A Dance With Dragons Part II
Here’s the part II of my dance with the Dragon. I built a second prototype and continued my testing. As you can see, there’s one important change in the design, it now has two gas ports instead of four – more on that later. My first test was with my standard 200gr Brazos bullet over […]
A Dance With Dragons Part I
Ever since I learned about the Ed Masaki Dragon gun, I was sort of obsessed with it. I was lucky enough to buy one, but some questions still remained unanswered – why is it not available anymore? Why no one else tries to make one? And can I be the one? After a years of […]
Turning Tugnsten Tuesday
It is Tuesday and I’m back in my shop, turning tungsten….wait, what? I recently upgraded my .22 pistol to the famous Pardini SP22. The gun is absolutely fantastic, the trigger, balance, feel and accuracy is superb, no wonder pretty much all Olympic shooters choose it. However, there’s still room for improvement and this time it […]
Z-Axis Power Lift
I think in every machinist’s life there is a moment when hand-cranking that z-axis table or head becomes almost unbearable pain in the rear. In my case it was when I had to make a part with a lot of holes of different sizes. It went something like this: Indicated the part. Cranked the head […]
The Rite of Springs
Bullseye shooters often develop their own loads and tune their gun to the load they like the most. Which for the most part means finding a proper recoil spring that allows the gun to cycle reliably. Unfortunately there’s no exact formula that would help calculate the spring rate, one pretty much has to try different […]
Black and Gold
I wish all jobs always went according to the original planning, but, as we all know, it’s never happening. This one was a classic example. It came to my shop in a pretty rough shape, the parts were unfinished, the dust cover had multiple holes drilled and tapped for previous scope mount installations and the […]
Low Voltage Rock’n’Roll
A customer needed a scope mount for his Bullseye gun. It’s not a particularly difficult part to make, I’ve done it before many times but I always just spray painted the parts with Cerakote or even a regular Rust-Oleum matte black paint. This time, however, I decided to go big or go home and instead […]
Twins for Bowling Pins
It was a long and tedious build. I hate to admit it but I’ve never fitted a compensator on a 1911 before. So while there wasn’t anything special about it, it still took a bit of time for preparations and studies. Other than that, these are, well, just a pair of 1911s that a friend […]
What’s In The Box?
Bullseye shooters know how hard is to find a range box in a decent shape. There were several companies and people making those boxes back in a day, such as Pachmayr, Gun-Ho, Greg Walloch, etc. Unfortunately, the new boxes are not made anymore, and the used ones fetch a hefty premium on eBay and other […]
Winchester ’73
This is the story of the Winchester Rifle Model 1873, “The gun that won the West.” To cowman, outlaw, peace officer or soldier, the Winchester ’73 was a treasured possession. An Indian would sell his soul to own one… Boy, oh boy, a Winchester ’73! What I’d give to have that gun. One of 1000? […]