My Baker Rifle - finally finished and firing

[Larks]

.....mostly.....

A couple of photos of my finished TRS Baker Rifle. It took a while and it can do with some tuning (or perhaps I could do with some educating on how to use it properly.....) but I am thrilled with the final result and I had never guessed just how much fun it would be to shoot. I love it

 

[Larks]

And a bit of video of my first shot(s) from when I took it down to our local range with a good mate to test it out at 50 metres. I was really happy with initial results – in so far as it fired and I landed on paper on my very first shot ever fired from this rifle.

I mostly used reduced loads of 60grains of Wano FFg with 3 grains of Wano FFFFg for the primer and round ball shot that weighed in at 315 to 319 grain.

I’d left my normal range bag with my ear plugs and prescription safety glasses at home and I really didn’t know whether I was doing everything correctly but we had a lot of fun. I started out with the paper cartridges but found they became difficult to feed, to the point that I didn’t realise that I’d not been seating the ball fully down the barrel......(and wondering why I was missing everything after that first shot). So I switched to lubricated patches and I reckon I’ll stick with them.

A bit of frustration with a whole lot of failures to spark (as you’ll see in the video) . We managed to get it firing (though more by good luck than good measure I think) - if we were facing the Frenchies I’d be toast….

This is my first ever flintlock so I really don’t yet know what I don’t know …….and I don’t know what is causing the reliability issues. Initially I didn’t have the flint well seated but sorting that out didn’t resolve it for long.

The flint built up a black residue underneath the strike edge so I swapped it out and the new one seemed to work for a while, but not consistently.

The hammer seems to be well hardened and when it does spark it seems to spark well.

So is it the way I have the flint fitted? I’m using a leather wrap and I’d been advised to wet it when setting the flint.

Do I need to clean the underside of the flint after every few shots? If so how?

Could it be that I’ve got the feather spring set too light? Given that it does spark well at other times…?

How long should a flint last and what should I be doing to maintain them?

 

[Stumbling Buffalo]

Very nice rifle! How long for delivery of the kit from TRS?

 

[satwel]

Congrats on your nice build!
Seems like she'll be a great shooter once you master the nuances of flintlock shooting that comes with experience.
Please don't shoot your rifle with the paper cartridges placed on the bench next to the rifle. I cringed when I watched your video. Sparks from the vent could easily land in the box and set off all the cartridges. I urge you to either cover the cartridge box or move it so it's behind you. Same goes for your powder flask. Please cover the spout or move it safely away from potential sparks. I put my powder measure over the spout to keep the flask safe from sparks when I load off a bench. We want you to enjoy shooting your flintlock for many years.

Cheers

 

[Larks]

Very nice rifle! How long for delivery of the kit from TRS?

Not quite as long as I’d been warned, I think it was about 8 months including shipping to Australia because they had a full kit ready to go...... I gather that’s fairly quick by they’re standards.

I’ve mentioned it before here but I ordered a completed lock and they mistakenly sent the lock kit instead. Initially they said that they’d post me the completed lock and I was happy to pay the extra to keep the lock kit as well but that never appeared and when I followed up they started ghosting me. Which is unfortunate as the lock is the one thing that’s given me the most issue with the build.

I’ve also tried to order a Heavy Dragoon pistol kit and the powder cask castings for the flintlock but again they’ve ignored that ........ ..... I’m guessing they’re just not wanting the hassle of shipping overseas but instead of letting me know if that’s the case they’ve just refused to respond to any correspondence (email, phone calls and letters).

 

[Larks]

Congrats on your nice build!
Seems like she'll be a great shooter once you master the nuances of flintlock shooting that comes with experience.
Please don't shoot your rifle with the paper cartridges placed on the bench next to the rifle. I cringed when I watched your video. Sparks from the vent could easily land in the box and set off all the cartridges. I urge you to either cover the cartridge box or move it so it's behind you. Same goes for your powder flask. Please cover the spout or move it safely away from potential sparks. I put my powder measure over the spout to keep the flask safe from sparks when I load off a bench. We want you to enjoy shooting your flintlock for many years.

Cheers

Thanks mate - and yes I did initially think of that but got swept away with the excitement and then simply became complacent. Given how much fallout that I see in the video’s I’d say that I was just lucky ....... these times anyway....

 

[PathfinderNC]

Congratulations! Looks like you had a grand time. I am sure you will get better with that cool rifle the more you use it.
(Just a polite suggestion if I may. Don’t ever keep a box full of cartridges or a powder flask on the shooting table, especially on the right side of your flintlock. Accidents happen.)

 

[Thingamajiggy]

That's a beauty. If we assume your frizzen is hard, being new could be several things. How does the strike surface on frizzen look, is it scoured evenly or does it appear to be skipping? how far from frizzen is end of flint at half cock? 1/16 to 1/8 inch (2-3mm) away is usually right. Could definitely be dirty as well, frizzen also, alcohol wipes work great for that. Depending on weather conditions or amount of powder in flash pan, might need to wipe often. good luck and keep is posted.

 

[Colonial Boy]

Great build, and wish you every success with it.
Nice looking range as well; where’s it at?
I get up to Queensland four or five times a year as the youngest son lives in Brisbane.

 

[TDM]

You did a good job! Looks great! Always been fond of the Baker.

 

[Larks]

Great build, and wish you every success with it.
Nice looking range as well; where’s it at?
I get up to Queensland four or five times a year as the youngest son lives in Brisbane.

It’s at the Gold Coast Pistol Club and yes it is a good range with very good facilities - longest range is 50 metres but for the sake of testing it saved a trip up to Belmont range in Brisbane. I’ll head up there soon though to test it out to a few hundred metres

 

[Bushfire]

Great stuff mate

Are you going to take her hunting?

 

[Larks]

Great stuff mate

Are you going to take her hunting?

Thanks mate. And no, I gave up hunting when I met my wife . I used to do quite a bit of it in the NT when I lived in Alice Springs, even got paid for it for a few times (TB eradication). As much as every now and then I get interested in deer eradication (they weren’t the problem when I gave up hunting that they are now) I confess that I don’t really miss it.

 

[Sam squanch]

Very nice rifle! How long for delivery of the kit from TRS?

About 300 years…. In my experience..

 

[Stumbling Buffalo]

Sam, in that case I don' believe I'll last to the delivery date.

 

[Sam squanch]

I’m waiting for parts I ordered 10 years ago…… I gave up.

 

[Larks]

That's a beauty. If we assume your frizzen is hard, being new could be several things. How does the strike surface on frizzen look, is it scoured evenly or does it appear to be skipping? how far from frizzen is end of flint at half cock? 1/16 to 1/8 inch (2-3mm) away is usually right. Could definitely be dirty as well, frizzen also, alcohol wipes work great for that. Depending on weather conditions or amount of powder in flash pan, might need to wipe often. good luck and keep is posted.

The set of flints that I bought, which I gather come from RMC Ox-Yoke in the US, vary in size and shape a bit but they leave about 3mm to 6mm gap behind the hammer/frizzen at half cock.

Looking at the face of the hammer the flints seem to be sometimes scouring evenly downwards but possibly skipping at least once and not evenly along the hammer - I’m guessing mostly because of the flint shape.

The last flint that I used was the second from right in the pic above, protruding a little at the centre of the strike edge, but looking at my hammer now that I’ve taken a photo I’m seeing a bit of a gouge down the centre of the face which has me questioning my case hardening again.

I’m also seeing a possible hollow in the lower right third of the hammer. I flattened it over a linisher wheel with a fine belt and scouring belt so it “should” be flat or level across the face........but I was very nervous about messing up the profile when I finished it so perhaps it’s not as level as it could be.....

 

[jefair1]

Thanks mate. And no, I gave up hunting when I met my wife . I used to do quite a bit of it in the NT when I lived in Alice Springs, even got paid for it for a few times (TB eradication). As much as every now and then I get interested in deer eradication (they weren’t the problem when I gave up hunting that they are now) I confess that I don’t really miss it.

What is "TB eradication?"

 

[acavdragoon]

What a nice looking rifle!

I got one of those IMA Bakers cap lock, that was in sad shape. I steamed or boiled the metal parts, then carded them. Was totally surprised the original blue just popped. I wash the stock with Murphy’s and put a few coats of BLO.

 

[Thingamajiggy]

The set of flints that I bought, which I gather come from RMC Ox-Yoke in the US, vary in size and shape a bit but they leave about 3mm to 6mm gap behind the hammer/frizzen at half cock.

View attachment 241840

Looking at the face of the hammer the flints seem to be sometimes scouring evenly downwards but possibly skipping at least once and not evenly along the hammer - I’m guessing mostly because of the flint shape.

The last flint that I used was the second from right in the pic above, protruding a little at the centre of the strike edge, but looking at my hammer now that I’ve taken a photo I’m seeing a bit of a gouge down the centre of the face which has me questioning my case hardening again.

I’m also seeing a possible hollow in the lower right third of the hammer. I flattened it over a linisher wheel with a fine belt and scouring belt so it “should” be flat or level across the face........but I was very nervous about messing up the profile when I finished it so perhaps it’s not as level as it could be.....


View attachment 241843

With good spark some of the time, I don't think it's a hardening issue. It does appear that the flint is missing a large portion of your frizzen so that could be a part of your problem. More flint to frizzen contact, the more spark. Does appear to be hitting high enough though so I don't think it's a space between flint and frizzen issue. The way I see it, either flint/frizzen is dirty/ oily and need cleaned or your not getting enough flint contact, especially with some flints since you seemed to have better results with some flints more than others. This could be due to flint shape or frizzen shape. There are plenty here with more experience with this then me so i'm sure you'll get more possible solutions.