Engraving machine

[Crow99]

I've just bought a used New Hermes engraving machine (Model GM, table top model, diamond drag) in hopes of doing caliber marking on barrels. Could any of you folks who currently use one of these to mark barrels give me some tips on jigging up a barrel or barreled action in the vise? I don't recall seeing any pictures or descriptions of this, although I've seen several say that they do use a similar machine. I've got an idea or two on how this might be done, but I'd like to hear or see what you more experienced folks have come up with.. thanks.

[Zebra13]

Crow,

In the attached picture, you can see the aluminum v-block vise jaws I made for my New Hermes TX. My engraver's jaws have 4 dowel pins that stick up on top, 2 from each jaw. The holes in the tops of the pictured jaws fit over the top of these pins and hold them in place. I got the idea to use the dowel pins to index the jaws from a Butch Lambert posting. I shamelessly copied his idea...

When doing the chambering engraving, I pad the jaws with pieces of leather I have laying around and grab the action. This works on 700's. I haven't tried it on any other actions. When I'm engraving farther down the barrel, I grab the barrel where I will be engraving. The jaws leave me a window of space between them to get the drag tool in there. Because of the taper, you may have to build up the smaller side of the barrel a bit to get things nice and straight.

So far, the jaws and method have worked out perfect for me.

Something else I do is bolt up the barreled action in the stock, laying an 1/8th parallel I have on top of the barrel channel, and scribe a mark with a pencil down the length of the barrel a ways. This mark, which runs parallel with the top line of the stock becomes my "is it square to the world" reference, as well as the lowest point of the engraving, i.e., with the pencil mark left on after engraving, it would look like this:223 Remington. Hopefully, I explained this OK.

Hope it helps,
Justin

[Crow99]

Thanks, Justin.. the jaws on mine will be shallower than those on your TX machine, but I see the principle. I was thinking about making something similar out of Acetal plastic (Delrin)... but I suppose there are a couple of suitable materials that I can try.

[Jkob]

Thanks, Justin.. the jaws on mine will be shallower than those on your TX machine, but I see the principle. I was thinking about making something similar out of Acetal plastic (Delrin)... but I suppose there are a couple of suitable materials that I can try.

I think your machine is like mine. The acetal is a good idea; I made some for mine. I took a piece of acetal, 1 1/4" diameter round and turned it down to fit the bronze bushings in the face of the vise, make two. I then put it in my snap head and milled a 90 vee into the large end. What you have are two opposing "Vee" blocks to clamp your barrel.

[Crow99]

Jkob: thanks for the idea; I have some round acetal material that might work. Would you have a photo of the setup by any chance? So far I'm thinking v-blocks of some sort will be what I need to use.

[Butch Lambert]

crow, both of these guys are friends and very capable gun smiths. They won't lead you wrong.

[Rustystud]

My Pantograph has a mechanical peg board to hold part to be engraved. I made pillars to hold the barrel in alignment with the board.
Nat

[Crow99]

Butch: I agree. And I appreciate the great advice. I've gotten some excellent information from this board in the past, and it is all appreciated. I know that Jkob is an ACGG member, for example. I haven't got the machine yet (tracking says it will arrive early next week) and I'm trying to wrap my mind around just exactly how it will work and how I can mount the work piece. I've got some good ideas now and I guess the next step will be to get up close and hands- on with it and make it work. I look forward to this since I've felt for quite a while that just stamping the barrel isn't up to the quality of the rest of my work, and I'm always looking for ways to do things better.

[Zebra13]

Crow99,

If I'm envisioning Jkob's vise jaw's correctly, wherein the pre-existing hole in the vice jaws is his index point, so to speak, his would probably be a whole lot quicker and easier to make than mine. It seems using his jaws, one could put a little level on the barrel, get er' flat, and tighten it up. Nice.

And your right about the engraving vs. stamping and how it reflects on the quality of your work. People don't see the time and effort that goes into dialing a barrel or so on both ends, but put your name and caliber on it in some cutesie font, and they notice that. And it looks better, to boot.

Justin

[Crow99]

And another thing will be that the muzzle end of the barrel hanging way out beyond the vise will have to be supported somehow too. I don't see any problems there though. I do have a couple of pieces of round acetal material that I could make Jkob's vee blocks from, depending on what my basic vise actually looks like.

From the pic's the seller posted, it does seem that there are two dowel pins on top of each jaw for the various jigs, which would coincide with Zebra 13's mounting method. I'm sure different manufacturers and different models used different jaw mounts over time. so i'll have to see what works with mine. And of course some minor modifications aren't out of the question either. Between these two, I think I'll have a good start.

[Butch Lambert]

If you have a desk top machine anything will hold the barrel on the muzzle end. All of the New Hermes that I have been around have the same dowel pins and are the same center to center. My machine is a free standing one and I have a telescoping stand to hold the muzzle end. A young friend of mine in Canada made an adjustable are that ran from one leg of the stand and he adjusts it to whatever length and size muzzle that he has. My vise is like Zebra!3's.

[tech-shooter]

Faced with the same barrel holding issue, I ended up making a set of Vee jaws for my New Hermes machine as well. There are pictures along with dimension specific descriptive text, and a short write-up on spindle bearing replacement as well at my web site here. Click on a picture to start a slide show for high resolution photos. Hope that this helps!

Cheers,

Chris
www.the-long-family.com

[Butch Lambert]

Chris,
As usual your projects look great.

[Crow99]

Tech-shooter: yeahhhh... that machine looks similar to mine, although mine has no motor and is set up for diamond drag only. When it arrives I'll have to check the vise dimensions. The pics of mine look a little different, but it does have the two pins in each jaw like yours. But they look closer together. Nonetheless, I do think your idea would work on mine, and I do have a piece of 1/2 inch thick acetal too. Many thanks, a very nice writeup on your web site.

[Jkob]

If you email me, I will try to send some pics.

Jkob60@msn.com