.58 cal Harpers ferry

[hawkeye2]

BTW, the .58 rifling for most if not all of the production is a slow twist with shallow groves for a mini since they were using the rifle-musket tooling.

 

[Stantheman86]

I recall Dixie used to recommend a .58 Minie with 40 gr of 2f but they changed it.

It's a toss up, you can have a .58 rifled flint pistol that fires Minies with a questionable lock or a percussion .54 smoothbore......

I with Pedersoli would just make a .54 smoothbore Aston Johnson repro , for the NSSA events.

That .54 Harper's Ferry seems tempting , they probably make them with a little better QC given the intent to use them as match pistols.

They would be fun to make paper cartridges for with .520 round balls.

 

[hawkeye2]

I'm with you on the Johnson repro, guys age gobbeling up good ones to shoot. I have a flint that I've never shot but I like the way it points and I expect the caplock version would be a good match gun it the quality was up there.

 

[Stantheman86]

I wouldn't want to shoot an original a lot but I'm sure Pedersoli could do a nice repro.

The Harper's Ferry would look good after a few range trips to get some patina on that white steel and tarnish that brass up. In some ways its kinda cosmetically close to an Aston Johnson.

 

[hawkeye2]

The Harpers Ferry is a handsom pistol and a suitable companion to the 1803 rifle which might just be the best looking rifle to ever see service with the U.S. Army. The MIlitary Police thought the pistol attractive enough that a crossed pair has been featured on their emblem for 96 years.

 

[Stantheman86]

I'm strongly considering getting a smoothbore .54 Harper's Ferry pistol just for fun range shooting.

It would be fun to make .520 round ball paper cartridges for it.

I kinda gave up my desire for a dedicated "match" pistol now that I have a Plains Pistol and I want a fun smoothbore military pistol now.....I had wanted a Pedersoli AN IX but I heard they eat flints so I kinda reconsidered it.

 

[Stantheman86]

For those who aren't afraid of the Indian made guns , there is the 1822 French caplock conversion pistol that has a nice look to it, similar to an Aston Johnson.

It has a rear sight so I guess it takes it out of the competition arena. Likely the sights are nowhere near POI anyway. For $375 I'm gonna pick one up.

 

[Road_Clam]

Those of you considering the Pedersoli Harper's Ferry be forewarned the lock design is GARBAGE. I generally don't make a habit of bad mouthing firearms but the HF absolutely deserves it period. I contacted Pedersoil and was basically told in broken English translation "nothing wrong with our locks" . When new , I was lucky if I got off 4 out of 10 shot attempts. My final solution was Cabin Creek, and even they commented the lock design is very poor. My HF lock is extremly abusive on flints. The hammer by design drives the flint almost straight into the frizzen , not at a gradual arc angle. My stock frizzen was gouged after like only 30 shots. Brad at Cabin Creek re-ground and hardened my frizzen and it's much better now.

https://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/threads/thank-you-brad-at-cabin-creek.111104/

 

[Tanglefoot]

I have a flint pistol which is a clone of the HF but with different markings. It had the same ignition problems out of the box, and a friend of mine fixed it by cutting a small slice of metal from the front leg of the double-throat cock and then rewelding the metal. The goal was to change the strike angle of the flint, and it worked very well. She's a a good sparker now and she shoots center if I do my job. She was marked .58 but I had a hard time loading .562 .RB. She turned out to be a .56.

 

[Stantheman86]

I honestly wouldn't buy a flint Harper's Ferry and I'm on the fence with getting an AN IX, I just think they're cool and they likely have a better lock

I would maybe check out a percussion Harper's Ferry though.

 

[hawkeye2]

Dollar for dollar I'd look for something else unless I absolutly had to have a Harpers Ferry.

 

[Smokey Plainsman]

I honestly wouldn't buy a flint Harper's Ferry and I'm on the fence with getting an AN IX, I just think they're cool and they likely have a better lock

I would maybe check out a percussion Harper's Ferry though.

The percussion model is a superb gem. Here’s mine:

Despite being a smoothbore .54 with just a front sight, it is superbly accurate. I can’t speak for the flintlock version but I can’t express how much I like this caplock. The design is based on arsenal conversions done to originals that served during the Mexican War and even in the early parts of the Civil War in the south, so the percussion model is based in history and is not a fantasy gun. In fact, the rifled .58s with their historically incorrect color case hardened locks are much less historically accurate in fact. You can find originals converted to caplock from auctions on the net. Overall a great gun! Superb trigger, extreme reliability, great accuracy. The best Pedersoli pistol I’ve ever seen let alone owned.

 

[nkbj]

L&R wrote me back.
They don't make a lock that will fit.

 

[Stantheman86]

The percussion model is a superb gem. Here’s mine:

Despite being a smoothbore .54 with just a front sight, it is superbly accurate. I can’t speak for the flintlock version but I can’t express how much I like this caplock. The design is based on arsenal conversions done to originals that served during the Mexican War and even in the early parts of the Civil War in the south, so the percussion model is based in history and is not a fantasy gun. In fact, the rifled .58s with their historically incorrect color case hardened locks are much less historically accurate in fact. You can find originals converted to caplock from auctions on the net. Overall a great gun! Superb trigger, extreme reliability, great accuracy. The best Pedersoli pistol I’ve ever seen let alone owned.

I love it, I may have to get one

 

[Stantheman86]

L&R wrote me back.
They don't make a lock that will fit.

Could you get a hammer and Drum from Pedersoli, from their "conversion " model and have a skilled gunsmith just convert it to percussion?