For the Thompson Center Folks.

Outdoor industry figure Gregg Ritz announced on Monday that he had acquired Thompson/Center Arms and plans to "reinvigorate the brand and its legacy in the firearms market." Ritz was previously the CEO of the company prior to 2007.May 2, 2024

I hope all products return. I have sighted all rifles with The Thompson Center Cheap shots. The Poly Tipped, copper jacketed stuff just fails to often for my taste.

I do not know if the wait is going to be as bad as GOEX.

You don't honestly think they're going to resume making traditional style muzzleloaders do you?

They claimed there going to bring back the hawken, may take a couple years.

Duk said:

They claimed there going to bring back the hawken, may take a couple years.

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If and when they do, be prepared to step up too $1000 plus. Hope they do it. My current TCs will double or triple in value. Which honestly doesn't matter. Pretty much all my guns will be staying in the family.

If they were smart- which I doubt- they would produce a very well tuned FLINTLOCK. Since caps are sky high right now.

The vast majority of hunters today in the US purchase and shoot muzzleloaders to take advantage of additional hunting an additional hunting season or two.
They have no interest whatsoever in the traditional aspect of muzzleloading, and never will.
Modern projectiles, 209 primers and pelletized substitutes have driven muzzleloading hunting and will continue to do so as improvements to current equipment are developed.
I do not think T/C will ever make another traditional rifle or pistol as the market for them would be too small.

They just bought an empty factory here in my home town and got a 10 year tax embayment from the town. No word on when or what is coming. It's about 6 miles from my house and I am looking forward to seeing what jobs are available.

Word is the Contender and Encore will be first to return to production.

They should concentrate on a very high quality target pistol to compete with pedersoli in that area.

I was very much into anything Thompson/Center in the 80's. Was a member of TCA. In my opinion, TC went downhill when Greg Ritz got involved. I would not expect him to make new production traditional style muzzleloaders.

Uncle Miltie said:

The vast majority of hunters today in the US purchase and shoot muzzleloaders to take advantage of additional hunting an additional hunting season or two.
They have no interest whatsoever in the traditional aspect of muzzleloading, and never will.
Modern projectiles, 209 primers and pelletized substitutes have driven muzzleloading hunting and will continue to do so as improvements to current equipment are developed.
I do not think T/C will ever make another traditional rifle or pistol as the market for them would be too small.

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No kidding. "Traditional" muzzleloading deer seasons now include rifles utilizing smokeless powder and optics capable of 1000 yard accuracy. Today's hunter is not demanding more reliable flintlocks.

All I've seen and heard in Ritz's announcements and streams is supporting the Encore platform. I suspect owners of that system will be their primary customers for the next few years. Traditional guns and accessories have not been mentioned in anything I've seen so far. It would be hard to be competitive with CVA and Traditions in the limited market for flint and percussion sidelocks.

I don't think a rebirth of T/C would result in the same quality product. Three would be unwelcome differences, visually and mechanically. And quality. There would be differences the maker would believe to be "improvements," which would ruin what T/C lovers loved about originals. Look at Colt's reentry to revolvers.

Uncle Miltie said:

The vast majority of hunters today in the US purchase and shoot muzzleloaders to take advantage of additional hunting an additional hunting season or two.
They have no interest whatsoever in the traditional aspect of muzzleloading, and never will.
Modern projectiles, 209 primers and pelletized substitutes have driven muzzleloading hunting and will continue to do so as improvements to current equipment are developed.
I do not think T/C will ever make another traditional rifle or pistol as the market for them would be too small.

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Amen, Bro. Tradition and remembering history seems to have vanished from the American scene. Some states, including my Arkansas, have abandoned a muzzle loading season and now called it an 'alternative' season allowing modern guns but restricted to straight walled ammo.

Someone should make TC lock parts frizzens, frizzen springs and such. If not TC someone else.

I would buy one if done right and if they beat Kibler to the draw.

COTNTOP said:

I would buy one if done right and if they beat Kibler to the draw.

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Beat Kibler to the draw? Do you mean Kibler might produce a rifle so far from authentic as a T/C, do you?

Uncle Miltie said:

The vast majority of hunters today in the US purchase and shoot muzzleloaders to take advantage of additional hunting an additional hunting season or two.
They have no interest whatsoever in the traditional aspect of muzzleloading, and never will.
Modern projectiles, 209 primers and pelletized substitutes have driven muzzleloading hunting and will continue to do so as improvements to current equipment are developed.
I do not think T/C will ever make another traditional rifle or pistol as the market for them would be too small.

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All due respect, but I think there's about 24,000 of us here that might disagree.

Eterry said:

All due respect, but I think there's about 24,000 of us here that might disagree.

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Disagree all you want, it doesn't make him wrong. Think 24,000 is a lot of shooters? How many of them have money in hand and are clamoring for an American built sidelock that they'll have a hard time finding caps for?

The membership of Long Range Hunting, Accurate Shooter, and 24hr campfire together are almost 300,000. The members of LRH (122,000) and Accurate Shooter (74,000) are mostly going to be the big scopes, sabots, and fancy pelts crowd. I'm sure some own traditional equipment, but largely it's a novelty to them and not a way of life like it is for some here. The muzzleloader is just a ticket to them that admits them to another week of hunting, they want it to be as easy as possible with as little handicap as possible.

Lyman quit muzzleloaders. CVA makes only inlines. Midway currently has 49 different models of inlines in stock, while guns using No.11 or musket caps is 18. They don't even list a flintlock anymore and I wouldn't be surprised if a large number of the "out of stock, no backorder" sidelocks get dropped in the future. They're going to stock what they know will sell.

Will T/C build traditional? No idea; probably not but some will hope. I think if they do, they're going to be a stones throw away from a thousand bucks (the GPR was ~$700 when it disappeared). I don't see them getting much traction if they go in that direction, especially if the word is out among traditional enthusiasts that Jim has eventual plans for a plains style rifle.

The new traditions great plains list at $700-$900 and most good TC flints are lusting for over $600. So , i guess a new TC would be in the $1,000 area.

Kind if makes a new Kibler sound like a good price.

I suspect TC will make percussion guns at first. The big difference over Kibler is they will make finished guns ready to shoot.

Where I live almost nobody shoots flint or could possibly put together a Kibler kit. It seems like Traditions stays sold out of many of their products so the market is there.

There seems to be a point where people tire of high tech "improvements" and the increased cost of putting together a rig. In archery the latest and greatest rig right may set you back 3K or more. There is a definite resurgence in Traditional archery where a passible rig may cost you as little as $200 and is a lot more fun.

Hopefully the same will happen in the black powder realm. The big stumbling block is the notion by many who don't know squat about replica arms is that they are only effective at ranges of 50 yards and less. I have heard this over and over when I posted one of my new rifle builds on my Facebook page for my local friends to see. I get asked the same question " how far away can you kill a deer with that" then they say" I heard it was only 50 yards away or less". At which point I tell them that my .54 hunting load at 100 yards has the same ballistics as if you fired a .45 ACP round point blank at a deer's chest. The last guy who asked said, "WOW, I didn't know that".