FearNoWind
Well-Known Member
it's a good idea to avoid putting the MagnetoSpeed bayonet harness over the muzzle brake. But if you happen to be napping and make that mistake, you can recover from it without too much difficulty. Carelessness can be costly. Mounting the MagnetoSpeed Chronograph on the muzzle while forgetting that "this rifle has a muzzle brake" isn't the smartest thing I've done and the resulting damage to the bayonet certainly didn't qualify for warranty repair. With nothing to lose (hey, it was already broken) I figured I'd do the surgery and see if I could revive the patient. It became immediately obvious that MagnetoSpeed didn't intend for the bayonet to be disassembled. Careful handling of the box cutter on both sides did a pretty good job of freeing the inner layer of the bayonet up enough for me to remove it. The rear portion of the inner layer (connector jack) was fractured so that end loosened easily. Once I coxed the inner layer out I found two problems. One connection at the jack was broken and, because I pulled a little too hard when removing the inner layer, another connection at the front of the bayonet had also broken lose. Re-soldering the connection at the jack was simple enough. The broken connection at the other end required some planning. I used my band saw to carefully cut a chunk out of both sides at the front, just deep enough to expose the broken connection point. That made it possible to re-solder it too. The fine folks at MagnetoSpeed confirmed my assessment that the bayonet was made of a type of ABS plastic but I couldn't find any ABS in sheet form. I picked up an ABS coupler (99 cents) at the local Home Depot, cut out a section and heated it with a heat gun until it took on an even sheen. Pressing it between a length of steel and a wooden pressure plate solved that problem. A few measurements and a another visit to the band saw gave me the pieces needed to restore the sides of the bayonet using an ABS epoxy.
