80% Lower Party? Ideas and help appreciated.

[Socomike]

Curious if anyone in the central Indiana area has the know how and capability to complete an 80% lower? If I bought the lower and brought it by, is there someone with the expertise that could coach me through it?

I have an idea to get 5-8 guys together in a place that has the capability to complete lowers. Maybe BBQ or something while we do it. Make it a all around good time. At the end of the night we all take home our completed lowers to be coated and roll marked at a place of our choosing at a later date.

Anyone have and ideas or can offer any help?

Mike

 

[gunworks321]

I'm interested also. Soon to have four of them and jig for milling.

 

[Covert8645]

I............ I said I wanted to play...................

 

[gregkl]

If (and it's a big if) I get my two lowers and a jig, I will most likely sell them to someone who wants to finish them. I have found a company that will coat the lowers. They have a minimum and you could probably do 3-4 lowers within the minimum charge. I also found a guy to engrave them.

If I decide to keep them and finish them, I would be open to a build party. Ideal would be a manual mill to do the machining. I have a couple bits that could be used.

I don't think it is hard to do, but you could mess it up if you don't take your time and "measure twice, mill once". I have watched YouTube videos that show how to do it wrong as much or more than how to do it right. Machine work is slow with lot's of checks required. Plus you have to get used to removing thousandths of an inch, not 16ths.

 

[SumtnFancy]

I'm not exactly central IN but I would drive to make it happen still.

 

[6mm Shoot]

I was involved in this about two years ago. I was the only one that showed up. It took the guy that was putting on the party two hours to finish milling his and about two hours for me to mill mine.

You are talking eight men that is 16 hours to do the eight and already some people are talking about doing more than one. The problem is I don't know any one that has a mill that wants to bring it to a party.

If you had one wouldn't you want to do yours at home. What is it going to take to get you to pack up your mill and take it to some ones house and let a stranger use it. I mean after all you only have a grand or so in it and what could go wrong carrying around a mill? You see the problem? With eight guys doing one you would need at least two mills and three would be much better.

I took my drill press to the party with a bunch of drill bits and cutting oil. We used it to drill the holes in the sides. The milling is what takes up the time.

I would like to do another one. The first one came out fine. I just felt like I was really putting the guy out that had the mill. I would hate to be the guy that drove two hours and end up not being able to mill my lower after standing around all day to use the mill and if you set up eight men to use one mill that is just what is going to happen to someone.

That is why I haven't gotten a second 80% lower. I wish you all the best with your builds. I would love to be involved, just not with eight guys and one mill. I don't know if there is a place that rents mills or not.

 

[indygunguy]

I should have lowers soon and would love to participate.

 

[flashpuppy]

Ideally, you need to have all the lowers from the same production run. Manually machining them is fine, but tedious. You have to do them in a CNC, and they take about 10min each to finish. Now here's the kicker: I have all the equipment to do this, but I can NOT have a "party" at my commercial shop for all my buddies. Insurance, legalities, etc. See where I'm headed? Good idea, but I don't think it's feasible.

 

[gregkl]

Ideally, you need to have all the lowers from the same production run. Manually machining them is fine, but tedious. You have to do them in a CNC, and they take about 10min each to finish. Now here's the kicker: I have all the equipment to do this, but I can NOT have a "party" at my commercial shop for all my buddies. Insurance, legalities, etc. See where I'm headed? Good idea, but I don't think it's feasible.

This is me also. I have a manual mill, but it is huge. There is no moving it! And it's at work, so even though I could go in on a weekend, I couldn't take anyone else with me.

I definitely see 6mm's point. It really should be done alone. I would rather not have 5 guys looking over my shoulder watching. I would tend to feel rushed to get it done and probably ruin one of my lowers.

However, we could keep tabs on each other and bundle our machined lowers for a deal on engraving and anodizing.

 

[Classic]

This really does sound like a great project. It has been many yeas ago that I had experience on a small Bridgeport mill, (and I really liked running it) but I don't have any real experience at CNC. I'd sure like to finish my own lower though.

 

[Socomike]

I'm not asking anyone to bring a mill. I'm asking to go to someone's mill. Maybe 2-3 people a day for a weekend. Guy hosting the party gets a little cash. Maybe beer? Bottle of bourbon? Pizza? It doesn't have to be a rushed business meeting. It's a learning experience for all and a good time with like minded dudes.

We could create a thread soley for our lowers. Post pictures of the throughout the stages and of the final completed rifle. Sounds fun to me.

 

[nucular]

I might be interested. I have 3 lowers from hlf and a cnc mill in my garage but I haven't bought the jig yet. I was hoping to make one but it was low on the list of projects.

 

[Socomike]

There are jigs in this thread already. Are you pretty confident you have the ability you can do it?

 

[nucular]

Pretty confident, yeah. I have used it to make a ton of stuff. It's not good to .001 but it's good enough for this. I modeled the firing pocket in 3D a while back but have yet to test it out on some scrap.

 

[hornadylnl]

I always like investing thousands in equipment and others expect to use it for free or on the cheap.

 

[Socomike]

I always like making threads and having people make douchbag comments.
I don't EXPECT to use ****. I'm curious if there is someone out there that would LIKE to help out. Go troll somewhere else and **** in someone else's thread for no reason.

We are brainstorming here. We didn't post a price or really even talk about that. People don't buy expensive machinery and then wait for people to come along with small projects. They buy them for work or their own use. This would be for fun and in the name of learning for all.

 

[hornadylnl]

I always like making threads and having people make douchbag comments.
I don't EXPECT to use ****. I'm curious if there is someone out there that would LIKE to help out. Go troll somewhere else and **** in someone else's thread for no reason.

We are brainstorming here. We didn't post a price or really even talk about that. People don't buy expensive machinery and then wait for people to come along with small projects. They buy them for work or their own use. This would be for fun and in the name of learning for all.

So buy the tooling and host it.

 

[gregkl]

There are jigs in this thread already. Are you pretty confident you have the ability you can do it?

Are the jigs pretty universal? If I get mine and the lowers from a crowd fund I did could it be used on lowers other than mine?

Once concern I have about the jig is that it is also made out of aluminum, so if I or someone got into it with the cutting portion of the mill, it would be wrecked.

 

[gregkl]

So buy the tooling and host it.

He's talking about combining resources which is smart. Last Fall, my entire cul-de-sac split the use of a lawn aerator. We all kicked in like $8 and did our lawns and it was enough to cover the guy's gas and rental fee who went and got it. More of this should be done.

At the range if someone want to use my UpLula to load some mags, I am happy to let them use it. I don't expect them to go buy there own.

 

[flashpuppy]

I'm not aasking anyone to bring a mill. I'm asking to go to someone's mill. Maybe 2-3 people a day for a weekend. Guy hosting the party gets a little cash. Maybe beer? Bottle of bourbon? Pizza? It doesn't have to be a rushed business meeting. It's a learning experience for all and a good time with like minded dudes.

We could create a thread soley for our lowers. Post pictures of the throughout the stages and of the final completed rifle. Sounds fun to me.

FWIW, I understood what you were getting at. To manually run one out on a Bridgeport takes a good bit of time. However, if one programmed it in on a decent 3+ axis cnc mill or Bridgeport conversion, the time drops immensely. Even a good multi-tool readout system would cut the time down after the first one were done. Especially since these are aluminum parts (any idea of the metallurgical composition? 6061, 7075, etc?).

What I was getting at though, is the equipment needed to run multiple items in a "party amount of time"is not usually found in someones garage. I have everything one would ever need or want to do this and would love to host. The issue is that I can't have a group of people in my shop building firearms. Imagine the legalities of the situation. What if someone got hurt? What if one of these lowers found it's way into the hands f a criminal and used in a crime? It eventually gets traced back to me and then a non FFL holding machining company manufacturing and distributing firearms. Best case scenario, I'd lose everything. Worst case, I'd be in jail.

Heck, the same thing could happen from a homeowner standpoint. Your insurance company does know you have industrial machine tooling being used in your garage, right?