in 1975

[jerrywh]

 in 1975 I finished a 11 gauge shotgun. It was supposed to be a jaeger type smooth bore. Back then I really didn't know for sure what one looked like but I did my best.
 The barrel was made out of a piece of Shelby seamless tubing, True seamless I think. The barrel is 1/3 octagon and 2/3round tapered and was filed down by hand without a lathe.  I think I figured out some way to turn it in a electric drill. I reamed the inside with a square reamer and honed it with a brake hone.
 I never made a barrel before and it worried me so I proof tested it. Just to be sure I loaded it with 600 grains of ffg Black powder and three ounces of shot, tied it down to a tire and lit it off with cannon fuse. I did this three times. Then shot standard loads in it a half dozen times. That gun still sits in my vault. The lock was hand made. I don't show that gun but it is a reminder from when I was younger. That was the good old days. The good old days weren't so good some times.

[grouchy]

If you enjoy it, It's the good old days!

[Joe S.]

sounds like good old days to me,held together didn't it?not sure why your posting it the way you did but OK.When I was a kid I go out after the fouth of July,following morning looking for dud firecrackers.Would find a bunch and we would use the powder to experiment using metal tubes for gun barrels and would shoot screws and such just to see what would happen.Made I guess what would be primitive muzzleloaders,the old days indeed.

[jerrywh]

 I thought it might be interesting for some of the guys to elaborate on some of their early projects.

[bob in the woods]

 1975 was the year I got married. We had a small apartment....no shop, so my first builds were done in the kitchen on the table.    Projects in progress were stored under the bed. Clean up was sometimes "difficult" .
My wife put up with it until I got my first shop in 77.  Things weren't easier back then , but they were simpler.
My first gun was built using the barrel from an old Snider enfield.  The lock was from Dixie. A friend bought a lock " kit" from Clark just outside of Toronto. Neither he or I managed to get it together . More enthusiasm than skill back then.

[Bob Roller]

1975 was the year I got married. We had a small apartment....no shop, so my first builds were done in the kitchen on the table.    Projects in progress were stored under the bed. Clean up was sometimes "difficult" .
My wife put up with it until I got my first shop in 77.  Things weren't easier back then , but they were simpler.
My first gun was built using the barrel from an old Snider enfield.  The lock was from Dixie. A friend bought a lock " kit" from Clark just outside of Toronto. Neither he or I managed to get it together . More enthusiasm than skill back then.

Is Clark still in business? I saw him at the CLA Show in Lexington I think in 2008.

Bob Roller

[Acer Saccharum]

My first gun was made around around 1970, after spending hours poring over a Dixie Gun Works catalog, and a summer of farm work, saving money.

This was made from a piece of green maple, a straight barrel, and Dixie parts. Stock design was traced from a Winchester 30-30 lever action. 'Too much wood' is an apt description, as well the old advice "needs to see original work"

Anyway, this gun was stolen from my workshop when I was in college. What was I thinking, taking a gun to school? Anyway, I now find it flattering that it was taken, and I don't have to hide it in the closet.

[bob in the woods]

Clark is still in business, {  Clark Industries }  , and still sells his locks, but has mainly switched to making aircraft propellors [ air screws ]   

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

This all brings back memories.  Good thread Jerry.

When I was a fourteen year old kid, I handled a couple of original muzzleloaders that my Uncle had.  I got the idea that I could build a flint lock pistol.  So I went to the library and found a postage stamp sized picture of an English dueling pistol, bought a piece of walnut from a hardwood dealer in the city, and made everything with hacksaw and file.  I got 25 cents a week allowance and the wood was $3.95...talk about difficult times.  I'm left handed so I made the pistol left handed too.
Here's a picture...still have the beast!

[Daryl]

Not quite correct Taylor, you used Dad's little Optical Company lathe to bore that hex blank out to .50 calibre - smooth. Looks octagonal in the picture, but is 12 sided. Now THAT's Cool!

[Daryl]

In around that time, 1975, Jerry, I stocked up a piece of octagonal Shelby Tubing as a smoothbore 44 cal. cap-lock. I used card wads and .410 wads with 1/2 oz. of shot - made 10 straight on trap one rendezvous here in PG, then traded it for an original .50/70 Sharps barrel and mould. LOL.  Richard Lester's (now gone)  kids are still shooting that gun. It would hold about 2 to 2 1/2" at 50 yards off bags and was great for shooting bunnies with patched round balls. I used .432's(I think they were) - Lyman mould.

[P.W.Berkuta]

This is my first Hawken in 1968. The only purchased parts are the .54 Dougles barrel, bolster, tang, & trigger guard all the rest of the parts were made by me even the complete lock. I still have this rifle and will never sell it.
 

[shortbarrel]

Please keep these post coming, I was 12 years old when I made my first muzzle loading gun. Young minds back then didn't need the (great information highway) to help then out. They just thought it out and did it'.

[FDR]

What is this 1975 stuff!  In 1954, (11 years old) I was buying percussion caps from Turner Kirkland and black powder at the local hardware and stuffing a fine Spanish single barrel 28 ga shotgun. "Fine" is/was a rather loose expression to describe a cheap ML shotgun that was made for the native trade in some other country. How the gun made it to Tennessee to a local pawn shop is one of life's . Original guns did not exist where I grew up except as rusted relics.
The caps, from Kirkland,  came in a wooden box shipped to the local railway express office and my mother had to sign for them. I could only afford a few tins at a time because the shipping was expensive but the hardware store had plenty of BP for blowing stumps. Lots of small game made it to the supper table!  Still have the gun and the round ball mould I had just in case something big came along.
That gun also taught me how smart a dog can be. We had a nice English Setter and he spent  most of his time with me. He could tell the difference between our modern guns and a 22 rimfire or the ML shotgun. We would sneek off and hunt rabbits and he would hunt real close and point them. If Dad was along he would only point quail and ignore the rabbits completely.  Great kids dog!

[Levy]

My first ML was built around 1970 using a piece of Cherry from Arkansas and the barrel from a single barrel 12 ga. shotgun.  I cut the chamber out of the barrel and put a breechplug in it.  I bought a $12.50 lock from DGW and  a .$2.50 trigger too.  the buttplate and the trigger guard I salvaged from an old Zulu breechloader.  I just had to figure out how to make the parts work together, and I did.  I forgot to put an underrib, pipes and ramrod on it, so it was incredibly light.  I simply carried a loading stick with me in the woods.  It was fun on squirrels, but the recoil was fierce.  I got a double on squirrels with it once and eventually traded it for something else less interesting.  Wish I had it back.

James Levy

[Joe S.]

1975 was the year I got married. We had a small apartment....no shop, so my first builds were done in the kitchen on the table.    Projects in progress were stored under the bed. Clean up was sometimes "difficult" .
My wife put up with it until I got my first shop in 77.  Things weren't easier back then , but they were simpler.
My first gun was built using the barrel from an old Snider enfield.  The lock was from Dixie. A friend bought a lock " kit" from Clark just outside of Toronto. Neither he or I managed to get it together . More enthusiasm than skill back then.

Too funny,I'm doing my first build pretty much on the kitchen table.Parts ect under the bed as well.My girl doesn't mind the mess,God bless the shop vac.Portable vise is great also.The light isn't the greatest so if I get good weather I move out on to the deck.If and when I get to setting up a shop it would be a narrow bench to be able to work the builds from both sides,kinda like how that works on the kitchen table.

[David Price]

I built my first flintlock rifle in 1959.  I also purchased the barrel from Dixie Gun Works.  It was a 40 cal. slim jim barrel, as they called it , made in Belgium.  I used an antique lock that someone gave me which was a piece of junk, but it would fire most of the time.  The rifle took me  over a year to build and I shot it in competition for about a year.  The craftsmanship wasn't too bad but it looked like a modern gun.  I wanted to build a better one, but not having the money to invest in another, I took the rifle apart and used some of the parts to build another, using a Russ Hamm lock, which came out quite nice.

A few years later I  gave it to a friend and at some point he moved away and I lost track of him.  Then 50 years later I got a phone call from someone who had it.  My name was on the barrel and he called the NMLRA office and asked if anyone knew who I was.  They gave him my phone number and I ended up  buying it back from him for $100.00.  It is now in my safe where it will stay.

It was like seeing an old friend.

[davec2]

In 1969 I was a sophomore in high school.  I had a Dixie catalog with a 2" x 3" very poor black and white photo of a flintlock rifle.  You can imagine how much detail there was.  At the time, this was the best lock I could come up with.......



I built one rifle with one and it worked OK, but I innately knew it that its architecture looked more like a canoe paddle than a rifle...and I knew the lock was junk.  I determined to build a better lock (from looking at a bigger picture in the Dixie catalog).  I made a set of master parts in silver, brass, copper...anything that was easy to work.  Then I vulcanized a set of rubber molds and pumped waxes of all the parts.....







I found a local foundry that did steel castings.  The guy who owned the company got a kick out of a young kid trying to build flintlocks and he said he would cast as many wax patterns for me as I wanted to make up for $25.  I didn't have $25 but told him I could borrow it and he held out his hand and said "Deal !"  I made up 20 sets of wax parts and brought them back to him and he cast them all for me in a few days.  However, when I went to pick them up, he was holding a box and he said that the castings didn't come out as good as they should have, so I could have this batch for nothing.  When I opened the box, the parts all looked fantastic to me.  When I looked back up at him, he just winked at me.  I eventually had him do some additional castings for me and insisted that he let me pay for the next batch, which he did.



I started putting the pieces together and making a lock plate out of a steel strap......



Finally got the lock all together and hardened all of it.....and then, since I couldn't engrave, I covered the plate with asphaltum varnish, free hand scribed the decoration I wanted, etched the pattern with dilute nitric acid, and then gold plated the etched lines  before I removed the asphaltum mask.



I built two locks and then made a matched set of rifles for my Dad and I.  The barrels were Douglas, 13/16 inch straight, .45 caliber.  Not great locks, not good architecture on the rifles, (but much better than the first rifle with the Spanish lock.)  We still have the pair of rifles and they mean a great deal to me for the all the lessons I learned building them at the tender age of 16.

[Bob Roller]

That lock is elegant and graceful. NOTHING to be ashamed of,nothing at all.

Bob Roller

[Bill Paton]

I am really impressed! Your story and accomplishments brought tears of admiration to my eyes. I am certain that 16 year old went far, and the foundry man shares the admiration I feel for the precocious gun builder! Thanks for sharing your “make-my-day" experience. Bill Paton

[kaintuck]

At 16 I was running D7 and D8 cable cats, hauling hay, and dreaming of a road runner with a 383.......now at 57, I wish I had the skills you guys developed over 1/2 century !

Marc n tomtom

[P.W.Berkuta]

Agree Kaintuck -- at 16 I was chasing girls - looking for a car to buy - shooting ATA trap with my dad - fishing - and some muzzloading stuff. My interests were not focused -- OH -- and school work was in the mix .
 
Dave you do fantastic work even at a young age

[Joe S.]

At 16 I was running D7 and D8 cable cats, hauling hay, and dreaming of a road runner with a 383.......now at 57, I wish I had the skills you guys developed over 1/2 century !

Marc n tomtom

Funny how life is.At sixteen I was working stupid jobs during the summer,trying to get a date,how can we get a little beer,school the rest.My friend Mike built a little flint pistol from a kit bought at K-mart.I bought him the kit to finish the barrel/wood for Christmas. I'm still amazed at some of the work on this site,and done by kids no less.I remember they had rifle kits also remember telling Mike maybe someday I will build me one,thirty plus years later......guess better late than never.Like I posted before tinkered with steel pipes and gun powder to shoot screws ect.another was taking those old tin beer cans and cutting both ends out on three and on one just the top.Taking that one taping metal screen door screen to it and taping all the cans together making a tube.The one with the screen you would take a nail and punch a touch hole near the base.We would squirt some lighter fluid down the tube it would hit the screen down at bottom can then give it a little shake to help turn the fluid to gas.Jam a tennis ball down the tube hit the touch hole with a match/lighter and boom,tennis ball smooth bore.You could shoot them balls a long way.I know its not what where building here but the theory is the same,it was good fun for a twelve year old.

[Bob Roller]

At 16 I was running D7 and D8 cable cats, hauling hay, and dreaming of a road runner with a 383.......now at 57, I wish I had the skills you guys developed over 1/2 century !

Marc n tomtom

Never had a bulldozer but did have a 383 in a Plymouth Sport Satellite. That was the car made a Lincoln owner out of both of us.

Bob Roller

[PPatch]

1975 I owned a nothing but trouble 1968 bug-eyed Austin Healey Sprite and was attending the Kansas City Art Institute in the ceramics department. I designed and built a 60 cu ft downdraft kiln for the school as a class project, that was the 13th and last kiln I ever built. That kiln was still going strong 20 years later when it was disassembled and rebuilt as a class project by another generation of pottery students.

dave