Remmington 11-87

I do a lot of mechanic work, but occasionally I get something different in the shop.  I recently had the opportunity to do a little gun smith work.

A customer brought in an old  Remmington 11-87.  This is a standard gas operated semi auto shotgun.  This one is a little bit more interesting because it is an uncommon left hand model.

The magazine tube is brazed or silver soldered in to the frame.  Some how this connection had come loose.  On this gun the magazine tube holds the whole fore arm together and without it the gun is useless.  The owner had tried to solder it back together with regular lead plumbing type solder but it did not hold.

I took the gun entirely apart and cleaned the mating surfaces up with a small stone in my Dremel tool.  Once it was cleaned and fluxed I fired up my torch and used some silver solder that I normally use for high pressure connections on refrigeration equipment.  It is hard to see in the video, but the metal has to be heated up until it just starts to glow.

The metal was a little discolored from the heat, but you can hardly notice with all the rust on this gun.  The owner was very happy to have it fixed in time for the spring time migration.

Torch Modification

I am still working on the refrigeration job at the local store.  The next step is to install new filter dryers in the suction and evaporator lines.  The dryers are silver soldered or brazed into the line.  To melt the high temp silver solder you need a good torch.

I have a nice "Turbo Torch".  Normally this torch would be run off of a 20 lb propane tank (like you have on a barbecue).  In rural Alaska propane is very expensive due to cost of shipping heavy tanks of flammable gas.  A 100 lb cylinder is about $275 and 20 lb tanks are just not available.   I do have a bunch of smaller 16 oz propane bottles, but they have a different type of fitting.

Today I rummaged around in my box of misc plumbing fittings and rigged up a way to connect the Turbo Torch regulator to a small bottle.  I cut the end off of a cheapo torch, stuck a piece of snowmobile fuel line on the end, ran that line to a hose barb fitting that I screwed into the regulator.  (The red arrow points to the regulator.)  It works fine and it sure beats hauling around a 100 lb tank.