I'm new to black powder firearms. I have a Pietta Colt 1851 and wanted to get a rifle of some sort. I found a CVA Hawken rifle on gunbroker that looked like it was in good condition. I recieved it yesterday but the crown looks horrible. Is this normal for this rifle?
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No. That is not normal for a muzzleloading guns crown.
It looks like someone decided to "crown" the muzzle and they used a multi-fluted countersink mounted in an electric drill. These countersinks will usually "chatter" when this is done and it will leave a surface just like the one on your gun.
If you decide to fix it yourself, you can remove the chatter marks by using some "wet/dry" black silicone carbide sandpaper and something spherical to back the paper up with. One thing that comes to mind for something spherical that would be about the right size is a file handle. The kind of wooden handle that people put on the tang of their file to provide a safe way to handle and use a file.
These file handles come in several sizes so I would recommend buying one of the smaller ones which has a diameter maybe 1/4" to 3/8" larger than the bore diameter.
The closer it is to the size of your bore it is, the better it will work.
Ace hardware, Home Depot, Lowes and other similar stores have these and they don' cost much.
Follow this link if you don't know what I'm talking about:
https://www.zoro.com/nicholson-file-handle-wood-4-78-in-l-21526n/i/G2804907/
Start off using a 60 or 80 grit sandpaper, tearing it into a bunch of 1" X 1" squares. Use the spherical end to push the sandpaper down into the mouth of the bore and then rotate the sandpaper and handle back and forth. After a few twists, move the sandpaper a bit to the side and do it again. When all of the sanding grit is worn off of the piece of sandpaper, get a new one and start sanding it again.
Because there is quite a lot of material that needs to come off, it will take some work but I think there is enough sandpaper in one sheet to get rid of almost all of the marks.
When the marks seem to be gone, switch to a 120 grit paper and repeat the operation to smooth out the surface.
Before you are finished you will then need to break or round off all of the sharp edges left on the rifling grooves and the place where the bore meets the newly formed crown.
I recommend using 180 or 220 grit wet/dry paper for this and using your thumb instead of the hard file handle to push it down into the muzzle.
The softer thumb will allow the paper to conform to the shape of the surfaces and round off the edges.
When the edges are no longer sharp, you will have something that will never tear a cloth patch when you are loading.
If you don't like the bare steel color of the reworked muzzle you can use a instant gun bluing to darken the surface. I like Birchwood Casey "Perma Blue". The "Super Blue" is made for modern alloy steel barrels and usually doesn't work as well on the low carbon steels our barrels are made from.
