ARKANSAS STONE
The cutting edge of the reamer is kept sharp by honing with an Arkansas stone over the cutting edges.
The reamer should be touched up about every two barrels.
SURFACE SPEED
The surface speed for reaming should be rather slow, on a regular barrel-reaming machine; the reamer
turns, but on the lathe the barrel turns and the reamer is stationary. Instead of using an open belt and
higher speed, the lathe is set in back gear, and run at the slowest speed.
The feed can be made faster than that used for drilling. The barrel reamer is pulled through and used for
a greater depth, with more cutting edges in contact with the barrel.
For the roughing reamer you can use a feed twice as fast as that for finishing. After the drills and reamer
are made, and kept in good shape, many barrels can be turned out with them. Reaming is a simple
operation, and with this information and the tools to produce the barrels, you will turn out high-grade
barrels.
BARREL REAMER SIZES
Listed below are the Caliber, size of the rough Reamer, and the size of the finish reamer.
Caliber Rough Reamer Finish Reamer
172 .168
224 .215 .218
244 .233 .236
257 .248 .250
264 .254 .256
270 .268 .270
284 .274 .276
308 .298 .300
303 .301 .303