Friday, March 12, 2021

Restoring The Winchester Model 1906

Winchester Model 1906

(click on any image for a larger view) 

The classic lines and easy handling and shooting characteristics of the 1906 make it a classic rifle.  They used to be quite prevalent and inexpensive.  However, over time, they have become scarce and quite pricey, especially if they are in good shape.  So many of them have been left, neglected, in barns, closets, attics, and tractors and have fallen into disrepair.  This John Browning design is a simple, but sturdy action that can take a lot of use, if kept in tune.  The take-down action is especially nice for storage or travel. 

I have always wanted one, but was hesitant to put the budget into one, "because it's just a .22", right? I guess I am more of a sucker for a build project because I spent much more on this, than if I had just saved up and purchased one.  I think the results are worth it, however, because I learned skills and gained tools in process of creating and restoring these beautiful pieces of history.

The Restoration Project


I began my journey when I found a very old and very sad model 1906 for sale. My research showed that the serial number meant that it was made in 1913.  For some reason, I wanted to save and restore this beautiful rifle, even though I didn't exactly know how to do it. The story is that this rifle was stored in the attic of a house in the Southern US. The humidity and years of neglect really made a mess of the metal. It was rusted everywhere. The wood was totally rotten and smelled like the decay of a swamp. I wish I had taken more pictures of this mess, but here are a couple that represent well what it looked like. This is what I had to work with.  Over the next couple year, as time permitted, I worked toward a restoration, one step at a time. 




When it arrived, I immediately started the painstaking process of evaluating what could be salvaged and what would have to be replaced. The stock and foregrip were a total lost, so new wood was needed. Some metal parts could be restored, but others were broken, missing, or too damaged to re-used. I spent hours online searching for the places that sell original and rebuilt parts, so I would know what my options were. 

I began to remove all the rust from the main receiver and carrier and the raw metal looked good. The rust pitting was not too deep. The barrel had deeper pits is some locations, but the original Winchester lettering was intact and legible.   I used a wire wheel and then a buffing wheel to clean and polish the metal parts. 






After all the metal prep, I still had a problem. The barrel was no good. There was no rifling left in the bore, which means it needed to be replaced or re-lined.  I wanted to keep the original barrel, if I could, so I opted to reline it.  This process required a long drill bit from Brownells (#361504000) that has a cutting diameter and a also a guide/pilot that will help the bit follow straight down the old bore and stay centered. There are online videos that show people drilling out barrels to reline them. They key is to go slow, use lots of cutting oil, and clean up the metal chips often.  I was successful in drilling out 2 old .22 barrels for relining.  





Then I inserted the liner (Brownells) into the barrel and secured it. After cure time, I had to cut the extra liner off and then use a tool to resurface the muzzle so it was flat. I also had to carefully shape the breach of the barrel back to its original design.  This all took a lot of time and patience, but I finally had a barrel with fresh, sharp rifling.

After I collected some parts, including some action parts and new wood, I had a lot of unfinished metal, including the barrel.  I have read about the rust-bluing processes of old and was fascinated with how that chemical reaction could be used to create a preserving finish on metal.  I didn't want to actually spend that much time, however, so I decided to try Mark Lee Express Blue #1 (Brownells). This process follows roughly the same steps as rust-bluing, but sped up with modern chemicals. I did a test project with a few pieces and was amazed at how well it worked. The finish was a deep blue that matched the factory finish and looked amazing.  So, I did all the small parts with this process and really liked how it looked.



The barrel was more difficult, since it won't fit in any pot or pan and there is a step that requires submersion in boiling water for 5 minutes.  After some thought, I devised a plan to use a section of sealed aluminum rain gutter and my camp stove.  The process has several steps, so I need to  pre-setup all the "stations" and move from station to station quickly. I decided to use a shaft of carbon from an arrow with a rubber washer smashed onto one side to keep the barrel from sliding off.

Pre-prep: Clean the metal and remove all grease
Step1: Heat metal and apply Express Blue. The rust forms instantly. Apply again a few seconds later.
    I created a stand to hold the barrel and let me spin it freely. 



Step2: Boil in water for 5 minutes.
    I found I had to use foil on the stove to help route the heat up around the tray, otherwise there was too much loss of heat and it wouldn't boil. I also bent some wire and fastened it to the tray so that the barrel would be suspended in water and not touching the bottom.





Step 3: Pull from water and dry off. Immediately take it to the Carding Wheel (Brownells). With this wheel spinning, I ran the metal past it over and over.  This process removed the rust and leaves a nice blue coat on the metal. 


Step 4: Repeat steps 1-3: Each time I repeated the steps, the bluing got darker and more beautiful. On the 5th cycle, the rust barely even showed up when the chemical was applied. This shows that the surface has a proper coating of blue on it and little more can be done, chemically.  

Step 6: I coated the metal with oil (Break-Free CLP) and let it sit overnight. This neutralizes the chemicals and helps to preserve the metal.

I think the results were amazing.






With the metal finish complete, I still had many hours of work, carefully hand fitting the stock to the tang. More on this process later.  I used a new stock and foregrip that were a reproduction of the original shape. The 1906 had a flat "shotgun" style buttstock and foregrip for the pump action.

Assembling and hand-fitting each part also took many happy hours of my time. It was much like building a 1911 from parts.  There are a lot of moving parts that have to be adjusted and tuned to work correctly. The feeding and extracting cycles are especially precise and take some patience. I ruined one part by removing too much metal from the wrong spot because I didn't understand the what it was doing. Luckily it was a small part and I fit the replacement part perfectly. Learning comes from failing as much as from time.  














The project was rewarding in several ways. I learned a lot, grew in my skill set, and felt that I had saved a beautiful piece of history from certain destruction.  I hope it will last and bring joy to the generations that come after.  We need to fight to preserve our history and our rights.


The 1890/1906 Build




While I was preparing to restore the rusted 1906, I came across someone online that was selling a Winchester 1906 receiver set that was made in 1909.  The set had been case hardened with a process called the "Bone Charcoal" method. I loved how it looked, so I decided to build another Winchester on this set. This time, I wanted to make it look like the earlier model 1890, but still have the cartridge support of the model 1906.  The model 1890 had a cartridge carrier that only supported one specific contridge, and available options were 22 short, 22 long, and 22 WRF.  When the model 1906 came along, it was able to support 22 short, long, and long rifle with the same action, which made them more versatile.  So, I wanted that versatility combined with the long, octagonal barrel and crescent buttstock of the 1890. That look is so classic and elegant to me.




With this build, I had to acquire all the rest of the parts, blue most of them, and fit new wood parts. I was very fortunate to have found a new hex barrel. There are not many of those available anymore.  I was prepared to buy a used one, and then bore it out and reline it like the other project, but I had some good luck that saved me that effort.  All the parts had to be hand-fit and tuned until the action worked correctly.  Then, I used the Express Blue #1 process to blue all the parts. The barrel and magazine tube were already blued. I was impressed that the Express blue matched the factory blued parts so nicely. 



        


One of the most difficult things to accomplish was to fit a new wood stock and handguard to this rifle. All the curved surfaces must fit perfectly with their metal counterparts.  There are difficult lines, curves, and angles on both the top and bottom of the receiver tang where the narrow handle mates up. New stocks are always oversized and wood needs to be carefully removed in many places to get a correct fit and feel. 
             
           
In addition, this stock has a crescent shaped buttplate that needed to be fit. I had to acquired a raw forging for the plate and then shape, polish, drill, and finish it to fit.  This took a lot of patience and work.  I used a set of specialized tools for scraping very tiny amounts of wood at a time. This, along with the use of black inletting fluid allowed me to very slowly work with the wood as I fit each part. The figured walnut was beautiful, and when finished, really looked amazing on this rifle.







Here are the finished photos:


















[Project Specific Tools]
  • piloted reaming bit (Brownells) 
  • barrel liner (Brownells)
  • 22lr chamber finish reamer (a finish reamer is all that's needed for doing a few chambers)
  • 22lr headspace go gauge 
  • muzzle facing tool to square the front of the barrel (Brownells)
  • bedding epoxy (like Acro Glass), or Loctite 680
  • barrel clamp and removal tools
    • install breech bolt into receiver (with extractor removed)
    • aluminum blocks around barrel in vise 
    • large flat-jaw crescent wrench, padded with thick leather.
[Info]



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