An Early Vermont Rifle

[dave_person]

Dave,
Every picture in this thread has disappeared, only your last post, it is showing a string of little blue boxes with question marks in them.
Robby

Hi Robby,
It may be that the thread is loading really slowly for some reason on your end because of all the images. It may be timing out before images are successfully loaded. Has anything slowed your internet speed recently?

dave

 

[Raz]

Hi,
Finished it. I think I preserved the rural feel despite refining some things relative to the original rifles. The carving behind the cheek piece is simple, partly reflects the rather crude incised lines Hills carved but embellishes them a bit. Same with the carving around the barrel tang. The staining and finish came out well and the wood really shows the figure. It has a Rice "C" weight 54 caliber barrel cut back from 44" to 41". The lock is a Chambers early Ketland lock that I modified. I case hardened the plate, cock, and top jaw and then temper blued them. I also cased the frizzen and tempered it to 375 degrees F. Trigger pull is a crisp 2.5 lbs. The rifle weighs 8lbs. The sights are high and clearly quite a bit of height will come off the front sight but I will wait until the owner and I shoot it.






























I have to finish making a New England fowler but after that I am done with New England guns for a while.

dave

Great job.

 

[Robby]

Well, it probably is the thread Dave. I'm not even getting the little blue boxes now. This is the only thread where this is happening on this site. I only visit a couple sites and everything seems to be in order there as well. I'll leave it up for a while and see what develops.
Waited ten minutes and still nothing. interesting!
Robby

 

[dave_person]

Hi Robby,
I have no idea why they would not load for you. If you click on other threads I've posted like the one about my apprentice, do you still get photos? The photos are all hosted by imgBB. I wonder if your browser is blocking that hosting sight for some reason.

dave

 

[Brokennock]

Hi Robby,
I have no idea why they would not load for you. If you click on other threads I've posted like the one about my apprentice, do you still get photos? The photos are all hosted by imgBB. I wonder if your browser is blocking that hosting sight for some reason.

dave

I don't usually look at the section of the ALR where this would be. Did you post this thread there?
I'm wondering if the pics would work for @Robby on that site for some reason.

 

[Robby]

I just went to My Apprentice and Her English Fowler
The pictures are gone from there too. Now it is getting real interesting!
Robby

 

[dave_person]

Hi Robby,
It probably means your browser is blocking photos hosted by imgBB for some reason. If you click on the link below do you get the image?
https://proxy.imagearchive.com/f5a/f5a475e685875b4fded660e897b4686c.jpgHi Brokennock, yes the thread is posted on the ALR site under John Hills Rifle.
dave

 

[Robby]

Dave, I do see the image posted in your reference.
I saw the completed rifle on the ALR site. Interesting architecture for a New England gun, to me anyway. Your execution is masterful as always, I really enjoy seeing your work, both in progress and finished, thank you.
Robby

 

[dave_person]

Hi and thanks Robby,

I just don't get why you cannot load the photos. It is bizarre. The Hills family made guns for years in Goshen, CT near the NY border and they definitely were influenced by the Hudson River Valley. I also suspect John Hills must have seen rifles made in PA, perhaps when the Rev War was active in Vermont and northern NY in 1777 and Dan Morgan's men were at Saratoga.

dave

 

[dave_person]

Hi,
The owner came over yesterday to pick up the rifle. I set up a target and bench so he could test it out. at 50 yards. I sighted it in with a laser bore sighter in the shop, which almost always gets the first shots on paper in the scoring areas. It is particularly good at getting the windage close to zeroed. I left the front sight high and assumed the rifle would shoot low initially. We used 55 grains of 3F powder, 0.530 caliber balls, and 0.015" thick patches lubed with Ballistol and water. I took the first shot and assuming it would shoot low, I aimed at 12 o'clock at the top of the outer scoring area. The bullet hit right where I aimed but the patch was a mess. It was burned through so I had little faith that the shot told us anything about the sights. I passed the gun to Curt and he aimed at the center of the target . He hit in the 9 ring just missing the 10. He shoots again, and it is a 9 just outside the 10. I told him we need at least 3 shots for a standard deviation so he fired again and it was in the 10. He shot another in the 9 ring barely outside the 10. He fired one more and it was at 6 o'clock in the 8 ring just outside the 9. I looked at the patch for that shot and it was not centered on the ball and was burned through on one side. Anyway, we were all pretty happy. All of the patches showed a little burn through so he will have to work on that. The round bottomed rifling in Rice barrels tends to do better with thick patches so I suspect he will do well with 0.020-0.022"" thick patches and 0.0526 caliber balls. He also needs to experiment with 2F powder. Anyway, the sights appear in good shape for now but he has to do a lot more experimenting.

dave

 

[Robby]

Brokennock suggested I erase my cookies to see if that would help. Not being a computerphile I decided to have a cup of coffee, two of my wife's fresh baked chocolate chip cookies and muse on just how I might do this. Well the ones before me were erased lickity-split and a quick search told me exactly what I must do to erase those nebulous non-edibles in the netherworld.
I am happy to report that it was a success and the pictures of your wonderful work are once again available to me. Thank you Brokennock, thank you Dave.
Robby

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

Beautiful!!

 

[Brokennock]

Brokennock suggested I erase my cookies to see if that would help. Not being a computerphile I decided to have a cup of coffee, two of my wife's fresh baked chocolate chip cookies and muse on just how I might do this. Well the ones before me were erased lickity-split and a quick search told me exactly what I must do to erase those nebulous non-edibles in the netherworld.
I am happy to report that it was a success and the pictures of your wonderful work are once again available to me. Thank you Brokennock, thank you Dave.
Robby

You're welcome Robby.

Best regards,
Dave
aka... Brokennock