Engraved patchbox question

[jafo20]

Hello...can I have my patchbox engraved before I fit it into the stock?

Thanks
David

[Mark Elliott]

Yep,  The better engravers do it that way.  I engrave my locks out of the gun, but for some odd reason, I always engrave the mounts in the gun.   I guess I perceived it to be easier, but it really isn't.   I have to tape the patchbox lid closed so that the vibration doesn't keep popping it open.    Next time,  I promise I will glue the mounts to a block to engrave them.   Just use 5minute epoxy or superglue and glue the parts to a fitted block of wood.   When done, you heat the part with a torch (not enough to ruin any temper) until the glue lets go.   The metal part should separate from the glue cleanly leaving the glue attached to the wood block.   I just rasp off the glue every once in a while.   

If you glue your parts to a block (the real professional engravers use pitch in a really expensive bowl to hold their parts) you can move the block around a whole lot easier than the whole rifle.    You can easily clamp the block in a regular vise.  I use a version of the Versa Vise on my gun building bench.   I have two of them on the bench.   They are easily repositioned 360 degrees.    I also have an adapter that lets me tilt it. 

I forgot that some folks also use auto body putty to hold parts for engraving.   That is probably better for the curved patchbox lid and finial.   That way you don't have to carve anything.    Just take a piece of 2x4 (that is what I glue my lock parts to); slather on some body putty, and stick your patchbox to it to dry.   Then engrave away.     If you haven't done a lot of engraving,  stick a practice piece of brass to that block first and go to town on that before your patchbox.   

I hope that helps.   

[T*O*F]

Some people read a statement and may assume something that the writer didn't mean.  I don't think he's asking whether the patchbox should be engraved in or out of the gun, but rather should the patchbox be inlet into the stock before engraving.  Inletting (fitting) the patchbox may require bending, filing, wood removal, etc.  Once it's ftting, then it can be removed and engraved outside of the gun.

He also doesn't say that he's going to engrave it himself.  He may be sending it off to an engraver for that work.  If you take a patchbox, say one acquired from TOTW, and send it off to be engraved, you are asking for a potential disaster.  One must assume the skill level of the writer when giving advice.

If you glue your parts to a block (the real professional engravers use pitch in a really expensive bowl to hold their parts)

The pitch bowl is pretty obsolete these days.  Most engravers today stick their work to a block of wood with hot melt glue and a heat gun.  While heating the glue stick, smear a layer onto your wood block.  Then reheat it and stick your part to the block.  If the part is larger than the jaws of your engraver's ball, then make a T block so you can clamp the narrow part into your ball.

[jafo20]

Thanks....answered my question. I appreciate it.

[Acer Saccharum]

I can't tell you how valuable it is to have many people responding to a question. While it may seem like overkill to some, it gives the original poster many options. I usually pick the suggestion(s) that best suit my skill level and fit my concept best.


Tom


Patchbox should be fitted to gun before any engraving takes place. A lot of banging and filing can happen before it looks right. You risk damaging the engraving if you engraved first.

But then there is Jacob Kuntz's box, which looks like it may have been engraved before it was fitted to the gun.

[rich pierce]

This topic has been modified as needed to keep it on topic and not personal.  Though exchanges between members may be just for fun for them, others may not "get it" and usually they add little to the information on a topic.

[Pete G.]

So if your skill set is equal to Kuntz it may be engraved as installed. Otherwise fit it to the inlet, then remove and engrave separately.

[Acer Saccharum]

Pete, I don't definitively if Kuntz engraved first. It's a theory. Some of his cuts run smoothly right off the patchbox.

You just can't make cuts like that. As soon as a graver reaches the edge, it jumps to the path of least resistance. In the case of Kuntz, it would have been right into the stock wood.

To make the cuts, the graver would have had supporting metal, which was trimmed back afterwards.

Look at the chin(lower beak) of the eagle. If you tried to cut that line with the patchbox in the stock, the graver would have skittered into the wood.

I believe the design was engraved on sheet brass, then it was cut out afterwards. THEN it was installed on the gun. Kuntz had been doing this long enough he would have known the process and achieved his intended results.



There, I'll get off my soap box now.

[whetrock]

I think Acer's got a point. But there are some other minor details, such as the anchor pins that have engraving going across them, that suggest that some of the engraving (at least finishing touches) was done after installation.

A close examination of tool marks on antique guns suggest that some boxes were engraved in place on the rifle. I'm talking about engraving lines that pass across screws, pins, etc. (But I'm not intending to disagree with Acer's observations about these deep lines in the Kuntz eagle, etc.)

[smylee grouch]

Acer, is the area around the toung between the upper and lower beak brass or wood? Looks like wood. Also the toung and lower beak almost look like they are bent over and inserted into the wood if it is indeed wood in that area. Any thoughts on that?

[Dave B]

"`...engraved first then cut out and inlet"  I have had this same thought about this work of Kuntz. It does has the look of being  engraved then cut out after the fact. I am sure that once the patch box was inlet to the stock it was touched up over those areas that required cleaning up. The retaining pins being one area as well as over screws to keep the flow of the line from being interrupted. The use of forming blocks to shape the patch box to the contour of the wood butt stock is a very effective workman like way of "getting it done" quickly. How else can one work with such thin brass and not ding it up.

[Acer Saccharum]

Grouchy, I am not sure about the pins. I think they moved out, and then tapped back in again over the years. I have a photo of the lion's face wheretwo pins were in the wrong place. This means the pins had fallen out, and were replaced without understanding.

I believe the area between beaks might be metal, cut to a lower level, and blackened. It looks like a jeweler's saw cut stopping at the opening of the beak.

Dave B, Kuntz and Rupp made enough of these rifles, on the same pattern, to make use of the forming block idea.

So if the  boxes were pre-engraved, off the gun, then Kuntz could have supplied engraved boxes to Rupp, and vice-versa. There is such similarity between the two men's work, it makes me wonder.......

[Acer Saccharum]

Is this a clue to engraved on or off the gun?

The side bar slips under the finial piece, and the patterns don't line up real well. It could be things have gotten moved around over time, but I think it's more likely that the pieces were engraved off the gun, then installed. The sidepiece engraving goes right under the finial piece, which would be impossible to do with parts ON the gun.

[kutter]

That lower beak/chin on the eagle is cut from the front to the back w/a flat graver.
The bottom of the flat is layed down on the edge of the brass inlay and takes a very fine cut making the sharp edge of the inlay into a small flat.
Then as you procede farther into the cut you start to turn inward and the flat graver starts cutting as a V tool. The bottom and one side become the cutting edges.
That makes the V cut come out of no-where on the lower beak and up into the throat on the eagle w/o damaging the wood.
Add a few rearward angled shading cuts coming up out of the convergence point of wood and cut line and you're done

The small flat(s) made in first part of the cut become quickly worn over and rounded especially in brass with some handling and use.
Inlays generally push upwards anyway making the edge wear more severe, and that can add to the look rather than distracting many times on a figure.

It's not all that unusual to see a flat graver used for both it's intended purpose and as a V tool. A flat is very easy to shape and sharpen compared to a V tool and is easy to learn to cut with.

As far as the side bar goes,,at least the inside solid line border shows a klunk into the top piece of the patchbox right in line with it. The outside border just a small raised burr on the upper piece where the border line ends. Both look like where the nose of the graver ran into it while cutting the border.
I really don't see anything there that would need removal of the brass from the wood to be cut as it appears,,though of course it could have been done so.

I'm sure about every which way has been tried,,some more successful than others but that depending on who the person was trying them out. That's one thing that hasn't changed.

[Paddlefoot]

Just a side question on Kuntz' engraved artwork. There is an oblique view of a head with a sort of cap or tiara looking headpiece. Acer is it just me or could that be another view of the Lehigh  "Indian", Liberty cap man, or "Woman with a nightcap"?   It appears that there is another more frontal view on that finial but its cut off in the picture.  Sorry its off topic of engraving technique but its something I just noticed.

[Bill Paton]

Good question, Paddlefoot. I thought the same. Bill Paton

[Dphariss]

All sorts of parts were sold engraved. Including patchboxs.
Hardware store catalogs, Tryon and others used to show them and Leman etc.
Page 38 of "The Plains Rifle" shows Tryon pages with patch and cap boxes. Two of the cap boxes are shown engraved.
This practice pre-dates the plains rifles since apparently engraved hardware was being imported in Colonial times. Sideplates, Buttplates and TGs at least IIRC.

Dan

[smart dog]

Hi Pete G.,
Jacob Kunst was a pretty good engraver by American standards of the time but pretty mediocre by European standards.  Whether you have his skill level or not the bottom line is that smooth scrolls, curved borders, etc are much easier to do and more smoothly produced if the metal work can be spun in a vise.  Once inlet, it is more difficult to produce smooth surves.  So, you have to weigh the positives and negatives, which will differ between people.  If you can inlet a patchbox with sufficient skill to allow you to remove it after inletting and contouring without chipping wood and ruining the inlet, then by all means remove it and engrave using a good engravers spinning vise.  If you cannot do that, then fit it permanently in place and take your chances engraving it in place.  The engraving probably will not be as good but it may be good enough.

dave

[flehto]

I don't engrave and the engraver that does my work doesn't like to engrave on the gun....too unwieldy for his method .So....all the patchboxes , inlays and BC entry pipes have to be removeable.  An important factor in removing and reinstalling a Pbox.....make sure the brass is sufficiently annealed. If the brass springs when the screws are loosened, that could be a problem.......Fred

[bama]

I think it is very probable that patch boxes were engraved on and off the rifle before inletting and after inletting! How is that for an answer, HA!

For real, I do think that a builder with the knowledge that Kuntz had was capable of engraving the box before inletting. From the original rifles that I have had the oppotunity to see the old builders used a much thinner brass sheet to make their patch boxes from than we tend to do today. It would make sence to me to fabricate the box, then engrave it while it was let's say the "flat stage". This could be done except the for the area where the box meets the butt plate. This area could be engraved after installation on the rifle. Because thin brass was being used it could be more easily conformed to the contures of the stock whitout damage to the engraving.
Braceletts are made this way today. They are engraved flat then bent to shape with little or no damage.

Now the key words there are the "Knowledge" to do the inlet well engough to inlet the box without any file work on the box.

I personally am not quite to that point. I have inlet some that I did very little file work on but I have yet to install one with no file work.

As far as engrave first then cut the box out, possibly on the side plates, maybe on the finial if the hinge is not intergal to the finial but I would not attempt to form a hinge on a nice engraved piece of metal, not saying it is impossible, just that I woould not attempt to do it.

I always pull any metal part off the rifle if possible to engrave it. It is just flat easier to do it that way. But I have also engraved on the rifle, again only if I have to.

The side plates on the John Jacob Sheetz documentary copy that Darrin and I did for the CLA auction this year are an example. I engrave them off the rifle, now the tricky thing is these side plates were nailed on the rifle, not screwed. So care had to be taken not to deform the side plates during the nailing process and not destroy the engraving. It turned out just fine.

You may ask why did I not engrave them on the rifle, because the original was done off the rifle. How did I know that, becasue the nail holes where drilled through the engraving on the original. This led me to believe that the plates were cut, shaped, inlet and then engraved before the nail holes were drilled then nailed on the rifle. Not an easy task to complete but doable with care.

[Acer Saccharum]

Engraving off the rifle would allow a smith to farm the engraving out.

Who engraved Rupp's rifles? Whose patterns did Rupp/Kuntz use? Who made what for whom? When Kuntz moved to Philly, his style and stock shapes changed dramatically.