Ships' Gun Barrels: Roll Your Own?

[redhorse]

Originally Posted by Papercut

As I read thru the threads it occurred to me just how bad I am at rolling barrels. Now please do not get me wrong, but again it seems we are going down that path of do we stay paper or do we use other material. I for one have a difficult time justifying a set of barrels for a $40.00 and now higher Battleship kit that look like something Clint chewed before shooting all the bad guys! If you can roll and it look like the main gun of the vehicle then by all means do so and I have seen some that have it down to a art, if however I want to finish and not loose the battle because the paper does not want to cooperate, then I for one will, have, and do intend to use mfg'd barrels. As a matter of fact, I will use paper, PE, cast, resin and the kitchen sink if it works. But if you can roll, then do so until the cows come home. I do not have the ability nor do I care to roll barrels that I find to be the toughest part of the construction, notice I said barrels, they taper, other straight rolled items do not bother me! So for my 2 cents worth, turned barrels are the way to go:D if you can find and afford. The best I have seen came from JB Models.

Another thing you can try if you don't want to spend the money on brass barrels is wood in a Dremel. I suppose a lathe would work better, but rotary tools aren't bad in a pinch. I've used toothpicks, bamboo skewers and dowels for this.

[Wilfried]

Hello to you all,

I mean, we've different ways to get gun barrels; self rolled from cardboard or turned barrels of brass or aluminium - and - self made from brass tubes, wire, injection needles - all in various diameters available, I think.
We have the purist, who did all from cardboard; there are the lelaxed modelmaker - looking for an easy way to get a proper result and convenience solutions... and maniacs they always look for materials and methods to get clother to the original... everyone of us may find out, in which group he falls ...
I'm in the third group; as an example may be the 15 cm gun barrels for my destroyer ... the barrel has 3 different parts; "A" is made from cardboard, symmetric; tube in the center is conical and made from cardboard. The front tube "B" rolled from cardboard. But I don' t use the cardboard version and made them from brass... "C".
I think that's a good combination...
On the other way; special guns need often special barrels, they're very tricky to realise in scale with every material ... I'll show tomorrow some of it...

With lovely greetings
the Wilfried

[lepercan]

For years, every fall, I'm out cutting dried out weed grass stems (Johnson Grass is great) to use for gun barrels.
Lep

[Gil]

Wilfried,

Nicely made Guns. You've given me an idea.
Do you use two different size tubes to roll the tapered barrel?

+Gil

[Wilfried]

Originally Posted by Gil

Wilfried,

Nicely made Guns. You've given me an idea.
Do you use two different size tubes to roll the tapered barrel?

+Gil

Hello Gil,

if tapered means conical - no! Inspired of you, I show my method here:

Paper tubes - rolling round itself ...

The form of the tube depends on the former ... I use round material of every size, brush handles for masts, tooth sticks, etc.

With lovely greetings
the Wilfried