Uberti Paterson fixer-up "Kitchen Table Gunsimth" opinions

[rifle]

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I've got a Patterson by Uberti. Had it a long time. I noticed the wedge was going in fairly far. Then I noticed the barrels wedge slots at the rear and the front were "even" with the front and rear arbor slots. Barrel was tight enough and didn't cause a problem but....it wasn't right so I set to work.
I made a new tool steel wedge with spring that was more wide than a factory wedge. Fit it to what I thunk perfection is(as close as I can do it) which included working the arbors lots and barrel slots relationship.
Subject.......The wedge sides are mated perfectly flush to the rear of the barrel slots and......the kicker......flush with the front arbor slot....
which I canted some ,as the wedge side is canted, so the wedge front side is flush on the full contact of the face of the front arbor slot. The rear barrel wedge slots fore and aft are perpendicular with the centerline of the barrel and that moves the front side of the wedge to easlty enter the slots and go into proper fit. A little break in or seat in will let this fit be able to be a "thumb press fit" that's tight enough for the gun to fire.......usually it's not needed to have the "seat in" or "break in" to get a tight thumb press fit. Anything other than a fit like this can't be a good thumb press fit.
When I do something like this that's how I do it. It includes the arbor being bottomed in the arbor hole of the barrel with the cylinder gap set at min. tolerance when the wedge is tight.  The Colt guns seem to shoot less high and more accurately like that. Soooooo........
Does anyone know "HOW" the wedge and arbor slots are technically supposed to be fit.I haven't had problems the way I do this type thing but......wonder.....since the cap&baller Colts seem to be "all over the place" as to how the wedge and the arbor slots fit....what  should be  the "Rightest" way?.
Just asking for opinions from those that "tune" Colts or fix Colt cap&ballers as to what method they use to fit a new edge that's wide compared to the factory wedges.
Excuse the faulty English composition please.

[Raven]

Rifle,

From my point of view it sounds like you did an exellent job!
The wedge should be thumb tight and you shouldn't need tools to remove it!

For any of you that will say you didn't get your gun back that way....If you didn't ask and didn't pay for it I didn't do it to yours. I gotta make a living at this.

Rifle, from what I here, and from your posts your one of the better "Kitchen Table Gunsimth" around!

Raven

[Thumper]

Rifle...we're all goin to have to chip in and get you a "better table"...youve outhrown the one in the kitchen!!! Nice post on the wedge fit.

[rifle]

Thanks fer yer opinions Pards.
Thumper,I could come to yer place and work for food and......the permission to use your blacksmith shop?/
Raven, it's the thumb tight that gets me wondering. People like it and it makes sense considering the guns were made fer combate and self defense and are slow to re-load. I'd hate to be surrounded by savage warroirs and be lookin for my wedge punch and little hammer to change out spare cylinders.
My favorite personnel way is to tap very lightly on the wedge with a little steel ball peen hammer I have and listen for that sound that is in the taps that tells me the arbor is bottomed and everything is tight and can go no tighter without deforming the metal.
That takes a tool of some sort,even if its a stick picked up in the woods, or the butt end of a screw driver to tap the wedge loose.
Of course I'm always tryin to turn the danged things(Colts) into target pistols to compete,in therory at least, with the venerable Remington revolvers. You know.....make the barrels of the Colts unmovable when fired thru. My therory is that if anything can move it will. Show up as a wedge that's broken in or seated in a little too much after not too much firing or whatever.
I thunk I'm re-evolving to a "thumb pressure install of the wedges though. I reasoned though,that the wedge has to fit "the rightest way" to get a good thumb press fit.
That's where the "make a living" part comes in. Usually to do a really good fit it takes time consuming extra fitting and file work to get a really good fit. Depending on how the Colt came from the fatory. Since the "Ultra Fit" isn't an absolute neccessity all that isn't really imperitive.
It takes some TIME.
I'd like to have some detailed history from the Colt factory from the past as to how the hand fitters went about the fitting.
When I think about how many Colts are still around and still fitted nice with "the original wedge", it blows my mind.
That doesn't take all that much though.
Anywhoooooo......I wonder.....what do most preferr? The thumb press or the tool tap in/out? Either way works well but in my opinion the 'best fit" needs to be there for the thumb press method.

[rifle]

I end up lining the hole in the back of the cylinder with a steel shim so the slop was minimized. I got the slop out ot the hole the "toothed rack" fits in. The toothed rack is the parts people name for what I call the index ratchet. The steel shim turns with the cylinder. It's a .005 shim and had to be lapped in to turn nice. There's no slop to the fit of the index ratchet and the cylinder but......the hand is still a little short and it's a new part. The cylinder has to go past "full cock" a little to lock up even after gettin more out of the hand with the shim. Maybe the notches or the ratchet location is a little off with this gun.
Makes me wonder if the Uberti Paterson has a different action sequence(compared to the later single actions) where the trigger hits full cock and the bolt hits into the bottom of the cylinder notch.
If I want the typical action sequence with this Paterson I'll have to weld up the new hand to make it longer and then....probably have to make the bolt work earlier to get out of the notch when the hand wants to turn the cylinder earlier.
Since it's my own gun I wonder if the extra work is neccesary?
I guess it will be neccesary since I'm a crazy old man when it comes to my guns.
Anywhooooo....this old Paterson is a real good shooter. I reamed the chambers to get them a tiny bit larger than the barrel grooves and made sure the alignment of the chambers to the bore is right on. That always helps if the balls can get out without hitting and bouncing around everywhere.

[Sir Charles deMouton-Black]

I am no kind of gunsmith.  Bubba, at the best!!

Is the arbour tight in the frame?

[Thumper]

If ya come out this way...make sure to bring the miss's so my wife has some one to play with while we stoke the forge.

[rifle]

Sir Charels, the arbor is tight. The Patersons are made different with the ratchet on the back of the cylinder and the cylinder are two separate parts. The ratchet(toothed rack to the parts suppliers) was loose in the cylider hole in the back of the cylinder so...the hand had to take up the slack before the cylinder turned any.
Weird thing....the diameter of the cylinders hole was .020 in. bigger than the diameter of the ratchet that fit in the hole but.......anything thicker than .005 in. shimstock made the fit too tight. Add .005 for each side of the hole (since the steel shim lined the hole all the way around and it's .005 on each side) and that adds up to .010 in. to be too tight in a .020 in. space. I made three shims that had to be heated and shaped around the inside of the hole(actually shaped around the ratchet) before I went down to .005 shim to fit. That needed diamond lapped with compound to free it up so the shim wasn't too tight.
I guess that's where that saying came from that goes like,"easier said than done".  ha ha ha  Nothin is easy.

[Raven]

Rifle,

I've got a strong thumb and my "Thumb tight" might be someone else's "Tap tight" ......it's a fine line.

Raven

[Smokin Gun]

I got a nice Oak Dinning room table I can donate don't think I'll be needin' it ... you'll have to come gett it will leave a key under the mat...
See ya headin' home ...
SG

[rifle]

Raven,you being a pro......means knowin where the fine line is. It's pretty close to......do it right,do it fast,the first time,make the customer happy,make some spendin change,don't take any wooden nickles.
Smoking gun.....strap that oak table to the top of yer Lexis cuz......you'll be needin it  to work on during those long winter days up north east way.

[Raven]

being a pro......means knowin where the fine line is. It's pretty close to......do it right,do it fast,the first time,make the customer happy,make some spendin change,don't take any wooden nickles.

Story of my life

Raven

[Smokin Gun]

Smoking gun.....strap that oak table to the top of yer Lexis cuz......you'll be needin it  to work on during those long winter days up north east way.

Heh heh Rifle ... my Brother said I already have one there and a fully furnished Bedroom ... I'll show ya the pics one time of what he's havin' built...
Catch ya later ... replied to yur posts yonder... 
SG