heavy barrels/ small bores

[The other DWS]

Its been mentioned in passing at several different locations on the site, but I think the topic deserves its own thread or location.  if so feel free to relocate it.

heavy barrels for bore size:  one sees a fair number of original smallish bored rifles--sub-40 cal--that are rather large and heavy for their bore size.   Anyone have any idea why?   I'd speculate that maybe it was to allow for freshing and reboring as the bores corroded.

  One VERY seldom reads anything in original literature about the method or frequency of cleaning so I suspect that corrosion may have been an even larger issue than we realize.  I know that the 18th and early 19th military "returns" of arms inventory seem to indicate a very high proportion of inoperable arms and corrosion may have been a factor.

[Ken G]

That could be the reason but I have always thought it was more due to manufacturing.  Especially forged barrels.  One size fits all sort of thing.  I think also thicker barrels would make up for deficiencies in the metal of the barrel. 
Just thoughts based on nothing. 
Ken

[D. Taylor Sapergia]

Ken, those are thoughts based on experience, which is a long way from nothing.  In '07 I got my first look at several collections of original rifles both flint and percussion, but mostly flint.  I came away amazed at the weight of the barrels.  There were no skinny barrels like we use today.  And few of the rifles have bores that would want you to take them out and shoot them, in spite of the overall great condition of the pieces.  Yet all of the rifles felt wonderful in the hand - well balanced and solid.  I suspect they averaged nine pounds or a little more.  Personally, I like my rifles over 8.5 pounds, and 10 is not too much.  Less than  8 pounds is too difficult for ME to hold still.

[Dave K]

Ken, I have to agree with your thoughts. I have always thought the same. The iron made barrels were thick for safety reasons and I never thought of the one size fits all thought, but it sure makes good sense to me. Now, the next question though I always wondered is, how were they able to make fowler/shotgun barrels so thin and yet safe? Or at least presumed safe? Both rifle and smooth bored fowler/shotguns would handle the same loads as a rifle. Does the smoothbores drop pressure because we are not asking the rifling to impart it's work on the projectile?

[smokinbuck]

I have mostly given to the speculation that original larger barrels, with small bores, were made that way for a couple of reasons; one was for safety given the sometimes inferior quality of the metal used in the barrels and second due to economy. A barrel was difficult and costly to come by and if it were made excessively large and with a small bore it could be drlled, and rifled, to a larger caliber when worn out. The stock and all other hardware would remain in use and the rifle would be as new. Just my 2 cants.
Mark

[The other DWS]

OK, that makes sense if one assumes that the builder is purchasing a barrel from one of the barrel mills one hears about.  the mills would logically be making a fairly standard large "blank" for sale to individual gunmakers that could be bored out and rifled and/or filed down to the builder/customer specs.

By the same token one has to consider that iron and steel were at a premium on the edge of the frontier;  to the extent that settlers were reported to have torched their shacks in order to sift the ashes for nails and other iron for salvage in the process of moving farther west.  If an iron shortage is accurate there would need to be a good reason for making barrels any larger than absolutely necessary.

I've always rather imagined that the makers who hammer forged their own barrel from bar stock was either early or the later exception  (unless they had a shop full of apprentices to keep occupied).

I wonder if any of our senior scholars who have been studying old court records for years have ever noted any unfinished barrels that might be raw stock form a mill in any of the estate inventories--and how common that was.

[Ben I. Voss]

For one thing, I think that the average farmer or workman would have had muscles that we can only find in superhero comics these days (ever try to use a scythe?) and a 10 or 12 pound rifle would seem about right to them! The other thing is that i think they believed that longer and heavier barrels were more accurate and therefore were common.

[The other DWS]

Ben I think you are right about physical condition they may not have been as big, heavy, etc as the current generation  (though that is a subject of considerable debate)   but it is for sure that they had conditioning and environmental adaptation that only our current long distance runners and long distance cross country skiers approach today.  And I'd like to see one of them run a marathon in winter carrying a hunting flintlock rifle and the rest of the gear----in moccasins and other 18th cent clothing.  They were just a whole lot tougher than we are period--and on a diet that would make a modern nutritionist go into shock and convulsions.  scything grain, hoeing all crops, manually cutting and shocking husking and shelling corn, the lifelong endless job of chopping & splitting wood must have built up incredible upper body endurance if not brute force strength.  Holding and handling a 10-14 # rifle probably was not even commentable by an adult male on the frontier.  Though I personally question how much the formal "off-hand" shooting position was actually employed in that era.  I suspect it is a later style influenced by post 1840 european military and more formal euro-american schuetzen traditions.

[wvmtnman]

All of the above is what I have seen but how do you explain J.P. Beck?  His rifles generally run in the .45 to 50 caliber range and the barrels are similar to a modern day "B" weight barrel (without the radical swamp).  Abd based on the diameter of the ramrod, I don't think many were freshed out that much.
I am getting ready to build a Beck and find this to be interesting.  Any thoughts?
                                                                           Brian

[Majorjoel]

I believe there were many different weights in barrels as there are today. I have seen 3\4 inch small bore (32 cal.) barrels from the 1830 era. They are nice and light to tote.  Most of the small bore 29-34 cal. original barrels with wide flats (15\16-1inch) and lengths 40"+ that I've run across were made in the mid to late percussion period. There are a lot of them floating around. Many of the early flintlock big bore rifles are pretty hefty as well.

[The other DWS]

Is there any difference in the bore/barrel size relationship between the earlier era where I assume lower less consistent grade iron barrels and the later years when iron/steel making had progressed and higher grade alloys were becoming more widely available?

perhaps a study of the evolution of the long rifle in relation to the development of the iron and steel industry, and the commercial distribution of steel bars would be enlightening.

  I have noticed that similar studies in England of metallurgy (specifically as it relates to arrowhead production) development as well a some of the other economic factors in production and distribution of other necessary materials have recently provided a much better understanding of the evolution and development of the military longbow.

[dannybb55]

Why is there always a seeming smug assumption that the metalurgy was off in the OLD DAYS? this is the post sword making, armor forging, clock spring winding forth millenia of European/ Middle eastern iron work. Forge welding is so easy that cave men did it. Once you get IT, it just gets easier, especially if you do it as a part of your normal 60 hours a week job and somebody showed you how ( I taught myself} and bar stock had to be made up out of your scrap pile. The left over nail rod was welded back  into bar stock and quarter inch rod is a bit tricky. A nice, hefty barl scalp is easy to hold and soaks up the heat with some leeway in the forge. These barrels were worked from the inside, outside and both ends leaving about half of the mass in the finished piece. The rest went into the scrap bucket, nitric acid and the floor. I will bet you forge welded chain that musket and fowler barrels were welded thick and then forged thin, look at the match locks for clues, they had massive breeches and long tapered profiles. Many have delicate.pierced and filed trigger guards and fancy triggers and locks. the boys weren't incompetent. they were hedging there bet with indifferent powder and users. Wrought iron is very consistent if the raw material or scrap is good. 80 percent should be ore, charcoal and lime and the rest good, cut up scrap. Barrels were proofed and a maker was probably only as good as his last tube. A one eyed two fingered survivor was bad press. Just my two bits worth, Danny.

[The other DWS]

Danny, asking in all seriousness--would you think that a frontier black/gunsmith would have the equipment, access to quality raw materials, or even the skill level (by training--not native artistic ability) equal a craftsman of the more settled parts of the country. 

  I'm assuming that state sponsored arsenals and manufactories would have well established supply and apprentice systems as well as a basic QC program---even prior to the standardization of parts. but I know very little about the situation with individual civilian operations.

I guess really ought to read up on the development of the iron industry in colonial and 19th century america, can anyone suggest a  good book or two to add to my reading list

[dannybb55]

M T Richardson's Practical Blacksmithing in 3 volume 1889- 1891. Don't let the late date fool you. This is a collection of the best letters to the editors of Blacksmith and Wheelwright magazine from all over the country. Many old smiths sharing their knowledge of how it was done, not how it would have been done. Hanson's the Hawkin Rifle has the St Louis boy's inventory of tools and supplies which was long my shopping list and I never came close to having all that they had to hand, Those frontier smiths used Hundreds of pounds of steel and tons of Iron and charcoal so they were never far from sources of supply. Firearms, Traps , & Tools of the Mountain Men by C P Russell, while dated and probably spurned by the current community, is a dedicated study of iron for the frontier. Page 402 on lists the tools that were used at J J Astor's post on the Columbia in 1812. You can't get any more Far west and in the Period than that. I am sure that these shops are too large or too citified but we smiths don't have time to raise crops or hunt so we need a good crowd of customers. Smith's weren't longhunters, they were civilization and stability. Alex Bealer's The Art of Blacksmithing... Redneck Georgia smithing covers firearms forging and all kinds of country work. Gotta go to work, Danny

[KentSmith]

Anythihng on this thread on my part would be at best speculation though an interesting topic for research, however, I do know something about forging barrels.  Forging the barrel isn't the problem, drilling out the whole, reaming and rifling is.  However, the technique of fabricating using rifling benches was well known in the Southern Highlands (can't speak for Bent's Fort or other caravan supply route destinations out west).  After most major large game (native Americans, scoundrels, buffalo and elk) disappeared east of the Mississippi, there was no need for the larger bored barrels.  Smaller bore, less lead and powder for the smaller game most available.

As for the size of the barrel.  Whether they bought blanks and reamed/rifled then or were constrained by the size of skelps they had learned to use to hammer forge them or some other combination is speculation on my end. 

[The other DWS]

I guess my question (and we are wandering off the original topic, but it seems constructive) is transportation determined.  Astoria and even the upper missouri trading posts, as well as the earlier eastern coastal plain gunsmiths were well supplied by ship and boat-borne methods.  heavy bulky cargos like coal and charcoal as well as iron and steel could easily be supplied at relatively low cost. The early upper piedmontese and trans-appalachian 'smiths would have been faced with a much more difficult and expensive situation---at least until the development of shallow draft riverboats opened up the OH/KY/TN river systems.
  Certainly a native iron industry was a priority in Colonial and early Federal-period America. I am always amazed at the number of local bog-iron type smelter sites I run across as I travel that date from the late 1820s and 30s--and even earlier.
 Wood was in superfluous abundance of course, and while I have read little about commercial charcoal production it might have been so ubiquitous that no one commented on it.  
 I imagine that the development of canal and riverine transportation starting in the 1820s or so went hand in glove with the development of the coal industry both in terms of industry and the immigration of european digging and mining labor.  However it was the advent of the railroad in the next decade, as both a consumer of iron and steel and a means of transporting raw material and finished goods, that caused the economic mushrooming of all three industries.
All of which would of course had logistic implications for the gun producers.

[The other DWS]

Just another comment re:
"Smith's weren't longhunters, they were civilization and stability."

true to a certain extent; however I have read early pre-1700 Indian relation documents, of both french and british origin, in which a wide variety, both tribal and geographical, of Indian petitioners and negotiators were requesting/demanding that gun/blacksmiths be permitted or licensed to operate in Indian controlled areas.  This would be well in advance of the settled frontier.
  Admittedly, from what I have personally seen, most of the work was in repair and maintenance of arms rather than actually building them; but then I'm more familiar with the French colonial economic system than the Anglo-colonial one.  The French system VERY strongly dis-encouraged colonial manufacture.  I am not aware of ANY colonial gun builders under the French area/regime; though I would be joyful at being found in error.

[Roger Fisher]

Been wrong before so just a thought!

Heavy barreled rifles used in shooting matches from a rest by the locals and the circuit shooters, while the hunter more often used his trusty smoothbore trade gun!   Until the whites moved west and ran up against the big stuff and needed the big 'stuff' to handle them!

[Dr. Tim-Boone]

apparently Squire Boone worked as a blacksmith and gunmaker.smith in NC while also do some long hunting to KY & TN...........Maybe others too...

I would hazard a guess that some gunsmiths in cites like Philadelphi or Lancaster etc, bought some barrels and made some.. those from the big city where there was lots of apprentice labor available and production was at relatively high volume probably could and did make some slimmer barrels than some more remote backwoods barrel maker....if there were any who made barrels in the backwoods. Just a theory...

[The other DWS]

I may be wrong as well, but I'm guessing that local shooting was popular probably up to the county level, and there were some REAL BIG counties of course. this would reference the local turkey, hog or side of beef matches.
  But I think that "Circuit shooters". if you mean traveling exhibition/competition shooting with pro and semi pro purse shooting, you'll find that most of it was a bit later than the Golden Age flintlock era.  There was a tremendous increase in formal and semi formal target shooting in the later 1830's that really took off in the 1840s culminating in the Bogardus/Oakley type professional shooters as well as the schuetzenverein movement.  This ties soundly into the political upheavals in northern Europe and the huge increase of immigration from those countries.
  An unusually high percentage of those immigrants were relatively well-off middle class professionals (rather than the working class ag/mine/construction and industrial laborers of the precious decades) who could well afford high grade target and hunting rifles. This may be the economic origin of some of those elegant high art flint/percussion transition arms.

 It was from those largely german/swiss/austrian that the Schuetzen movement (along with the Turners as well as the musical groups--and of course lager and pilsner BEER) flowered.
these groups as well as other national groups in that wave of immigration, along with the US military infatuation with the European military developments, that gave rise to the local private uniformed militia companies in the late 1840s and the 1850s.

[dannybb55]

Anythihng on this thread on my part would be at best speculation though an interesting topic for research, however, I do know something about forging barrels.  Forging the barrel isn't the problem, drilling out the whole, reaming and rifling is.  However, the technique of fabricating using rifling benches was well known in the Southern Highlands (can't speak for Bent's Fort or other caravan supply route destinations out west).  After most major large game (native Americans, scoundrels, buffalo and elk) disappeared east of the Mississippi, there was no need for the larger bored barrels.  Smaller bore, less lead and powder for the smaller game most available.

As for the size of the barrel.  Whether they bought blanks and reamed/rifled then or were constrained by the size of skelps they had learned to use to hammer forge them or some other combination is speculation on my end. 

Amen

[scooter]

I spent yesterday afternoon in Huntingdon, PA, at a local hysterical society show of guns made in that and adjacent counties. I'd say about 10% or more, and 50% of lower end, guns made in Huntingdon are 1.25 to 1.5" across the flats with corresponding .32 to .36 bores. It is assumed they are "beef shoot guns" used across a log or similar. See Gary Cooper at Sgt York in that splendid movie. There is a scene before WWI where he is shooting turkeys. About 1/2 the Kopp rifles -- George or Andy--made in Geesytown in my experience were beef shoot guns. I have seen only one John Border among Bedfords and none made in Somerset Co. It seems to have been a local thing. Now immediately south of Somerset Co PA is Hampshire Co WV, and I've seen many a medium heavy, short barrel made there in smaller calibers--but not as heavy as those made in Huntingdon Co.

[dannybb55]

Just another comment re:
"Smith's weren't longhunters, they were civilization and stability."

true to a certain extent; however I have read early pre-1700 Indian relation documents, of both french and british origin, in which a wide variety, both tribal and geographical, of Indian petitioners and negotiators were requesting/demanding that gun/blacksmiths be permitted or licensed to operate in Indian controlled areas.  This would be well in advance of the settled frontier.
  Admittedly, from what I have personally seen, most of the work was in repair and maintenance of arms rather than actually building them; but then I'm more familiar with the French colonial economic system than the Anglo-colonial one.  The French system VERY strongly dis-encouraged colonial manufacture.  I am not aware of ANY colonial gun builders under the French area/regime; though I would be joyful at being found in error.

That is true, but most smiths were generalists in the country and specialists in the towns and cities. Whitesmiths, cutlers, farriers, wheelwrights, anchor and chain forgers, naglers, ironmongers, rolling and slitting mills, charcoal burners, gun and locksmiths were found in town where they had a large enough customer base to make a living. Country smiths needed about 15 to 20 farms to keep them busy all year.
Mr Roy Jordan of Pender County, NC made Oyster knives, flounder gigs, welded springs and harrow tines, shod mules and oxen, made and repaired log chain, sharpened axes and turpentine hacks, resteeled plows,repaired oyster dredges and trace chain, shrunk tires and made barn hardware. That was in the 1940s when he was in his 60s. No telling how hard he worked when he was young and healthy. Coastal NC in the 1940s was a lot like Coastal NC in the 1840s and probably real close to 1740s. The same farms were there with the same families and industries. Corn, peanuts, rice, timber, tar, fishing, salt and gunning. If you new the Skippers you could get some nice wine, the Foys had a tidal mill and a good carpenter. The Nixons had a small forge. Roy had about 15 farms within walking distance to his shop and cars were rare until after WW 2. I think Pender county NC is a good approximation of a country smith and his clients.
 Down in Wilmington, on the Cape Fear, Wilmington Iron Works was built in 1840. When I was buying Iron from them in that 1990s they still had a 450 lb anvil. 500 lb swage blocks, a 100lb steam hammer, a pattern room, acorn tables, gear cutters and the machine shop was run off overhead shafting and leather belts. They built machinery for the CS Navy yards and the local forts Anderson and Fisher as well as the Wilmington and Weldon RR. They did the same for the Navy in the next big three wars. They stood in sharp contrast with Mr Jordan's small one man shop. It must have been that way up and down the coast and up the rivers.

[flintriflesmith]

...
I guess really ought to read up on the development of the iron industry in colonial and 19th century america, can anyone suggest a  good book or two to add to my reading list

I wrote a quick summary and posted it here.

http://www.flintriflesmith.com/WritingandResearch/WebArticles/ironandsteel.htm

In terms of making gun barrels---bars of iron were available in stores even in the way back country. They were even traded in the hide trade with Native Americans on the fringes of the "frontier" before the Revolution. Wrought iron was neither expensicve nor hard to get.

Gary

[Curt J]

Another thought! Have you considered that some barrels might have been heavier, particularly with target rifles, for the same reason target rifles have heavy barrels today?  They might not have used that term, but harmonics were not unknown, even back then.  A heavy barrel was the only way they knew, that would deaden that imperceptable shock-wave that occurs when a rifle is fired.  They understood that this was detrimental to accuracy, even if they did not fully understand the fine points of what was involved. Your thoughts?