole new class of shooting and, and, and.......now we're at a place where a setup from ten yrs ago won't even PLACE in any discipline..... and a clean, tight setup is more important than ever.......


So I believe in square ammo.



I use YOUR BULLETS Randy to show people this :) I've got 7 different 30cal setups based on the "308 base-case" and 7 different ways to make cases ranging from shortened 308's and to 300Sav to 30X47L to 30BR and it's dead easy to illustrate the importance of straight brass.


For me.


Yes, I actually do make cases of different fittages, I actually DO make cases different ways, fireform different ways and TEST IT.


And it is MY OPINION that brass fit is a Big Deal.

opinionby



al







Ohhhh, and back to the days of Brennan's "Precision Reloading" there has been talk of setups where "the best groups occur while fireforming".......... Not from you Randy, I'm talking in general. The subject gets bandied about. I've seen articles in Precision Shooting, posts here on this board and I gotta' say,


Dude!



If your best groups occur while fireforming YOU'VE GOT A PROBLEM!!!



And it's probably crooked brass.
Click to expand...

Now, Al, I NEVER said anything disagreeing with straight vs. crooked brass - just there are are many ways to get it . . . I agree; one cannot hope to consistently collect trash without it.:p

Oh, and yes, I used to measure the stuff, and turn the heads, however, for me, and probably many others, fire-forming seems to do the trick. Square is square. One thing about BR - if one wants to win, one must figure out how to , "make things work" - on the target!

I gave up on "squaring" (turning) case-heads way back in the late '80s, along with a few other steps, which did not measurably improve the Agging capabilities of various barrels. As draconian as my methods may be, my loaded ammo usually impresses people who want to, for comparison, "spin" a few rounds.:D Even via my antiquated methods (in which, base upon testing, I firmly believe), fire-forming produces 'square' cases. So, what's the beef?;) RG
 
Well since this has gotten way off the marking barrels issue onto brass forming, and this minus .006", I'm shaking the old noggin here. First, how does one make a Dasher case without blowing a shoulder forward? I've never owned a Dasher,but do own a 30 case that is .075" forward, not the .100" forward. So does several other people. A false shoulder always worked for me, same with a hard jamb.

And of you short chamber a "normal" round by .006", a sizing die will never work. Wildcats not included here.
 
OK, I wrecked it . . .

Back to the ETch-O-Matic - that's why I tuned in anyway - wanted to see/hear some first-hand experiences.:) RG
 
As an FYI Al,

R.G. Robinett said:
Back to the ETch-O-Matic - that's why I tuned in anyway - wanted to see/hear some first-hand experiences.:) RG
Click to expand...

You might want to think about what Randy has said so far. He does have a couple of Nationals wins and more than just a few big match wins to back up his philosophy. And, BTW, well over 30+ years of competition as well.

Just an FYI

David
 
Well, as usual Francis has it right...... that is exactly what happens :)

So, short and sweet, Randy that's my beef :)

Caseheads don't stretch back flat. Sure, they do come back..... and sure, some folks who've checked them find out they don't come back flat...... and then they grease the cases (yeahhh, Ratigan won a plaque once too)

Y'all can argue all you want. You're not arguing with ME, you're arguing with Borden. Jim also DOESN'T STAMP BARRELS and y'all can tell him he's crazy all you want,


Me, I'll lissen....



And actually test stuff. As I said, I HAVE and can today again, or tomorrow fireform cases all three ways in a wide variety of chambers. And I've tested this on all lengths of cases.....believe you me you can get away with MURDER using 220R/BR cases...... but IF YOU MEASURE you will see the difference. If your measure is "winning wood" then that's OK too. And you luck into a gun and barrel that rings like a tuning fork you can throw brass at it and feed it oatmeal and it'll push good bullets into the same hole ;)


But dude asked my why I did what I did.


I do it to count less on luck.


al
 
Back to the etch-o-matic,

Al,
Can you deep etch with DC, and then blacken the etch with AC? I'd imagine it would look nice on stainless.

Regards,
Ron
 
RJM said:
Back to the etch-o-matic,

Al,
Can you deep etch with DC, and then blacken the etch with AC? I'd imagine it would look nice on stainless.

Regards,
Ron
Click to expand...


Yes, that's how my etches in the pictures was done.

al
 
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