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- Feb 18, 2019
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On another related subject, back in the day, before I discovered there were some fairly reasonable sources for high quality reproduction Scottish pistols, I tried my hand at modifying the common reproduction Murdoch pistol which can be easily had. Of course, these pistols are much too big for one thing but, cosmetically, there are a couple of things that can be done to improve the look and make it more "unique." Here's what I did with some success, I think. (1) I replaced the factory cock with one from a Scottish pistol kit from TRS. These cocks have the circular wing and give the pistol a much better appearance IMHO. You have to use a small flat file to make the fit but that was easy even for a klutz like me. (2) The scroll butt is atrocious on two accounts, the rams-horn design and the vent pick. This modification took a bit more work. I drilled and reamed out the very thick metal on the rams-horns and thinned the metal down by at least half it not a bit more. I then took a propane torch, heated the rams horns and using a pair of large needle-nosed pliers, turned the curve to be much tighter and smaller as were many originals. Not tiny but more in a closed curve. I also punched a series of small "holes" or dings around the outer edge of the curve for decoration. This really enhanced the appearance! (3) I filed and polished down the brass medallions on the grip to make them much thinner and with an outside edge flush with the steel. This gave them a pleasing domed appearance. The next two steps I'll treat as one. I filed the trigger to get rid of the flat stem from the ball to the mechanism so that it was more round in appearance and less like a modern trigger. I also filed away at the vent pick on the butt and made it much smaller and round. In its out of the box state, the vent pick is 3-4x too big. This was the hardest part of the whole project as it's hard to hand file something smaller in a perfect sphere! If I had to do this again, I would get a gunsmith to fit a TRS trigger from the same kit mentioned above and replace the vent pick as well rather than trying to modify it myself. (I have to admit this is what I finally did as these parts are cheap!). And, finally, (5) I blued the steel. I used a cold blue process so I didn't get or want a deep black blue result. As all know, the originals of these pistols seemingly were either blued or browned to resist the elements and what we see today is the result of well-intentioned but overly vigorous cleaning. You know these pistols must have been spectacular with the brass and silver inlays on the blued steel backgrounds! What I got was a finish that was a dull, faded silver/blue that more that anything else took off the shiny new appearance and gave it a more "antiquey" or used look. The only think I didn't do because I couldn't wrap my head around what I wanted as an outcome was to modify the muzzle and give it less of a Flash Gordon ray-gun look. But I have to say, after blueing the finish, this because much less noticeable, again in MHO. I know this sounds like a lot of work but it did not seem to be and was fun. I have six-thumbs and do not do work like this well but I was please by the results and would recommend the project to any likely lad who wanted something that looks better and is not so common as the off-the-shelf product! I'd post some pictures but I sold this pistol many years ago.
