Making a Hotchkiss Portative tri-pod

After the last machine gun shoot with the Hotchkiss I made a decision that what was really needed for this gun is a tri-pod. I did a post a while back about ideas for the tri-pod, http://gunlab.net/hotchkiss-portative-tri-pod-ideas/, but now I am on to the project, in my spare time of course.

I was down on a job a week ago in Tucson and when I finished I stopped by Omega, Don Bell’s shop, to say high and check in on him. While I was there I came across this little beauty that Don offered to me at a really good price,free, for the project.

The pintle support prior to cleaning.

With a basic set that was with in my price range I could not say no. It is a Chinese tri-pod for a recoiless rifle.

The first step in the process was to clean all the rust off and paint a coating of primer on it.

With the tri-pod back together for a quick photo op. I kind of like the look.

It will require a yoke and cradle of some type.

I wanted to paint it the same color as my Vickers, a Syrian desert brown.

A close up of the color.

I lost out to my wife and went with basic black.

This is after the first coat. A couple of more coats this coming weekend

The first part to solid model is the pintle support’

with this part complete I could start working on the basic pintle design.

This is all that I have left after the new computer ate the rest of the solid models. Actual it is not much of a loss as I was going to change the basic design from what I started with.