Belgian Colt Help

[Farmerted]

I bought a Belgian "Centaure" last year for not a whole lot of money. The gun is in great shape, overall, except that the arbor fit is so tight under the barrel that I believe some previous owner has loosened the arbor (it moves up and down a few thousandths of an inch) by forcing the barrel on. Under the hammer I can see where the threaded end has a miniscule pin at twelve o'clock fitted between the frame and arbor. The email at FROCS for info doesn't work for me so, can anyone tell me if this pin is original or not? Any recommendations for a fix? Thanks in advance.

 

[junkman_01]

The pin is original. You can tighten the arbor by using a punch on the pin and hammering it in firmer. This will require that you disassemble the gun and remove the hammer. I fixed the same problem on my ASM 1860 by drilling out the pin and threading the hole for a 8x32 set screw.

 

[Zonie]

Of all of the reproduction cap and ball revolvers I know of you have bought one of the most collectible.

Where there are many people like me who own well over a dozen different Italian cap and ball pistols they are not willing to pay a great deal for them.

Your Belgian "Centaure" on the other hand can fetch a pretty good price from the right person and they are rare enough that they don't even appear in the "Blue Book of Modern Black Powder Values".

I believe the original importer of your gun was Centennial Arms Corp and they go back to the late 1950's when they contracted with the same Belgian company which made licensed Colt's back in Sam Colt's days.
The gun they made was a copy of the Colt 1860 .44 caliber New Army pistol.
It had some features that were intentionally not the same as a real Colt pistol to reduce the possibilities of creating a forgery. As I recall, the rotation of the barrel twist was opposite the real Colt pistol.

I don't recall who but one of our members is making a study of these guns and their serial numbers. Hopefully he will chime in on your pistol.
Centennial Arms has been out of business for years.

Anyway, take care not to damage your gun. It may be fairly valuable.

 

[DOUBLEDEUCE 1]

The guy to get in touch with is Long Johns Wolf. He can give you some information about your Belgian Colt. He is in the members list if you want to look him up. :thumbsup:

 

[Long Johns Wolf]

Most Centaures have horizontal arbor lock pins only few come with vertical ones. If you feel you are having issues with the arbor send me a mail at [email protected]. I will then give you the contact information of a smith in the USA very experienced withe the repair of these Belgian Colts made between 1959 and 1973 by Fabriques d'Armes Unies de Liège in Belgium.
Long Johns Wolf