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odd repairs

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bubba.50

Barefoot Hillbilly
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I've seen all kinds of "repairs" on muzzleloaders in my day. usually concernin' usin' leather, wire, brass/copper sheet or some such to fix the stock. but I think the one I saw at the gunshow last weekend tops them all. an old cva with a broken mainspring was "fixed" by anchorin' one end of a carbureter return spring to the fore-end with a screw & big washer then wrappin' the other end around the hammer spur. anybody top that?
 
bubba.50 said:
an old cva with a broken mainspring was "fixed" by anchorin' one end of a carbureter return spring to the fore-end with a screw & big washer then wrappin' the other end around the hammer spur. anybody top that?
Well, if I needed the gun and it worked why not? Now would I sell it, or even display it proudly?? not a chance!
 
I have heard such repairs called "farmered" or "farmered up".

No disrespect at all. When you have to get a piece of equipment back in the field in a day or an hour there are no extra points for "like original" or "historically correct". Get it working and servicable with what is on hand.

These are the kind of engineers that will get us on the ocean floor or mining the asteroids. Don't be too critical . . . for other than historical accuracy. ;-)
 
[u]...... anybody top that? [/u]

um, maybe.

The return spring idea sounds like it would work, pretty clever and thinking outside the box.

I did see a guy whose sear wouldn't engage the notches in the tumbler on his 1803 HF. I was watching him hold the hammer with his thumb and while holding the trigger out of the way let his thumb slip off the hammer spur and fire the gun. (a flintlock for those who aren't sure what an 1803 Harper's Ferry is) I said "holly cow, fella', you're gonna hurt somebody doing that" he said, "oh, no, I've been doing this for years now, no problems so far." He was perfectly happy shooting it that way. I convinced him to let me take it back to the shop and repair it (free of charge and even shipped it to him for free just so he wouldn't hurt somebody with it)
 
It was not a repair but on an auction site I have seen an original late percussion rifle made that way.
It had a coil spring attached to the fore stock going to the hammer on a home made back action lockplate. There were no guts in the lock. The trigger had a lever that came out of the side of the rifle below the lock plate. The hammer had a filed half cock and full cock notch that engaged the external lever of the trigger.
 
I saw once where a fellow drilled into the barrel of his caplock rifle as he was mounting a scope base, and didn't understand he needed a special tap to complete the tapping process..., so he just drilled through and tapped the hole, and used an aluminum screw to mount the rear of the base, and existing holes for the adjustable rear sight to mount the forward part of the base...., and gee whiz, when he dropped two 50 grain pyrodex pellets into the barrel, and a TC Maxi-hunter slug..., to add to it, I don't think he used the right size hole, I think it was a few thousandths of an inch too big so the screw barely held... and that aluminum screw didn't hold when he touched off the rifle. :shocked2: Rather spectacular, and he's lucky he didn't lose an eye or his life. :shake:

LD
 
Can't recall if I saw it here or in a book but there were a number of pictures of muzzleloaders rigged up in different ways. Yankee ingenuity :thumbsup:
 
Used to visit the Grandparents' farm where my Mom grew up. Grandpa had a lot of equipment for the farm acreage, but his favorite for home garden use was an old Ford Tractor. Even back in the 60's it was already old enough that nobody stocked parts for it. Grandpa had a hammer, anvil, charcoal fire and bellows and routinely custom-fit steering parts, brackets, and parts for that tractor. All the parts looked like the originals, and they were all drop-in fit.

Occasionally he'd have to take something into town to have rethreaded, or turned down on a lathe, but he was able to take on making small and simple parts that most folks today wouldn't bother with. I've done the same over the years, but my parts have been mostly limited to pins and screws that I could spin in a chuck to file to proper diameter, or cut to proper length. It's often easier to make screws to fit than to special order something and wait for it to arrive.
 
These sort of skills are rapidly disappearing in Western society. An article in the local paper pointed out that whereas we were generally taught by our fathers (and grandfathers) how to fix things, kids, in general, aren't learning such "skills" these days (for a variety of reasons).
 
Are you kidding, these kids nowdays know everything! Shoot, all they have to do goggle it, or watch a YouTube video! :haha: but seriously in this age of hi tech stuff, most folk don't know how to do things, specially in them big city's, they have lost touch with reality. I have seen some strange repairs to firearms, and have done some myself just to get by. But I hate to modify one in such a way that it can't be returned to original as soon as I get the right parts.
 
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