Tom Faux of Brighton, Colorado

All,

Have a chance to buy a very nice rifle built by Tom Faux of Brighton, Co. Anyone know of his work, as I have not heard of him? It is a half stock Hawken in 58 caliber that I am looking at. Thanks.

I'm an acquaintance of Tom. We belong to the same ML club. I don't think he was ever a professional ML builder, even though he did have a business of making percussion and flint locks at one time. He sold the business and molds to The Hawken Shop in Oak Harbor.

I haven't seen enough MLs that he has made to make an assessment. Can you post pictures of the rifle you're considering? Might be able to comment on it with good pictures.

Custom 58 caliber muzzle loading rifle by Tom Faux. Walnut stock, 33" barrel with 1:56 twist, LOP 14.

I like it, J! In .58 caliber it is going to be a deer stomper. It has good fitting and decent finish, no flies I can see. If the bore is good and the price is fair I'd say buy it.

Even though the pictures are very small and difficult to see details clearly, the rifle looks fine to me.

There are some minor critiques I could point out like the lock panels are too wide and the hooked breech to standing breech match up isn't the best. These are cosmetic issues.

The hammer on the lock is similar to what Art Ressel developed for his Hawken kit as well as what Ozark Mountain Arms used on their Hawken. I can't tell whose lock is on the rifle.

The rifle appears to have a single trigger. This is not common, but at least two surviving Hawken rifles have single triggers rather than than double set triggers, so a single trigger is HC.

If the price is reasonable, it's probably a good buy.

As I stated before, I don't believe Tom Faux ever worked as a professional ML builder, and I wouldn't expect his rifles to have any collector value.

Thanks all for the feedback. I am debating the purchase.

Jerry

I went ahead and bought it. Looking forward to taking it out for an afternoon of shooting. Thanks all.

Jerry

Tom Faux manufactured his own locks, using tooling he developed with Ron Long. The Hawken Shop® is now making his full line of locks, breeches and tangs and other builders supplies. You can check them out on The Hawken Shop® web site.