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Can we talk breach loaders here?

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Thank you for posting this.
The development of breech loaders was a big part of rifles and handguns and firearms in general, this history goes right along with our muzzleloaders.

I remember watching, as a child, an old rerun of the Davy Crockett series where one of these was used, it was in the hands of the British and the heroes of the show had to sabotage the plan to prevent the British from being armed with these
I read a very interesting article on a type of a rifle that was developed back in the very late 1700s , in fact it was sometime around 1800 and some in the American army were wanting to use it in the war between France and Britain over the American continent.

The rifle loaded from the breach a tube that contained numerous rounds similar to a Roman candle each ball or bullet had a hole through it with a fuse, I believe it was a flintlock, the firing mechanism was about halfway between the muzzle and the butt of the gun, the first one was fired you then had a moment , or three or four seconds to regain your aim picture and the fuse would be burning and set off the second round, then a moment later the the third round and a moment later the fourth round and so on depending on how many rounds were loaded into the tube, the tube could then quickly be removed in another one loaded into its place,
It appeared to function flawlessly but the inventor , kind of like a few others, was greedy and disagreeable and it never got into production.
I can't remember where I read about it, maybe someone else knows what I'm talking about and can post some pictures or a bit of History.
 
The rifle shoppe
Thank you for the information. It said the powder chamber held 72 grains I would guess of 1 or possibly 2F black powder and was .65 cal.
Sporting model has 10 thread breech screw and original has 11 threads.
Asking price for finished action kit is $1895.00 and $100.00 less for unfinished.
Interesting gun kit but not sure I'm quite that interested !
 
Hi,
In a TRS Ferguson you will get 55-60 grains of 3F behind a round ball ranging in size from 0.615-0.648" diameter. The chamber has a shoulder upon which the ball rests. I am not sure TRS copied the powder chamber accurately because I believe the originals could load well over 65 grains of German double strength superfine powder (probably similar to today's Swiss 3F). Some shooters have great success with carbine ball (0.615), which is what the originals were designed to shoot. I cannot get any acceptable accuracy with that ball so I currently use 0.648 balls lubed with beeswax and 55 grains of 3F Swiss powder. That works well and if you lube the screw plug threads with a mix of Crisco and beeswax and load carefully, powder fouling won't bind the plug until you fire 30-40 rounds.

Here is a thread that goes into a lot of detail about the history and building a Ferguson for those interested.

https://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/...uson-rifle-from-rifle-shoppe-part-set.160115/
dave
 
Oh, my!! Wifey will certainly be looking over my shoulder now. Been wanting one ever since I read Louis Lamour's book "The Ferguson Rifle".
 
Hi,
In a TRS Ferguson you will get 55-60 grains of 3F behind a round ball ranging in size from 0.615-0.648" diameter. The chamber has a shoulder upon which the ball rests. I am not sure TRS copied the powder chamber accurately because I believe the originals could load well over 65 grains of German double strength superfine powder (probably similar to today's Swiss 3F). Some shooters have great success with carbine ball (0.615), which is what the originals were designed to shoot. I cannot get any acceptable accuracy with that ball so I currently use 0.648 balls lubed with beeswax and 55 grains of 3F Swiss powder. That works well and if you lube the screw plug threads with a mix of Crisco and beeswax and load carefully, powder fouling won't bind the plug until you fire 30-40 rounds.

Here is a thread that goes into a lot of detail about the history and building a Ferguson for those interested.

https://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/...uson-rifle-from-rifle-shoppe-part-set.160115/
dave
Dave, I have a close friend of many years that I shoot and build muzzle loaders with and was talking to him tonight about building a Ferguson and mentioned your name. He said he knew a Dave Pearson he shot with that lived in Fairbanks AK some years ago and was wondering if you were the same guy. I see your handle is Person not Pearson but thought I'd ask.
His name is Pat Reed of Wasilla AK.
 
curious as to what the thread profile is like, on the breech components. I know its a multiple lead screw, basically 1 turn/1" X11.
for some reason :dunno: as a hobby machinist, threads and such are a bit of a fascination to me..
 
Thank you for the information. It said the powder chamber held 72 grains I would guess of 1 or possibly 2F black powder and was .65 cal.
Sporting model has 10 thread breech screw and original has 11 threads.
Asking price for finished action kit is $1895.00 and $100.00 less for unfinished.
Interesting gun kit but not sure I'm quite that interested !
That ain't much money these days. More than fair price for what you're getting.
 
That ain't much money these days. More than fair price for what you're getting.
True, the last one had a completed lock which was nice. Someone thinking about it now will have to either haveto have the skills to build the lock from castings or find someone else which could make it much more difficult.
 
curious as to what the thread profile is like, on the breech components. I know its a multiple lead screw, basically 1 turn/1" X11.
for some reason :dunno: as a hobby machinist, threads and such are a bit of a fascination to me..
I have built one of these... The thread is V form, 11 start and tapered! The plug is 2" long and goes from .878 at the base to .830 at the top.

I have no idea how TRS machines these, but I suspect is it using something like a Fuzee engine which was developed for clock making.

Be aware the Ferguson has some fundamental design weaknesses around the fitting of the stock. The design requires a lot of wood to be removed to inlet the breech fitting and there is not that much left to support the stock. Be very careful when removing wood to fit the breech pipe into the stock. Make sure the back of the breech is bearing well on the stock face and that you need to leave clearance at the rear of the screw pipe fitting and the stock. You need the firing shock to be taken through the head of the stock from the rear of the breech and not by the side of the breech screw pipe on the lower part of the stock as this could split the stock. I suspect this was the reason for many of the original guns breaking...! You also need to leave a small gap at the end of the breech tang for the same reason.. (as with many ML designs..!)

My Ferguson leaked a bit from the base of the screw plug, which I mostly cured by scraping the handle against the base of the screw pipe to get a good seal. This seems to vary a bit between guns.. some leak from the top of the screw, some from the bottom. Make sure you wear good eye protection when shooting these!
 
I have built one of these... The thread is V form, 11 start and tapered! The plug is 2" long and goes from .878 at the base to .830 at the top.

I have no idea how TRS machines these, but I suspect is it using something like a Fuzee engine which was developed for clock making.

Be aware the Ferguson has some fundamental design weaknesses around the fitting of the stock. The design requires a lot of wood to be removed to inlet the breech fitting and there is not that much left to support the stock. Be very careful when removing wood to fit the breech pipe into the stock. Make sure the back of the breech is bearing well on the stock face and that you need to leave clearance at the rear of the screw pipe fitting and the stock. You need the firing shock to be taken through the head of the stock from the rear of the breech and not by the side of the breech screw pipe on the lower part of the stock as this could split the stock. I suspect this was the reason for many of the original guns breaking...! You also need to leave a small gap at the end of the breech tang for the same reason.. (as with many ML designs..!)

My Ferguson leaked a bit from the base of the screw plug, which I mostly cured by scraping the handle against the base of the screw pipe to get a good seal. This seems to vary a bit between guns.. some leak from the top of the screw, some from the bottom. Make sure you wear good eye protection when shooting these!
 
I can cut tapered threads on my lathe. I was playing with a spiral tapered barrel once
It isn't the taper that's a problem so much as the pitch. I would employ a helical gear attachment on either a vertical or horizontal milling machine. For the receiver, the only thing I can think of is a shaper with a key cutter arbor and some sort of indexable sine bar rig to rotate the receiver in time with the ram. The breech plug could also be cut with the shaper this way.
 
Yes, barrel out, bare receiver. Bore the breech plug hole and......then what? Just go at it with a threading bar? I'm trying to think if I have enough change gears to thread a pitch that fast.

The pitch is extremely fast, would need quite the reduction in the back gears to make it practical to cut with a threading bar. 11 starts makes for an interesting puzzle with the half nuts, and you'd need to grind a special threading tool at an angle to get a true 60 degree thread form.
 
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Yes, barrel out, bare receiver. Bore the breech plug hole and......then what? Just go at it with a threading bar? I'm trying to think if I have enough change gears to thread a pitch that fast.

The pitch is extremely fast, would need quite the reduction in the back gears to make it practical to cut with a threading bar. 11 starts makes for an interesting puzzle with the half nuts, and you'd need to grind a special threading tool at an angle to get a true 60 degree thread form.
And the breech screw appears to have a taper top to bottom. My Clausing ATlas has no gear cluster that will cut that thread.
I'm thinking it will require a broach cut on a dividing table with a helix guided sine bar. And investment cast that only needs cleaned up would be the way to go for the breech screw me thinks.
I could be mistaken but it looked like the breech and barrel were one piece in the picture.
 
I could be mistaken but it looked like the breech and barrel were one piece in the picture.
It does look that way, ill try digging it back out. From what I recall looking at it without calipers. . .
I assume the barrel is rifled and threaded onto the breach. The breach is threaded for the barrel and screw. The screw is not a tapered thread. Just what I remember from a glance.
 
felix wrote < I have built one of these... The thread is V form, 11 start and tapered! The plug is 2" long and goes from .878 at the base to .830 at the top. >

Thanks you, for the info you provided! I appreciate your answering my questions..

Respect Always
Metalshaper/Jonathan
 
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