old blackpowder guns

[CharlesHarris]

Mortblanc is spot-on. Another factor is that prior to the 1850s a great many guns by small makers were not of steel, but of iron, often of hammer-welded, twist construction. Many shotgun barrels prior to smokeless powder were twist lamination of iron and steel, often in complex, decorative patterns. Such barrels should be considered suspect even when used with blackpowder, unless magnetic particle inspected, using the wet method with continuous circular magnetization, or my other means such as xray or ultrasonic inspection. Unless you have access to lab test equipement, inspection effective of Damascus or twist steel barrels is not cost effective. On higher grade guns it is worthwhile to have them retubed and reproofed, but that is an expensive proposition.

But STEEL barrels of good quality and workmanship, in sound condition, with well fitted breech plug and properly tuned lock are a joy to behold. I would love to have an original Brown Bess musket or early American flintlock rifle, such as the 1803 Pattern Harper's Ferry carried across the Rocky Mountains by Lewis and Clark.

We have in the family an 1861 Springfield .58 cal. rifle-musket, which was carried by an ancestor during the War Between the States, aka The American Civil War, or the War of Northern Agression, depending upon which side your ancestor fought on. The rifle still shoots well, and if well taken care of, should continue to for at least another four to six generations or so.

[Tartar Horde]

Thank you for the replies, I have looked at a few old BP weapons in various museums during my studies and I was surprised at how "clean" they looked. The main problem seems to be the wood that deteriorates quicker than the metal parts, and a lot of these weapons have damaged stocks.
I believe that knowledge is power, and even though I have no intention at the moment in owning one, having some information regarding safety may serve me in the future if conditions change, forewarned is forearmed. Another point is that England is stuffed with museums full of all sorts of goodies for us poor unarmed Limey's

[Mortblanc]

Original muzzle loading barrels made before 1830-1850 were all made of metals other than steel, and all were welded in some way.

The weld either went straight up the barrel as a straight seam, which was always mounted along the bottom of the barrel, or it was a spiral weld as GH stated.

However, a good inspection with a bore light will normally show any intrusion into the metal inside the bore along that weld line. A small intrusion which is detectable visually will often reveal a fault in the weld.

While the faulty welds have always been of major concern to gun scribblers, I have found the faulty breech plugs of more concern in real world restorations. Often a charge was left in the breech for decades and the corrosion hides many defects and causes others. That is especially true when the breech plug was not of high quality when installed.

It was not until the 1830s that fixtures were devised for deep drilling of solid barrel stock creating a seamless barrel.

I have seen several muzzle loading guns made with brass barrels, and they were quite popular. I once inspected a brass barreled rifle using a barrel that was a perfect square bar. Many naval arms were specified to have brass barrels and many entire issues of martial pistols were brass barreled. So if you run across a barrel that is not marked steel it does not mean the gun is useless.

I would hate to place anyone in danger, but I also wish to inform as well as possible. I have the freedom to experiment in many strange aspects of BP use and have learned that the limits of metal are greater when using BP than one might imagine.

I have made and fired BP guns constructed from many oddball sources, including water pipe, automobile axles, steel bar stock, brass stock and a couple of cannon made from pickup truck drive-shafts. Also made a nice 3" mortar from gas pipe, with an old wheel rim as the base plate.

I also once did an experiment to determine how much pressure a section of copper water pipe would withstand. That experiment was conducted by hammering one end of the 1/2" copper pipe flat and folding it over on itself several times, then drilling a touch hole near the folded end. The device was fixed to a 2x4 with a hose clamp and fired using canon fuse for remote firing from behind a secure barrier, to which everyone scurried with great haste!

The charge was black powder and a cloth patched .50 round ball. We raised the charge at each firing. I am not going to tell you what charge finally blew up the pipe (not knowing the age or strength of the pipe you have access too), but it was far more than I had expected and we got several shots off before the copper pipe gave up the ghost.

I once (20 years ago) had a modern BP side lock rifle brought into the shop with the complaint that the gun "puffed".

I informed the fellow that black powder was supposed to "puff".

He replied that it was "puffing" out the top of the barrel!

I inspected and found that someone had drilled and tapped the barrel for a scope mount and had drilled completely through the barrel. When this fellow removed the scope he had 4 holes 1/8" diameter puffing smoke out the top of the barrel. He had been shooting it that way for a couple of years.

I suggested that he dispose of the rifle, or replace the barrel, because I was not going to touch it for repair.

He scoffed that that idea and went across the street to the hardware store where he purchased 4 screws to cap the holes in the barrel. I never heard from him again, and did not read of anyone blowing themselves or their body parts up, so I suppose his method was a success.

(I also once had a modern shotgun brought in with holes for scope mounting drilled completely through the chamber area. It was still shooting but the shells would not eject due to the rough edges of the scope mount screws protruding)

I was working as "range safety officer" at a national BP shooting match and noticed one of the trap shooters was venting smoke out the side of the right barrel on his muzzle loading SXS. Yes, it was an original gun with twist barrels. It seems that he had been shooting this gun in that condition for nearly 10 years and no one had made any issue of it.

I called him off the line and blacklisted the use of that shotgun and nearly faced a lynch mob over the issue! Fortunately the President of that organization was working RO on the next section of the line and we called for arbitration. After the head safety officer pushed a matchstick through the decomposed side of the barrel they declared the piece unsafe and sent the shooter looking for a new set of tubes.

The thing was, (extremely scary thought) he had been shooting the gun in that condition for an indefinite period!

I have seen a lot in my days of shooting, reloading and repairing. I have seen enough to know I do not want to push my luck. And I have seen enough to know how far I can push my luck in a survival situation.

What it all comes down to is that you do what you have to do, and pray it works.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Boonesborough

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Boone's brother Squire Boone was known as an inventor. He fashioned a makeshift wooden cannon, reinforced with iron bands, which was fired once or twice at groups of Indians before it cracked.

[Steve]

Fascinating stuff Mortblanc, thanks for sharing those stories.

[MoleTrapper]

I like to make my own ball fishing weights with moulds I have bought of the bay, I have them in several different measurements!

[Mortblanc]

Thank you for the replies, I have looked at a few old BP weapons in various museums during my studies and I was surprised at how "clean" they looked. The main problem seems to be the wood that deteriorates quicker than the metal parts, and a lot of these weapons have damaged stocks.
I believe that knowledge is power, and even though I have no intention at the moment in owning one, having some information regarding safety may serve me in the future if conditions change, forewarned is forearmed. Another point is that England is stuffed with museums full of all sorts of goodies for us poor unarmed Limey'sBig Grin

TH the reason the metal on those specimens looks so "clean" is due to a coating of preservation wax. The parts are dipped in the liquid, which stabilized the crap out of them. They can sit in that museum for another 1,000 years and show zero continued aging.

One odd thing about archeological work; if you are at a dig and they uncover a barrel, lock parts and trigger guard they refer to it as a "complete gun". They seldom consider the possibility of the stock surviving.

I was at a dig once and we found a complete pistol with wood stock intact down a well we were excavating. As soon as air touched the wood it started to crumble. We were forced to bring the pistol up in a large container of water and stabilize it in a liquid bath before we could expose it to air.

Any person living under "restrictions" should acquire certain "knowledge". Even if they can not purchase a firearm they should know how to build a simple firearm. They should know how to produce propellant, or what can be used as propellant and what can be turned into projectiles. Having that knowledge is not breaking the law, and when you need the knowledge the law will not apply.

This is the 21st century, the knowledge is all over the internet and there is absolutely no excuse for not having it as part of ones survival planning.

Always remember, it was not the full auto assault rifle that made the longbow obsolete, it was the match lock musket!

And as soon as European traders made the crudest flintlocks available to the native Americans they abandoned the bow.

Yes, a few remnants clung to the bow, but those remnants are among the extinct groups. The large tribes that survived were the ones that grabbed guns asap.

I know those are fighting words to some here, but they are the facts.

[CharlesHarris]

Interesting video of a lad in the US test firing his restored Nepalese Brown Bess Musket, which was assembled from original period parts from a kit sold here by International Military Antiques. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Xu4QQnUJRI

Reliable and accurate. Exceeded my expectations. A family with four of these would be well armed to repel the savages!

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Another video with useful information on inspection, cleaning, loading and shooting a Pedersoli flintlock Blue Ridge Mountain Rifle in .50 caliber

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrC2Thi_6xw

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You absolutely want to wear eye and ear protection shooting flinters, especially.

For normal accuracy you really need to have a ball which fits tightly when patched. While a heavier patch is useful as an expedient, which lets you make do with an undersized ball, having proper fit makes all the difference.

There is a touch of witchcraft as well as science in making these work. Being able to "read the patch" to diagnose proper loading is the key to good performance. When everything is "working" a recovered patch will have a clean black spot in the center, with no burn-through, holes or tears, and even a smoothbore gun will have useful accuracy to 40-50 yards, a rifled gun to over 100. These links have good general information for the starting blackpowder novice:

http://www.dixiegunworks.com/faq.php
http://home.comcast.net/~illinewek/faqs/kanger.htm

[Mortblanc]

Most of those Nepalese muskets were the East India Pattern, which was the same model that was used by the Mexicans at the Alamo and in the 1848 War. They were retained in service in remote areas until the late 1800s, even after the adoption of the SMLE, sometimes skipping the adoption of the cap-lock system and single shot cartridge guns altogether.

Most of the "Kits" they are speaking of are the metal remains taken off the decomposed stocks and sold with a 90% finished replacement stock made from Beech. The barrel, lock and hardware are mostly original.

One of the things the recent movies have gotten correct is the rate of fire for these muskets. A well trained and practiced trooper could get off 3-4 shots per minute using the paper cartridges.

The young man in the video is doing things the safe way. The original procedure was.

1. place the lock in half cock position
2. tear open the cartridge with the teeth
3. prime the pan and close the battery
4. pour the rest of the charge down the barrel
5.ram the ball on top of the powder

I have one musket with a drilled out flash hole modified so that the main powder charge will flow into the priming pan by gravity. That eliminates the priming step altogether, but it does create a weapon that shoots fire 6 feet to the right from the flash hole!

Most folks do not realize that our popular shotgun sizes are directly descended from the ML muskets of past eras.

Brown Bess was 10 gauge
Officer's Carbines, assorted light infantry muskets and Sea Service pistol were 12 gauge
French issue musket was 16 gauge
French militia musket was 20 gauge
British and U.S. cap-lock .577 musket was 28 gauge

[CharlesHarris]

If I recall correctly, the .577/.58 rifle-muskets are a 24-bore. My friend in Italy cuts brass 24-bore casings to load for his Snider, using .60" round balls, 70 grs. of 2Fg and sufficient 24-bore fiber wads to compress the powder charge.

A 28-bore is .54 cal. as in the US M1841 Mississippi Rifle or the earlier Harper's Ferry Pattern 1803 flintlock.

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A common antique gun encountered in North America is the Northwest Trade Gun, as sold by Hudson's Bay Company to the Indians in Canada. Reproductions of this basic pattern, most often in .58 or .54 caliber, remain popular and are effective for hunting with either shot or ball. Many enthusiasts build their own kit guns. High-quality finished guns are available from North Star West.

http://www.edmontonhousebrigade.com/abou...trade-guns
http://www.thefurtrapper.com/trade_guns.htm
http://www.trackofthewolf.com/categories...parts-list
http://www.longrifles-pr.com/northwesttradegun.shtml
http://www.northstarwest.com/northwest_gun.aspx

[Timelord]

A very useful thread. As already mentioned by MortBlanc, I will reiterate for those enquiring readers - Contrary to modern gun mythology, the blackpowder muskets are not completely inaccurate and useless as to not be able to hit a barn door. They are reasonably accurate to hit centre mass of a man sized target easily up to 50 paces. Beyond that the accuracy does decrease in uniform gradient but is still quite useable out to about 200 paces with practice.. Other variables can always be applied but generally this info holds true. This accuracy at these ranges is more than enough for the likely scenarios for self defence and in fact ranges are usually pretty close in this respect. This indicates that black powder pistols of the pre revolver type are also effective tools at likely combat ranges for self defence. Historical data and use demonstrates this. In fact there is a lot to be said for a slower moving but greater mass projectile. The soft lead as well as dumping ALL its energy into the target, can also cause devastating wounds as it sometimes shears apart under impact. If you think 50cal is big, try musket and BP pistol calibres like .69 or larger. These were the typical calibres of the day. One hit and out!
Additionally the utility of smooth bore barrels allows different projectile loads - multi ball or "oblong" shot or wired shot or buck & ball, fletchetts, mini bullet, etc etc
These type of weapons can be expediently run under poor field conditions, whereas modern cartridge ammo might not be available.