Bolt Jeweling with 5c Spin-Indexer

[charlesb]

I plan to jewel the bolt soon on a 98 Mauser I am working on. In a discussion forum I read about somebody using a 5c collet spin-indexer to jewel rifle bolts.

I have spin-indexer, and know that it rotates 360 degrees in one degree increments.

Here's the indexer I have, it cost me 29 bucks on sale. ( Click image to enlarge. )



Here's the front of the indexer, with a 5c collet ready to use. - You crank the handle on the back to tighten up the collet, once you have poked something in there.



To get the bolt in the indexer, I used a screw-in heat sink that I bought long ago on eBay, for welding on bolt handles to Mauser bolts.



It screws into the back of the bolt ( after firing pin removal ) like this:



The turned-down section on the end is .625" in diameter, so I chucked up a 5/8" collet in the indexer.

Here it is, ready to be moved over to the milling machine, or a drill-press with a cross-slide.



I am thinking about making a home-made tailstock that will engage the firing pin hole with a bit of polished piano wire, or something like that - but it may not be necessary as the indexer is pretty rigid, once it is bolted down to the mill, and the pressure used in jeweling is very light.

At any rate, this is how I ended up not having to buy or make a bolt jeweling fixture. When I get the new bolt handle finished up and the bolt polished, I'll be in good shape for jeweling it.

I thought maybe some of the other guys here might have a spin-indexer laying around, and need to jewel a bolt.

[charlesb]

I've been asked where I found the spin-indexer on sale for 29 bucks. - It was purchased from ENCO tools, about a year ago.

At that time they were normally 39 dollars.

I just looked the indexer I have up at the ENCO website and ( at this writing ) the same unit is going for around 50 bucks!

The best thing I can recommend is to get on the mailing list with ENCO, Grizzly and MSC for their sale flyers and email alerts. - And have a little cash set back for impulse buys, when they throw a sale.

I only bought three 5c collets for my indexer ( 1/2, 5/8, and 3/4" ) so now I'm keeping an eye out for a good price on a collet set.

The thing is great for making the gas ports in muzzle brakes. I have also used it on the mill to rough-shape a butterknife bolt handle, saving me hours of filing work.

When I did get around to the hand-filing work on the bolt handle, I put the indexer in my bench vise and used it to rotate the work to any angle I needed, while holding it securely.

As far as I am concerned, the indexer paid for itself on that one job, in time savings alone.

It's a lot handier little do-dad than it looks like. I originally bought it as a poor substitute for a dividing head, but I found out that I was being a snot about that, as it is much quicker and easier to use than a dividing head.

You don't have to have a crane to get it up on the milling table either, which can be a real plus for some of us...

http://youtu.be/X8Ow1nlafOg

The indexer will give you rotational accuracy down to one degree, which is all of the accuracy really needed for most gun work.

If I had tried to do all the stuff I have done with the little spin-indexer with a dividing head instead, I'd still be at it.

[charlesb]

I just checked, and now most of these spin indexers are going for around 100 bux!

[Bullseye]

I just looked at the ENCO website and saw one of their 5C spin indexers for $49 (Interstate) but another brand (Phase II) is running $99 each. For jeweling work the less expensive one would likely be acceptable. Also, a long nose live center would probably work well for your bolt jeweling firing pin flashhole tailstock idea - but some of them are not cheap.

R,
Bullseye

[charlesb]

I'm thinking about making a custom tailstock for that indexer, with some vertical adjustment but not much.

When I get around to it, I'll post pics of the setup here.

[Kevin B.]

Charles,

Not the most timely reply but I was looking for a tailstock to use with my spin indexer and ended up buying a second indexer to use as a tailstock. The center height didn't match the first one so I used the spindle stuck into both bodies to determine the difference and then milled the bases to match each other. It turned out very well and you can make a center of any configuration for the tailstock. Shars.com has them for about $49.00.

Regards, Kevin B.