It followed me home

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

Hmmmm…

 I wonder if DOT would mind me runnin a chain through it an towing it down I-40?

nothing to see here officer!
I’m just totin my battle ship cannon barrel back home! 

I’m pretty sure you’d have to come throw my bail! Lol

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

Could put a heavy bar through it with a chain on each end. Convince the Hwy Patrol you are just helping DOT roll the road bumps out.

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

Lol, yeah I could give that a shot!

It might work if I got pulled over by a rookie,

but I’d be sunk if an old hand pulled me over!

i got a long time friend that’s a highway patrolman, an I’m pretty sure even he wouldn’t let that fly,

I could see him now!
 walkin up to the truck takin one look at my face, recognizing me

an then sayin some very explicit words and not very politely making me get off the highway! bahahaha!

[George N. M.]

Thomas, I am estimating that the piece of gun barrel is about 12" caliber based on the water bottle being about 8" tall.  12" guns were used on US Navy battleships from the 1890s to about 1912.  There was also a class of very large cruisers in late WW2 which were armed with 12" guns.  The US Army also used 12" guns for coastal defense from the late 1880s up through WW2.  This could be from either source.  It could have been from a gun that actually served or from a spare barrel.  Large caliber guns tend to wear out their rifling fairly fast and the military always acquires spare barrels for each weapon.

I would guess this piece is from near the breech because of the thickness of metal comared to the bore.  Have you noticed if there is rifling in the bore?

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

[TWISTEDWILLOW]

George!!!

Don’t you be crowdin in on my barrel now!
i called dibs! Lol

[Frosty]

Weld up a heavy duty log arch on wheels and tires that'll take the weight, rig a hitch and tow it home lengthwise. Magnetic stick on lights will be perfect. Don't forget finders, it's gotta have fenders. Trailer brakes might be a good idea, I suppose it'd sort of push going down hill.

Frosty The Lucky.

[George N. M.]

Billy, I know you are "just funnin'."  Actually, where I'd like to see it end up is at an old coast defense fort which is now a museum, e.g. Fort Worden, WA near Port Townsend, which was armed with 12" guns and mortars but they were all scrapped after WW2.  This would give folk visiting an idea of the size of the guns.

And, yes, it would be a great lawn ornament.  No one else would hve one. ;-)

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

[ThomasPowers]

It would sort of push *anytime* something in front of it tried to slow down! I think that is a 20 oz water bottle.

There is clearly visible rifling in the bore.  I'll try to remember to measure it tomorrow and maybe get a picture of the breech as well.   As I recall NMT got it "cheap" from the Fed as surplus and it took a special rail car to bring it to Socorro. (At current full rate it would be US$10K for a 40 K# piece.  they might give a discount as it's really too big for them to do anything with. If the boss is there I'll ask about that too.)

I know that the scrapyard folks would LOVE to have someone buy either or both of the pieces!

 

[Irondragon Forge ClayWorks]

If I remember right, didn't you post a picture of the breech a while back.

[Purple Bullet]

Didn’t exactly follow me home. But it finally made it’s way to my shop: Precision Matthews PM-728VT milling machine. Woo hoo! This weekend is spoken for. Once I get it put together I get to learn how to use it.

[George N. M.]

I did some swag calculating and assuming that the water bottle is 8" tall I estimate the diameter to be about 30" and I am guessing the piece is about 5' long.  Allowing for a 12" long hole through the middle I calculate it to be a bit more than 20 cubic feet of steel.  At 491 pounds/cubic foot of steel that comes out to a bit north of 10k pounds or 5+ tons.

That would be about $2500 to the scrap yard at .25/lb.  Plus probably thousands of dollars in transportation costs.  But can you put a price tag on uniqueness?

However, if that is a 20 oz water bottle which is taller than my estimate (a 16.9 oz bottle is about 8" tall) this could be a piece of a 14" or even a 16" gun barrel which ups the numbers considerably.

I have seen photos of complete 16" gun barrels being transported on rail cars and truck trailers and it is impressive.

Thomas, have you thought about tailgating it at Quad State?

"By hammer and hand all arts do stand."

[Stash]

Hit a few barn sales Fri AM and got a few odds and ends. Some tools for the metal shop, the wood shop and the resource pile. The highlight for me was the pristine Wood River #5 plane, in its fitted wood box for $40 US. I spent the afternoon turning good wood into piles of shavings.

Steve

[Frosty]

NICE scores, that plane looks like it just came off the store shelf!

Frosty The Lucky.

[Scott NC]

  I like that wrench with the slot in the handle.  I guess I have never seen one like that.

[Frosty]

Me too, thinking of where to put in a sculpture, Scott? I like the curved wrenches, if I had 5 they'd make great spokesl.

Frosty The Lucky.

[Jobtiel1]

I got lucky on the flea market today too. A lot of files, most of the free as the people where happy someone even looked at them, a metal ruler with both metric and imperial on the sides. And a Stanley bailey no 4 and 6 plane. I want to make a wooden chest to fit the cast iron cooking ware, and these are just what I needed to get the basic tooling for woodworking and use those to make more tools I need to make the chest.

~Jobtiel

[Frosty]

Not a bad score, free files are good for the smith. You DO know not to lay good files in contact with each other don't you? Nothing dulls a file like rubbing another file. If you're limited on space then laying them on a towel in the drawer will keep them from touching. Laying another towel over them will form channels so the next layer of files can't touch and so on. The problem with this is having to unload them all to get at the bottom row. It WILL however help keep your files sharp.

Frosty The Lucky.

[Jobtiel1]

Thanks! I know indeed, these are all rusty or dull, and I'll use them as HC stock. I have a file rack on the wall where I keep all of my good files. It's an old photo, I've added a few to the collection.

I already snapped the top off off all the dull ones to check for case hardening.

~Jobtiel

[Alan Evans]

On 5/13/2022 at 4:36 PM, Trevor84 said:

I'm able to have this at hand in my tiny shop and it's indispensable.... Sunlight and water

 

On 5/13/2022 at 4:41 PM, Nodebt said:

  Mix some dishwashing soap in that water helps. We didn't have that luxury in many of the rot holes I found myself working in.    In retrospect, I could have brought my own spritz bottle in but got used to smelling.  Old habits.  I do use bubbly soap water and auditory clues for air leaks tho...  

 

23 hours ago, Trevor84 said:

Oh it's "sunlight" dish soap with enough water that it'll spray. 

Like I say I've got a small shop so it's easy to have it sitting there and since I'm always swapping around burners and forges I just spritz them before I spark up. 

 

Can an oxy leak ignite like propane or acetylene or does it disperse fast enough?

Not wishing to be gloomy but just as heads up…I went on a industrial gas safety course a decade or two ago and learned two things specifically.

1/ That Propane cylinder leaks were the most dangerous and I had always assumed it was the acetylene ones. 
 

2/ You should never use soap and water to test high pressure gas joints. Apparently the soap hydrocarbons can go bang if they happen to be transferred into the pressurised side of the fitting on a subsequent swap around. This includes high pressure shielding gasses like Argon and CO2 mixes as well as Oxygen. 
 

Up until then I had always used soapy water in a squirty bottle. No longer. 
 

Plain water, sniff and listen are much the safest if you do not have the commercial gas leak tester/detector product to hand. The commercial detector fluid is very inexpensive compared to a shop rebuild and it is available from any gas supplier.

Alan

[JHCC]

That's an interesting point about propane leaks being more dangerous. It's easy, perhaps, to assume incorrectly that because acetylene cylinders are more dangerous to handle, that acetylene gas itself is more dangerous when it leaks.

[Stash]

Jobtiel- the Stanley- Bailey 4 and 6 have been real go- to tools in my shop for years. Chances are they need to be properly fettled (tuned up) and you'll be making whisper- thin shavings in no time. If you are interested, you can determine the model type and mfg date/ range- search for 'Stanley- Bailey type identification flow chart'. 

Steve

[Scott NC]

3 hours ago, Alan Evans said:

2/ You should never use soap and water to test high pressure gas joints. Apparently the soap hydrocarbons can go bang if they happen to be transferred into the pressurised side of the fitting on a subsequent swap around. This includes high pressure shielding gasses like Argon and CO2 mixes as well as Oxygen. 

   Alan, this I did not know, I will look into it.  Better safe than sorry for sure.  I always have been sniffer anyway and listening and plain water can work.  Thanks.

6 hours ago, Frosty said:

Me too, thinking of where to put in a sculpture, Scott? 

  Why, absolutely!

[Jobtiel1]

Stash, I'll have a look at the age, thanks for the tip! I have lapped the soles of the planes, put a tiny bit of camber on the irons and sharpened them up. I've used the no4 for a bit but I've never really used planes so I'll have to practice a bit first. 

~Jobtiel

[ThomasPowers]

Scrapyard today, got there early and stayed late as a friend went along, I took out 80#, US$20; he took out 400# US$100---and then had to use my truck for hauling.

I got another tool chest with a few tools, a 3' section of wagon tyre---real wrought iron, some scrap 1/2" sq stock for a friends tent stake project, some fence for my wife, some band saw blade for pattern welded billets, a 4H NM License tag for bird house roof, etc and so on.

He got a old small baggage cart from a small airport, about 10' of mine rail, some telescoping sq tubing from highway work signs, a 2.5" dia truck axle, a plasma cutter cut out, some grating for a gate, etc.

I talked to the son and he said the gun would go probably for 20 USCents a pound and they would help load but would NOT transport! I measured the bore---12" alright. I included a bit of stuff for size comparisons.

 

[Alan Evans]

It was actually the Propane cylinder leaks which were more dangerous than acetylene cylinder leaks as opposed to just propane fittings leaking gas. A teaspoon of the liquid propane expands to many cubic metres before it is combustible so when you do get ignition you have a room filling fireball. 
 

Alan