Middlesex Trading Pistols

A friend of mine linked me to a company called Middlesex Trading out of New York state. I noticed they have some pistols there in the $350. They seem to have a nice variety of them. Does anyone have any of these or any information about them? How did they shoot? I'm curious because I'm looking at adding a pistol mainly as a plinker and a way to learn about flintlocks.
http://www.middlesexvillagetrading.com/

Middlesex traders is out of New Hampshire not New York. Reviews on their guns have been mixed. Some say they are just fine and good shooters, others go as far as saying they are dangerous junk. I have no experience with them so I can't offer an honest opinion. Their prices are attractive especially when you look at the prices of many production and custom flint locks. They look sturdy and shootable to me but I have never accually handled one.

Don

Although I don't own one I do know a little about them.

The reason the price is so low is they are made in India and their intended purpose is as a decoration. Most, if not all of them do not have the vent hole necessary to make a flintlock fire.

If you buy one of these and want to shoot it you will have to locate and drill a hole for the vent (touch hole). This is fairly easy to do if you have a sharp nail to mark the location, a electric drill with a 1/16 or 5/64 inch drill bit and some time.

There has been a lot of discussion about the safety of firing a "decorator" but I have yet to hear of one blowing up and the supplier will verbally tell you that it's OK to do.

Flintlocks are as good as their locks and I have heard mixed comments about the locks quality on these guns. I have heard some negatives about this and few positives except to say the locks will work.

The wood to metal fit is usually not very precise and the woods finish could be improved.

For a ventless decorator with a fair lock, $350 sounds like quite a bit of money but on the other hand they do have some interesting gun styles that are not available elsewhere at a price anywhere near that low.

I do not have any of their products either, however it seems that the only people who call them junk do not own them or ever shot them or even seen them in person. All of the MSTC guns you refer to have the vents drilled and are made and sold to shoot. The guns from the Discriminating General out of Canada do not drill the vents and are the only ones who sell their guns that way, as far as I know.
P

Wrong Zonie. The Middlesex guns are drilled, and are not made as decorators. The quality is worth what you pay. It is not great quality, but it is usuable quality. Most often the lock internals need polish and a little tuning. Expect heavy triggers, but they do spark pretty well.

While Zonie is correct about a few of the importers of Indian made "firearms" not being vented, MVTC does vent and sell theirs as working firearms.

Pros: "Cheap", all the ones I've seen spark better than my 3 custom flints. MVTC carries parts and will stand behind their product. They do seem to be safe.

Cons: Only have a vague shape like the item copied, as one gun building member here has said in the past, "Looks like a cartoon firearm". They miss the subtle shaping of the wood and metal work of what they try to reproduce. Low resale value. Wood used is teak or something of that ilk.

With that said I have two Indian made firearm and I'm in a history group where 3 other guys have Indian made muskets and pistols as they looked close enough to the weapons copied for our needs.

We have live fired all of them, they all spark well and when we demo a Scottish Highland charge they don't mind firing their muskets and dropping them on the ground to pull swords (unlike my custom flint musket that I die a little bit each time it hits the ground... my musket cost about what the 3 Indian made muskets did).

I hope this makes sense.

Quick review, should be safe, won't be pretty,can be fun, trigger may break somewhere between 8-30 pounds, should spark like crazy, don't plan on getting your money back out of it should you sell it.

Cheers,

David

I bought the Scottish Pattern pistol, .52 cal.
All metal frame and well built for a $300 pistol.
I've done some tuning on the lock and springs to make it safer and better to shoot it.
It's a fun little pistol and my son and I enjoy shooting it, with ball or shot loads.
The Wheellock is just junk. Don't bother with it.
I have another Musket, that I bought from a another collector from here. It's a Fish tail Fowler 1650's Flintlock, that he re-built and decorated with many pound beads and browned the lock and barrel. It's a really nicely made musket, and has become quite a conversation piece to friends and visitors at the house and the range.
Some just are better than others, but a little attention and work, they make nice, inexpensive shooters.
I'll buy others, in the future, I'm sure.
I do own a pretty big collection of finely made Matchlocks, Wheellocks and Flinters, but for the money they cost, the others get shot more.
JMHO...

These type of guns are sold in Canada, without the vent drilled, because they cannot be fired as such, thus are not firearms.
In Canada flint hand guns must be registered like any other hand gun. (loop hole???)
The Pedersoli Queen Anne pistol is finished better than these Indian guns, but are just as much junk. Lousy trigger pull, lousy spark, and reflect poorly on any real pistol of yesterday.
And are quite expensive.
Tradition and old CVA guns are not much better either.
Old Ford

I have bought several Indian-made replica firearms from both Middlesex in New Hampshire and Loyalist Arms in Canada. From these two suppliers I have gotten very well made replica arms. They are NOT as well made as the Italian replicas made by Pedersoli and Uberti but they are 1/3 the price. No, they are not walnut stocked and exact replicas but with a matchlock what do you care? I (We) use these for living history presentations, not full-charge round ball loads. They certainly go "Bang!" and they are easy to maintain. Sometimes it only has to be good enough for who it is for.

I have gotten my wheel lock (Indian made) to spark quite well after I learned to grind the pyrites to contact the wheel. Pyrites don't last very long (like 4-6 shots, tops) but once I got the shape right ignition was pretty certain.

These suppliers/retailers fill an important niche. Theer products can be misused but should be safe with reenactors who know what they are doing.

While this topic does seem to come up from time to time around here I wouldn't mind letting you know my experiences with them as limited as it is. I own one of their Germanic Cavalry pistols in .62 I have had no problems with it working and firing. The trigger is a bit stiff but the lock always throws spark. It's an accurate pistol and a lot of fun to shoot albeit a monster in size and weight. The finish on it I'll probably redo one of these days But the rest seems to be fine to include the fit of the furniture.

Because of the price it might not be a bad direction to go if you are learning flinters. They aren't crafted as well as many of the fine firearms that are made by our makers, but they are decent and work well. Their customer service is also very good so that's always a plus in my book.

Ray-Vigo said:

A friend of mine linked me to a company called Middlesex Trading out of New York state. I noticed they have some pistols there in the $350. They seem to have a nice variety of them. Does anyone have any of these or any information about them? How did they shoot? I'm curious because I'm looking at adding a pistol mainly as a plinker and a way to learn about flintlocks.

Click to expand...

I own one of Middlesex Valley's trade pistols. The trigger was extremely when I purchased it, but a friend suggested I file out the wood hole that the trigger bar goes through. This improved the trigger pull to a surprising level.

Next, the wood is very weak. I dropped the pistol from a distance of about a foot and the handle cracked completely through. Having said that, as a plinker it was fun.

Wick Ellerbe said:

Wrong Zonie. The Middlesex guns are drilled, and are not made as decorators. The quality is worth what you pay. It is not great quality, but it is usable quality. Most often the lock internals need polish and a little tuning. Expect heavy triggers, but they do spark pretty well.

Click to expand...

The guns as shipped from India do NOT have vents drilled so as to not be firing guns due to some law. Middlesex drills the vent and does other work on the lock. A friend of mine is getting the new double flintlock fowler and that will be ready to fire for a tad over $700.

I bought their double-barrel percussion howdah pistol and their steel-barreled "Dutch" blunderbuss. The blunderbuss sparks great and has a decent trigger pull. The howdah needed some tuning on the r/h lock (it was catching at half-cock when the hammer fell), but the trigger pulls aren't bad and the gun handles 55 grains of KIK FFg and a .600 ball with pillow-ticking for a patch with reasonable (i.e., not wrist-breaking) recoil. Fit and finish are OK for a cheap shooter. I'm certainly not dis-satisfied.

mazo kid said:

Wick Ellerbe said:

Wrong Zonie. The Middlesex guns are drilled, and are not made as decorators. The quality is worth what you pay. It is not great quality, but it is usable quality. Most often the lock internals need polish and a little tuning. Expect heavy triggers, but they do spark pretty well.

Click to expand...

The guns as shipped from India do NOT have vents drilled so as to not be firing guns due to some law. Middlesex drills the vent and does other work on the lock. A friend of mine is getting the new double flintlock fowler and that will be ready to fire for a tad over $700.

Click to expand...

Seems I read somewhere that there is some Indian law concerning exporting functional replica weapons from India, at least as far as "archaic" ones go. I know that every replica sword I've seen out of India, even the best quality ones, come with a 1mm "flat" on the cutting edge, supposedly due to their export laws. Don't ask me how they got away with exporting Ishapore Lee-Enfields a few years back...

Somewhere I read a translation of the Indian laws dealing with exporting small arms. I don't recall exactly where it was.

It basically said that it was against their law to export operating small arms from India. It did not make exceptions for flintlocks or antique styled guns.

That Middlesex would drill the vent holes necessary to make an operating gun doesn't surprise me.

Zonie , I think what you remember reading about the laws governing the export etc. was on a link reached from the MTV home page. They even explained how their proof system worked . :hmm:

I owned one of their Sea Service pistols. It was a very nice gun for the money.

I bought their double-barrel percussion howdah pistol and their steel-barreled "Dutch" blunderbuss.

Click to expand...

Me, too.
The Howdah is great fun but...when I got it, it had absolutely the worst trigger that I have ever tried to pull. I needed two fingers on either lock to fire the gun....had to be 30 pounds. I have worked on them extensively and now they are usable. Fit and finish are acceptable. It is a handy little item, always goes bang and is quite easy to carry.
The Blunderbuss, a flintlock, came drilled and has always worked properly. It is a hoot to shoot and patterns well out to 20 yards...the farthest I have tried.
Pete

The only thing I did to my howdah, other than fix the right hand lock so the hammer would fall without catching, is re-thread the nipple seats to 5/16 x 28. The threads they come with are an odd size (Whitworth?), and the nipples themselves are meant for an odd sized cap (smaller than U.S. musket caps, but bigger than #11 sporting caps). I now have two sets of 5/16 x 28 nipples: one for musket caps, and one for #11 caps.