Friction welding. Yeah, that's the way Grant's post "read" to me the first
2 times I read it. What with all the talk of high speed, less than very
careful reading would lead to the assumption he was friction welding, at
least to me, anyway.

Bob Swinney
"Lew Hartswick" wrote in message
ink.net...
Grant Erwin wrote:
A buddy is making the Parrot field rifle from the 1982 HSM plans. He
asked me to make him the part which has a capstan-type bolt head which
has 4 1/8" rods radially arranged with 1/4" balls on the end. He had
thought he could bead 1/8" welding rod with a gas flame and get a nice
ball, but he failed. I just couldn't imagine turning a ball on a 1/8"
shank without it bending, so I thought for awhile, then took a 1/4" ball
bearing and some old copper-clad 1/8" welding rod (gas welding) and made
one. This is how I did it.

I put the 3-jaw chuck on the lathe, and chucked a short piece of the 1/8"
rod and spun it at high speed and applied some abrasive cloth to remove
the copper and polish the rod. Then I rechucked it so only about 1/4" was
sticking out, and took a small center drill in the tailstock chuck and
made a light centered spot in the end of the rod, just enough to get some
clearance. Then I took a 1/4" ball end mill and chucked it in the
tailstock chuck and again at high speed fed it into the rod until I had a
nice spherical female end. I took a small smooth file and cleaned the
edges. Then I re-chucked the rod so it stuck out about 1", and chucked a
piece of 1/8" pipe in the tailstock chuck. I used the pipe to center the
ball bearing and press it against the rod. I fluxed it with white flux
and using silver bearing solder (low silver content) soldered the ball to
the rod. Then I backed off the 1/8" pipe and spun the part and polished
it. The ball isn't quite dead centered but it's way close enough, and it
was quick and easy. The low silver content solder matches the color
perfectly and you have to look very closely to see any fillet after
polishing.

GWE
How about friction welding it on???
...lew...