Hi Guys I need your help! Please!.. Ive bought a couple 1:35th scale .30 Cal Machine gun’s and need to drill the centers out for the gun barrel hole… I cant find/get the dead center, and have ruined two extra barrels that came with the two 30 cal M/Gun’s…
How do you drill out your barrels and get the hole dead center? [%-)]
I also have two .50 Cal M/G’s that the barrels need to be drilled out too and I’m worried that I’ll ruin these too…
Please help me if you can…I’m nervous about trying to drill them anymore and need your help…[banghead]
It would be good to start with a pilot hole, made with the tip of a new #11 exacto blade. Practice by stretching a few pieces of sprue and cutting them at the point closest to the diameter of your gun barrels, pilot the ends with the exacto blade and work your way up in size with your drill bits until it looks right to you.
Depending on your barrel style, drill press a 30 cal hole through a block of acrylic or whatever. Without moving the block, change the drill to the outer diameter of the barrel and drill halfway thru the block. Put barrel into the fatter hole and hand-drill the 30 cal hole thru the other end. Flip barrel over and drill from other end if inner drill bit is not long enough. In my case, this was a 0.25mm drill bit (about 30 cal to scale) to insert a 0.25mm fiber optic rod thru the barrel and flash a light to model MG firing.
This is a case of where perception is everything. In order to have the look of a barrel, you need only open up the very end of the barrel. As was suggested, a #11 xacto blade is perfect for this. A small pilot hole as close to center will start you off. THen use a very fine drill bit that is considerably smaller that your intended barrel diameter. It doesn’t have to be deep, just deep enough to provide the illusion of a barrel. You can open it with another larger drill bit or use the xacto tip to carve out your barrel opening. With the xacto blade you can adjust your hollowing operation to cover if its off center. Once painted, the barrel will look as though it is the real thing and you never really had to go all that deep.
If you have a magnifyer on your bench lamp or a set of optivisors it will help alot.
Yep all the above would be acceptable. Just ta. your time and make it as shallow as possible as with the swarf comming off after a deep intrusion you coulb burst it at that scale.
Since most of the kit parts these days are light plastic, I stole FingersEddie’s trick of using a sharpie to mark the end of the barrel, then do the pilot hole trick with the #11 blade. You can carefully just use the blade or if you invest in a pin vise with small enough drill bits (for things like .30 cal barrels or rifle barrels you need stuff that shipbuilders use, #80 size drillbits or similar) you can then drill out the barrel that way. The trick though is to have the barrel solidy secured so it doesn’t shift when you start to drill or use the knife point. If you get yourself a pair of hemastats or locking tweezers, they can help with this problem too.
Whoa…Ive never thought about optic rod for looking like its firing! Super idea!.. I don’t need the light… But love the idea of drilling a hole thru the stock and then a barrel size hole for the barrel to fit in to holding it in tight, then using the smaller sized hole as a guide to the center of the barrel for drilling… I could make two different size holes one for the .30 Cal and one for the .50 Cal too…I do have all the nessary drill bits, and really wouldnt need to use a drill press to do this with… I’m only drilling 1/8" or less into the barrel, just so it looks like the gun barrels hole…I’m not quiet ready for optical lights etc…thank you though for that super idea… [#toast]… Thank you all for your fast responce…I would really like to read any more ideas you all have about this too, they are appreciated and needed so I can use the easiest one to guide my drill bit into the Very Dead center of the gun barrel…I don’t have the stock to drill into to get the two sizes, one for the barrel and one for the hole to be drilled thru, Id need something about a half inch or a little less, huh?!..[%-)]
One thing to note about the opening of a .50cal barrel, note that it only is about 1/3 the diameter of the actual muzzle end. Be sure you look at photos before you open the end up as if it were some sort of flash supressor or something.
or less as you’re only going 1/8". ditto on suggestions to “center-punch” with a knife tip or needlepoint to keep bit wander in check. for one-sy, two-sy, “soft” stock like acrylic/plexi from the scrap bin at Tap Plastics ought to work.
Drilling an MG barrel all boils down to eyeballing it. There is nothing you can use to center the drill but your eyes. But what I do before starting to drill is to sand the barrel front flat and let it stay a little rough so that the drill bit will not slip. I also find it effective to start with a very small bit and gradually enlarge the hole by using a bigger bit. On a good day I can drill a rifle barrel but then everyday is not a good day.