Bridled Or Not ?

[Treerat]

First I would like to say hi as this is my first post and would like to thank whoever took the time to help get me on here. Now on to my question. I'm thinking of a colonial era Virginia rifle for my next project and I have settled on the Jim Chambers Eary Ketland lock. Only trouble is it comes in two different versions (one with a bridled frizzen and one without). I think the plain one looks more authentic but I've never used an unbridled lock and have uneasy feelings about how well they would hold up. What has been the experience of some of you guys ?

Bill Curtis

 

[Zonie]

:imo: It depends on how PC you want to be and when in the Colonial era your talking about.

I believe most of the locks in the Pre Revolutionary War era had unbridled frizzens.
While the bridled frizzens are more robust, the older shoulder screw design served for over a hundred years.
I own several of Davis's older style locks with the unbridled frizzen, and although I haven't put many shots thru the guns their mounted on, they seem to work fine.

The worst that I can think of happening is for the screw to break. While that would ruin your day of shooting, it would be easily repaired.

 

[LSU TIGER]

I had a long talk with Jim Chambers about this subject. It turns out that the bridled frizzen was a sign of quality, not period. So, the question to answer is: do you want a "high quality" lock, or a "regular" quality lock? I like & use both.

 

[Treerat]

Thanks for the info. I'm glad I can go either way with confidence. The lock question is still somewhat open right now as all I have for this project so far is a 54 Rice c weight. Thanks again for the help.
Bill Curtis

 

[Stumpkiller]

Hey! Sympatico!

I'm having a 44" LC Rice "Dickert" .54 barrel wed to a Jim Chambers Early Germanic (Christians Spring) bridleless lock. Ought to be ready in about another forever.

 

the london firm of Barnett became very active in the gun trade before 1800 and made more Northwest guns then any other company. they evidently became the pricipal supplier to the Northwest Company, in later years for the HBC's.

george simpson wrote to the london office from lake athabaska in 1821
...... the trade guns"marked wilson) are not to be compared with those of "Barnetts" make which the NW coy. import, the locks are badly finished, soft in the hammer, the tumbler and shear are not properly tempered and the pan loses the powder: the NW locks are altogether better finished and bridled inside or the tumblers covered.



as to the bridled frizzen , i believe it came about somewhere in the early to mid 1800.
i think you would be fine with an un-bridled frizzen, carry a couple extra screws just in case you have one brake. you may have to make a more up front effort to protect the frizzen if you use the rifle for hunting but for range shooting, i wouldnt see a problem .

 

[LSU TIGER]

The 1746 Long Land Pattern Brown Bess had a bridled frizzen, and I've seen a French musket from the early 1700's with an added bridle. :m2c:

 

That

 

[Treerat]

Hey! Sympatico!

I'm having a 44" LC Rice "Dickert" .54 barrel wed to a Jim Chambers Early Germanic (Christians Spring) bridleless lock. "Ought to be ready in about another forever."

I know the feeling. Right now I have two .36 squirrel rifles going that I started building almost a year and a half ago. I hope to be done this winter as that is when I have the most time for hobbies so you might not think it so bad,but thats only half the story. On the one I'm building for myself the Getz barrel has resided in my closet since 1984,ditto for the maple blank. I guess that gave the steel plenty of time to get used to this Ky humidity so it doesn't warp. :crackup: