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Any one bought a Milita House gun before?

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I sent him a Rifle Shoppe Kit to build, the results were poor. Without disclosing specific details, custom gun work requires extensive knowledge of the gun and its details, and a high pedigree of talent in regards to measuring, marking, drilling and inletting. this was just no where to be seen, But I take responsibility for choosing the wrong person to build my kit, I own that Completely.
I'm sorry to hear that
 
If you’re going to have someone work on a kit gun, you want to see their work in advance, mostly I do my own a Brown Bess is a hard gun especially if you don‘t have experience with it. This bothers me because there’s a lot of armatures that consider themselves gunsmiths today with very little experience being an actual gunsmith, especially these hacks that do it part time as a hobby, which means their free time spent on your gun is going to be rushed and this is a disaster waiting to happen. These reenactors that decided to start part time hobby businesses take it a little too far, a reputable gunsmith is just that, a gunsmith not part time, full time.

Personally I think his website is misleading, ‘accurate and detailed’ is hardly a way to describe amateur work. The picture of his Brown Bess, isn’t really his work, its a Pedersoli lock on a modified stock that was likely copied, or even may be a Pedersoli stock, you can tell because of the wrist, butt and lock panels.

I’ve been building my own guns for a long time, I live with my mistakes, I’ve helped out some friends with repairs, but will never invest in someone’s kit unless I buy it first for myself and then sell it back to them at a premium, a REAL BIG PREMIUM TOO if its darn good. This takes all liability and places it on me, if the kit goes bad, I own I the gun. What he is doing is not the right way to go about kit builds. He should also be owning up to what ever mistakes he made in advance before he sends his completed work, ‘hey did this wrong’ do you want the gun still ? This is a very painful and costly llesson to learn, best wishes.
 
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Based on my experience, the general public will not notice.

As a unit, we welcome people who want to participate in our portrayal of the F&I War. There is a grace period to get the equipment together, but we strive for reasonable correctness of uniform. We also accept Land Pattern Muskets of First, Second and even Third model. Well, we do insist that the wood cartridge block for our belly box is red as displayed in the First Royals Museum in Edinburgh Castle rather than black.

We want the reenacting experience to be enjoyable and affordable as well as educational.

Wow....that is a great attitude. I wish that your unit was around here.

I was at an event last summer and I literally asked "How does a guy get involved in your unit?"

His reply? "well my dad was in it so I joined." Apparently you have to be born into the unit. They portrayed a F&I unit. I was actually born in the area near Boston where the original unit was raised. I would have loved ot have gotten involved.
 
Let's see. We follow most of the British recruiting standards.

Do you have teeth to tear the cartridge open?
Do your legs reach the ground?
Do you know your right from your left?
Are you willing to take the King's schilling?
Are you interested in portraying a British soldier during the French and Indian War?

If the answer is yes to the above questions, then you would be welcome to try out the unit.
 
Let's see. We follow most of the British recruiting standards.

Do you have teeth to tear the cartridge open?
Do your legs reach the ground?
Do you know your right from your left?
Are you willing to take the King's schilling?
Are you interested in portraying a British soldier during the French and Indian War?

If the answer is yes to the above questions, then you would be welcome to try out the unit.
No.3 is only a preference (hay foot, straw foot) and Madge still owes me 10p from my two engagements; for the first of which I 'attested' my oath swearing on the Oxford Shorter English Dictionary, as have many before me. I'll have a go at the 7 Years War.........
 
Let's see. We follow most of the British recruiting standards.

Do you have teeth to tear the cartridge open?
Do your legs reach the ground?
Do you know your right from your left?
Are you willing to take the King's schilling?
Are you interested in portraying a British soldier during the French and Indian War?

If the answer is yes to the above questions, then you would be welcome to try out the unit.
Teeth-check
legs-check
left from right? Most of the time.
Kings schilling? That like real money?
We were Brits back then so sure.

Sadly I'm more than 500 miles away. I'm not sure that would work out.
 
Final update here for the militia house kit build By Adam Barnes. The workmanship on this model is so poor that the gun can’t be fired. The touch hole is drilled to far forward and is too small almost smaller than 1/16. The proper way to drill the touch hole according to Track of the Wolf and Rifle Shoppe is to remove the breech plug and drill the touch hole lower center of the middle of the pan into the end of the plug and then file out a groove. This was simply not done.

Almost all of the drilling operations on this musket are off from their intended locations, which makes me wonder if any precise measuring was done at all, even casted screw hole marks were missed in obvious spots like the butt plate and lock plate. Pinning operations were missed and plugged up with what looks like toothpicks in the rear entry rod pipe and two barrel lugs.

Upper Sling swivel was not lugged to the barrel, I’d expect an experienced gunsmith with the Brown Bess to understand this feature.

In my opinon, the workmanship is so bad on this musket that I can’t recommend Adam’s work to anyone on this forum.

Sadly I’m now left with the option of setting this kit aside until I can afford to do something with it. Gunsmithing corrections are too costly And a few I’ve spoken with will not touch faulty work.
 
Final update here for the militia house kit build By Adam Barnes. The workmanship on this model is so poor that the gun can’t be fired. The touch hole is drilled to far forward and is too small almost smaller than 1/16. The proper way to drill the touch hole according to Track of the Wolf and Rifle Shoppe is to remove the breech plug and drill the touch hole lower center of the middle of the pan into the end of the plug and then file out a groove. This was simply not done.

Almost all of the drilling operations on this musket are off from their intended locations, which makes me wonder if any precise measuring was done at all, even casted screw hole marks were missed in obvious spots like the butt plate and lock plate. Pinning operations were missed and plugged up with what looks like toothpicks in the rear entry rod pipe and two barrel lugs.

Upper Sling swivel was not lugged to the barrel, I’d expect an experienced gunsmith with the Brown Bess to understand this feature.

In my opinon, the workmanship is so bad on this musket that I can’t recommend Adam’s work to anyone on this forum.

Sadly I’m now left with the option of setting this kit aside until I can afford to do something with it. Gunsmithing corrections are too costly And a few I’ve spoken with will not touch faulty work.
 
Im sorry to hear of this poor experience.
And what is his response to these items?
I'd at least ask for your money back.
At most ,I'd cut it up into pieces that fit in a shoebox, and send it to him,that way no one can't inherit that mess.
 
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