A couple of Rayl swivel breech barrels

[JTR]

Some time ago I bought two Ed Rayl barrels from a private party because I had the thought of maybe making a swivel breech some day. The current swivel breech discussion got me thing about the barrels, and how light of gun they could build. And also I'm curious if these are a standard profile barrels or not.

The barrels are stamped RAYL in a small oval at the breech. No other info stamped on the barrels.

They're 42 inches long.
54 cal across the lands.
Have round groove rifling, and have one turn in about 80 inches. Seems a strange twist, but I got about half of turn of a ramrod in 42 inches, and sighting down the bore looks about the same.
 
The breech is .900".
The waist of the swamp is .725".
And the muzzle is .775".

The barrels look very slender, and are light. Weight seems to be about 2.5 or 3 pounds each.
The guy I bought them from said he'd had a swivel breech mechanism, but had sold it and the breech plugs some time previous.

So since you guys deal with modern made barrels more than I do, can anyone tell me if these are standard profile Rayl barrels? And with that long twist rate, wouldn't you have to shoot it with a pretty hefty powder charge for good accuracy?

Thanks!
John

[Dennis Glazener]

can anyone tell me if these are standard profile Rayl barrels? And with that long twist rate, wouldn't you have to shoot it with a pretty hefty powder charge for good accuracy?

To answer your first question, most of Ed Rayl's barrels are custom made as requested by the person placing the order. I have had a couple of Ed's .54 cal barrels and I didn't specify a twist and if I remember correctly they all were 66" twist.

Never shot a 80" twist in a .54, it sounds slow, but I once had a 45 cal with a 72" twist (not a Rayl) and the more powder I used the better it shot. I wouldn't dare print here what I used for a hunting load, that was back in my stupid days!
Dennis

[Randall Steffy]

They are atypically long I believe, but an appropriate breech size and weight for a swivel breech. I would use them for their intended purpose!

[JTR]

Dennis and Randall, thanks.
I've never heard of a one in 80 twist either, so that's why I asked. I'll try measuring the twist rate again just for the heck of it.

Randall, True, the barrels might be long for percussion period or late flint swivel, but I've seen some very nice pre-1800 swivel guns with about this length of barrels, and that's the time period I was considering. Or cut them back to about 39" and they'd make a fine looking Nicolas Hawk!

John

[deano]

Light weight barrels make more sense the older I get, but when I looked at John's dimensions for his barrels it occurred that the barrel wall thickness at the waist was 0.0925, would that generally be considered safe for a .54? Particularly considering the slow twist?

Though I can't imagine that Ed Rayl would make an unsafe barrel but what would be a good rule of thumb for a rifle barrel wall thickness?

Ken

[JTR]

Deano, The waist is around 35 inches down the barrel from the breech. I'd think the enternal pressure would have dropped off a good bit by then.
John