I might have mentioned before that I have a buddy who is very good at making things. He is also a collector and shooting enthusiast. Has half a dozen Martini Henrys. You will all know that modern Martini cases are lathe turned, at least all those I’ve seen are. They are usually turned from the solid with a straight hole drilled down the middle for the powder space, ie very thick walls because it is difficult to machine a cavity anything but straight.I have a case made by North Devon Firearm Service that was first machined straight on the outside, or maybe slightly tapered, and the neck formed by reducing in a series of dies, and annealed at every stage. The discolouration of annealing is visible. That makes a case with a full interior volume.My buddy has just done the same. Turned the case in exactly that way and made the dies for reducing the neck. The resulting case is a trifle rough as it is just an experiment at this stage. But it is good enough to shoot, and good enough that the dies just need a bit of smoothing to get them dead right. I have no doubt that with a bit of work he will make cases as good as the NDFS case which is beautifully made.This is the guy that makes such things as 50BP Express ammo by soldering a machined case head to tube body he has reduced to size also in dies he made.As he says, never say die, anything is possible.[Originally posted to SATalkGuns -- Admin]
Lathe turned cases
Posted by on October 13, 2006