Another Hawken done- a Kit Carson

[Herb]

I just finished up another Hawken from the stick, which I hope never to do again, except I have another one ready for the shaping!  This one, and the next one, are near exact copies of the original.  I asked Jim Gordon's permission to enlarge his photo of the Carson rifle from his book "Great Gunmakers of the Early West, Volume III".  I took the book to a printing shop and had them enlarge it to life size based on the known barrel length.  Thus I was able to modify the nearest commercial parts to be like the original.  (The buttplate is not the correct Jim Bridger buttplate, but another Hawken BP that I modified).  I know of no inletted stock that is correct, so I started from the stick.  I knew all the correct dimensions to shape and inlet the parts in the stock.  His enlarged photo is shown below with my copy beneath, not aged much except for the steel furniture.


Below is my copy of the Jim Bridger rifle (with a barrel shorter than the original, because that is what I had to work with) and my Kit Carson rifle.  They are nearly twins.

I finished the Carson rifle on Friday before New Years and took it to the range to regulate the sights.  On New Years day I shot it in Jim Goodman's traditional event.  Six people shot the course, and these were all top shooters, except Dan is a beginner.  I took first place with 11 hits out of 13 targets and won $25.   It has a 1" barrel in .54 caliber and I shot 35 grains of Goex 3F, except I used a double Bridger measure of 52 grains for 104 grains on the cross-canyon shot, over 100 yards, hitting both targets.   I can shoot this rifle well, and it is my favorite style of Hawken.

[Doc]

Fine looking rifles!

Doc

[deepcreekdale]

Very nice Herb, both guns look spot on. I always have had a soft spot for the Hawken, like so many of us that got into muzzleloader building in the 1970's. One quick question, are your barrels tapered?

[Don Stith]

 You did not ask for a critique, so will not offer one
  However, I do have to point out that I offer a very correct precarved stock with my set of parts for the Carson rifle. Perhaps you are not aware of my offerrings. I no longer advertise in MuzzleBlast. The website, donstith.com, is out of date , and offerings are being upgraded 
 I  now offer a lock that is the correct shape and size.  The one pictured on the website  was custom made by Bob Roller to the dimensions of the original lock. I have recently had molds made to match the original lock.  I  do not offer individual pieces, only complete part sets
Don
 

[rich pierce]

What's the timeframe of the Kit Carson rifle, Herb?

[madmtmike]

Both great looking Hawkens!

[ScottH]

Herb,
 Thanks for sharing the pictures of your latest Hawken.
About how much does this new rifle weigh?
Scott

[madmtmike]

I would bet the weight at 10 lbs.

[Joe S.]

nice rifle Herb,again appreciate all you do to keep us educated on a these rifles.

[Herb]

'Thanks, folks.  Deepcreekdale, these barrels are not tapered.  The original Bridger has a barrel 33 3/4" long, 1.185 ahead of the snail and 1.120 at the muzzle, .065 difference, half the thickness of a dime per side.  Carl Walker of the GRRW who handled the original said "you can make that much difference with a file".  It weighed 11 pounds 4 ounces, IIRC.  Mine has a straight 1 1/8" (1.125) barrel 31" long (because that is the GRRW barrel I had to work with) and weighs 10 pounds 12 ounces.  It is heavier than I can shoot now, with a torn rotator cuff.  My Carson copy has a straight 1" barrel, because that is what I had on hand, though the original is perhaps 1 1/16".  Don Stith gave the dimensions on here a year or so ago, and I can't find my notes at the moment.  The Carson and my copy have a 31 1/2" long barrel ahead of the snail.  I have not weighed my Carson copy, but it is a lot lighter than the Bridger and I can hold it to shoot it.  If I made a Carson for myself, I'd use the 1" barrel for the lighter weight.  Don, I know you have a Carson parts set but I wanted only a stock, and a suitable inletted precarve is not available.  Rich, I do not know when the Carson rifle was made.  Maybe Mountain Meek will call in with the answer, or someone else who knows.  My next Carson from the stick has a tapered barrel, 1.125 x 1.010,  I don't remember what kind, maybe a Rice, has 6 wide lands and grooves, 31 1/2" long.

[ScottH]

Thanks Herb for the response.
 I have a John Bergmann plains rifle, dare I say Hawken, with a 34" barrel tapered from 1 1/8" at the breech to 1" at the muzzle, the barrel was made by Bobby Hoyt. I know it weighs over 11 pounds. I like it but it is on the heavy side.

[deepcreekdale]

Thanks Herb. I put one of those GRRW barrels in a Hawken years ago and it was a dandy. Filed it to a taper and it wasn't that hard to do. The reason I asked about yours was I really liked the look of both of your rifles and I have a few straight 1" barrels and a bit of an itch to make another Hawken.  I would be proud to build a rifle as nice as the ones you did.  Understand about the rotator cuff thing. Tending to like the smaller calibers as a result. No one told us about that sort of thing when we here young and dumb.

[Herb]

Here are some of the parts I used.  The lock is Track's Jim Bridger.  I had to cut out for the snail.  The trigger is L&R's.  The contour is better than the Davis, though that has the blades at a correct height.  I have to cut these down, and I also cut the triggers less tall.  The trigger guard is Track's TG-Hawk-L-I.  This tang is Track's Jim Bridger 1 1/8", which has too much hump at top and drop at tail.  I have one I heated and bent to be correct, I put the wrong one in this photo.  This is for my next build with a 1 1/8" x 1" barrel.  The finished Carson rifle shown above has a 1" barrel, as does Bob's shown below, and the 1" Carson tang is nearer correct.

The correct butt plate is Track's Jim Bridger, which has to have the edge and corner filed back.

Here is Bob's TOW Kit Carson Hawken which we started on a year ago.  Bob is 6'2" tall with a sleeve length of  36 or 38", and Track's stock with its 14 1/2 LOP is too long for him, I cut it to 13.5" with a hacksaw.  They use their Buttplate Hawk-L-I and I filed out the inside corner.

 
You can see the cut off stock puts the cheek piece closer to the buttplate than the original.

I had him get the correct entry pipe, Track's #RP-Hawk-TE-7-I.  We went with a 7/16" ramrod.

So this New Year's we got his Hawken built except for fitting the escutcheons and cutting the dovetail for the rear sight.  Track's Kit Carson rear sight is correct for the original rifle, but is so small that the front sight has to be cut down to about .135 to zero it at 50 yards.  That is low for much shooting because of heat mirage off the barrel.  I make my own larger rear sight, like Jim Bridger's original, and gave Bob pictures of it with dimensions and a piece of angle iron to make it.

[Herb]

ScottH- My Kit Carson Hawken copy weighs 8 pounds 14 ounces.  Rich-  The magazine Man At Arms (www.gunandswordcollector.com) for December 2014 has excellent detailed color photos of this Hawken and the Carson-Beale Hawken.  You can buy the magazine from this web site.  The article has full-length photos of both sides of the pair, then paired photos of at least 14 individual parts (I lost the first page of my copy).  There is more detail here than in any other photos I have seen, even some a friend took in person at the Montezuma Lodge in Sante Fe.  The author dates the rifles between May 1849 and the late 1850s.  The Carson-Beale rifle has the underside of the barrel stamped "POSTLEY, NELSON & Co.", who were barrel makers in Pittsburgh between 1852 and 1875.

[deepcreekdale]

OK Herb, you need to knock it off! Looking at your beautiful rifles made me go out and order a couple of barrels, hardware and stock blanks. Now you provide a great link with a ton of great magazine articles that I just had to buy. I love this site for it's inspiration and great information but I might have to pull the wife out of retirement to go back to work to pay for all of it! Keep it up!

[Clark Badgett]

Herb, between you and Taylor, y'all done got the Hawken bug going in me. Got a .58 barrel for a FS here, and a .54 for a HS on the way. I'm not expecting these build to be copies of any existing original, I just want them to finish out in a workmanlike manner. Going to push my skills with these.

[Herb]

The story in Man at Arms for the Gun Collector is "Kit Carson's Hawken Rifles Reunited!"  There are 18 paired color photos that show the rifles full length, both sides, and closeups of the lock area and the other side, plus most construction details including the locks at full cock.  The photos show the color of the metal and the wood.