Chambers English vs New England Fowlers

[old ugly]

i am bringing this back to the top. so much good info here.
thanks Dave

ou

 

[Darkgael]

Grinslade was a great help some years ago when I was agonizing over which fowler was the one for me. I ended up with a very nice reproduction of the New England #9. It was done for me by Mike Brooks. Points “like a wand” and weighs 6 1/4 lbs.

 

[erhunter]

What a beautiful firearm! From what I've seen, Mike Brooks builds some awesome guns. Get that grill ready, I think you'll be putting some game in there!

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

I built the Chambers English Officer's fusil about 6 years ago. I am very happy with it. It is light-weight, slender and shoulders nicely and it's fun to shoot. I bought it to use in the smoothbore events at the NMLRA territorial matches. I've won a few medals with it as well as a turkey and a bag of potatoes at a turkey shoot in Maine. So far I've only shot patched .590 round balls. I've yet to fire buck shot. The round faced English lock is first-rate, the barrel has a pronounced taper with dramatic flare at the muzzle. I'm no expert on authenticity, but to me it looks just like the pictures of Dave Person's English Fusils. My only regret is that I didn't install a silver wrist escutcheon when I built it.

Hi Satwel, I have the English fowler on order and since you built one before I have a question if you don't mind? I've been reading Dave Person's writing on the English fusils and he shows that the barrels on these guns didn't use pins to hold the barrel but metal tangs ( brain fart) . When you got you kit from Jim Chamber's what did they give you?
Thanks Rich

 

[Buckskinn]

Guns from Chambers have pins. You will have to modify to use keys if that is your choice. I stuck with the pins...

 

[dave_person]

Hi Rich,
Those "tangs" are called barrel keys. By the 1750s most good quality English sporting guns had barrel keys along with hooked tangs and breeches (also called break off breeches, standing breeches, false breeches). It was a system designed to allow easy and quick barrel removal for cleaning. After 1750 or so only British military, livery, and cheaper trade guns used pins. Even modest quality sporting guns had standing breeches and barrel keys. If I was building a Chambers English fowler, I would cut off the barrel tang and file the bolster into a hook. Then I would make or buy a proper standing breech from TRS and install it. I'd replace all the barrel lugs with slotted lugs for keys and make or buy 3 barrel keys. Hooked breeches are not hard to inlet if you glue or solder the tang to the hook while inletting.

dave

 

[satwel]

Hi Satwel, I have the English fowler on order and since you built one before I have a question if you don't mind? I've been reading Dave Person's writing on the English fusils and he shows that the barrels on these guns didn't use pins to hold the barrel but metal tangs ( brain fart) . When you got you kit from Jim Chamber's what did they give you?
Thanks Rich

Hi Rich. The English Officer's fusil comes with barrel pins. I think this is because it does not have a hooked breech plug and standing breech so the barrel is not easily removable.

 

[Grenadier1758]

Both my replica Derringer (replica) rifle and my 1803 Harper's Ferry (Rifle Shop) rifle have the keyed wedges while the solid breech plug is not hooked. While not as easy as removing a hooked breech barrel, the removal of the barrel by removing the tang bolt and the keys is not difficult and is not really a problem in removing the barrel for cleaning.

Change the pinned under barrel lugs for lugs that accept keys.

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

Hi Fellows, thank you all for your input, I don't know if I'm up to the task of cutting off the breach plug and making a hook, o I guess I could? I kind of like the idea of Grenadier, using the keys but keeping the solid breach plug.
Dave, in cutting the solid breach plug, how much should you allow to make a hook and does TRS have a special breech to match this fusil, I'll check out your file again to see what TRS had.
The idea of putting in the "keys" sounds good, thank you Dave, just couldn't bring the word to mind! In pinning the keys, is installing a small piece of wire the way it is done just to the side of the barrel channel within the key slot? I've always used pins before, that's why all the questions!
I'll look into TRS and check out what they have, I definitely am going with the "keys "and maybe after I get all the info and I'm confident enough in my head to cut the bolster and make a hook.....who knows!
Thanks again everyone!
Rich

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

Hi Rich,
Those "tangs" are called barrel keys. By the 1750s most good quality English sporting guns had barrel keys along with hooked tangs and breeches (also called break off breeches, standing breeches, false breeches). It was a system designed to allow easy and quick barrel removal for cleaning. After 1750 or so only British military, livery, and cheaper trade guns used pins. Even modest quality sporting guns had standing breeches and barrel keys. If I was building a Chambers English fowler, I would cut off the barrel tang and file the bolster into a hook. Then I would make or buy a proper standing breech from TRS and install it. I'd replace all the barrel lugs with slotted lugs for keys and make or buy 3 barrel keys. Hooked breeches are not hard to inlet if you glue or solder the tang to the hook while inletting.

dave

Hi Dave, just was looking at your tutorial on the fusil and how you did the breech and the hook, I can do that...I think! You mentioned that you were unable to find a proper tang that was high enough to make the hump, I have no way of making one, could you recommend one of the ones you tried that would be the best of the lot?

 

[dave_person]

Hi Rich,
It does not have to have the hump but you can get one from TRS that does. Can you tell me the breech dimension of the barrel on your fowler?

dave

 

[GREENSWLDE]

After planning on it for a long time, I was just about ready to order a Pennsylvania Fowler kit from Chambers for this winter until I decided that I wanted a fowler that had a little less in common with my last build which was a Lancaster rifle. That left me with the English Fowler/Officer's Fusil and the New England Fowler/Militia Musket kits as runners up. For the past few weeks I've been torn between the two and could use some insight. Winter is coming quickly and if I don't make up my mind soon I am liable to spend it remodeling another bathroom.

I am not a re-enactor and don't have any strict PC requirements; however, I live and hunt in southeast and central PA and I like the idea of a fowler with lineage to what might have been used in these parts during the middle of the 18th century when this was the frontier. I also have ancestors who came over from Germany and England and although I don't know many details about when or where, the idea of a gun that would be similar to what one of my ancestors might have carried on the frontier is alluring. I know that British style fowlers were made in and around Philadelphia, but would a NE style fowler have been common in this neck of the woods during the middle of the 18th century?

Some other practical considerations include 20 gauge for the Fusil vs 10 or 12 for the NE (11 gauge is not currently available). Having two flintlock rifles, I don't plan to shoot much round ball with the fowler, so there is the "which bore is better as a dedicated shotgun" debate. I do plan to hunt small game and upland birds including turkey.

As for length, the Fusil is 57" and the NE is 62" overall. My Lancaster rifle measures just about 60" which can be a bit awkward transporting in vehicles or fitting in my ground blind, so I like that 57" seems more portable. Then again if we're talking fowlers, most of the originals were much longer than even the NE. And admittedly, how well a flintlock muzzleloader fits in a Toyota should be pretty far down the list of important considerations. But at 57", does the English Fowler/Officer's Fusil really pass for a true representation of a common fowler as the first part of its namesake might imply, or is it more of an aristocrat's gun that would have been relatively rare in those days?

Howbout balance and handling? Unfortunately, I haven't had the opportunity to try either one on. Both are similar in weight; the 10 gauge barrel weighs about 3/4 lb less than the 12 according to Chambers. I would probably go with the 10 to save that weight so either finished gun would come in around 7-3/4 lbs. Does one handle or balance particularly different than the other? Howbout for swinging at birds on the wing?

Anyway, these are just some of my thoughts. I'd appreciate hearing from anyone who owns or who is familiar with either of these guns and what your thoughts are. Why did you choose yours and how do you like it?

 

[GREENSWLDE]

When looking at the bores and barrel lengths of British fowlers of the Late 17th & early 18th many were 17 bores as were sporting single and double guns. I have a Brum made Single 17b with 39" Flint gun from about 1785/90 which had been Drum & Nippled (Now back to Flint)** and a Canterbury made 16b Double cap lock with 26"tubes,(a covert gun) from circa 1820, though I doubt that any guns of their quality were made over there. ** (I am with both Feltwad & Rudyard on Reversal. If it's untoutched and immaculate leave as is. If it's a relic and neglected you do little harm restoring it as with the RYAN & WATSON. The lock as the gun are left in a slightly Distressed condition. OLD DOG..

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

Hi Rich,
It does not have to have the hump but you can get one from TRS that does. Can you tell me the breech dimension of the barrel on your fowler?

dave

I don't have the kit as yet, trying to get all the goodies I'll need but the gauge is16.

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

Hi Rich,
It does not have to have the hump but you can get one from TRS that does. Can you tell me the breech dimension of the barrel on your fowler?

dave

Hi Dave, I looked at the TRS web site and they carry a breech for a 16 ga,, # 662-BRT-16 for $19.95 (or what use to sell for!), does that look like the one to use?

Rich

 

[bud in pa]

I am attempting to build a New England fowler. I don't reenact and not worried about HC gun. But I often wonder couldn't there be NE fowlers in PA due to the fact that north easter PA was settled by families from Connecticut . The town of Forty Fort, the site of the Wyoming massacre was named for the forty original Connecticut families who built the fort.

 

[dave_person]

Hi Rich,
Sorry I did not respond quicker. Yes, TRS series 662 Griffin fowler standing breech would work. I checked the Chambers website and your English fowler has a fully round barrel that is 1.25" at the breech. That should be a superb barrel in 16 gauge but you need a big standing breech. I measured my breeches from TRS and the Griffin is 1.3" across so it will fit nicely. You will find that the slot for the hook is tapered toward the top, as it should be but means you need to file your breech plug bolster carefully. Also Rich, you might consider buying 3 barrel lugs from them as well. The reason is that they will be like the originals on which the lug was pretty wide. Sometimes they are almost 1/4" wide and that is an advantage because it provides a wider surface over which the metal key slides. That allows better and more consistent adjustment of how easily it slides in and out of the stock because that force is more metal on metal fit rather than metal on wood, which can swell and change over time. I often make my own lugs but also use those cast by TRS. There are no lugs available from Track or the other main suppliers that are as wide except those made for Thompson Center barrels but those have huge slots for grossly over thick keys. One thing you will have to determine is if your stock has enough wood on top of the breech to fit a humped breech. I think it will and keep in mind, the sighting groove and hump on the breech sits above the barrel so it forms a shoulder or step up from the barrel as below.

That is the TRS Griffin breech on a gun with a 1.25" breech and here is a photo showing the fit of the hook.

Remember, that lug on the bottom of the breech is for a cross pin that anchors the bottom so don't file it off. If your stock does not have a little excess wood above the barrel you can always just file the groove and hump flat and flush with the barrel. That is appropriate too.

I think in another thread you asked about using cherry. Cherry is fine but would be very rare on a British-made gun. It might be found more often if the gun was restocked in the American colonies. However, I am not a big fan of cherry. It is a good wood and a dense blank works up nicely. My problem is it is usually very boring wood to look at after the gun is finished. Even cherry that has some flame curl is so monochromatic, meaning the figure is just a different shade of the overall red brown, that I never find it very exciting. I am also not a fan of American black walnut because it is usually much less dense and hard compared with English walnut and does not work nearly as well (with exceptions for rare heavy dense blanks). However, you can make walnut look really interesting with good staining because it usually has streaks of different colors running through it and if you can find one with some figure, it can be really stunning. Moreover, with proper staining you can make it look like English walnut, which is the most appropriate wood for this gun. The following photos show cherry stocked guns first and then some stocked in American black walnut so you can see what I mean.

walnut:

I am pretty good at staining cherry and giving it a glow but I still prefer the look of well stained walnut.

dave

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

Hi Dave,

Thanks for the reply, it's not a real pressing issue, the gun is still on order!
I see from your photos that the breech and tang would fit the kit nicely and I agree with you about getting the keys and tennons from TRS would probably be the best bet, although I have been looking around, on the computer at different sites, TOW, Muzzleloaders Supply just to get educated!

The small extension on the bottom of the breech gets a pin to hold it in, is that hidden by the lock and the side plate, I looked for it but...?

Your pictures of the guns you made are just beautiful, and I see what you mean about cherry compared to walnut, however I've already told Barbie that I'd be ok with cherry due to she having 2 stocks of it on hand and the walnut is 6 months away! She did tell me she would pick the nicest one for me, maybe I shouldn't have said that!

I bought some of that aniline dye you had mentioned at another time and am going over my J P Beck pistol, couldn't resist trying those colors, I'll get some pic's up in the near future.
Thanks Dave for all your willingness to help.

Rich

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

I am attempting to build a New England fowler. I don't reenact and not worried about HC gun. But I often wonder couldn't there be NE fowlers in PA due to the fact that north easter PA was settled by families from Connecticut . The town of Forty Fort, the site of the Wyoming massacre was named for the forty original Connecticut families who built the fort.

Hi Bud, I've been up to that area just to check it out, great history that seems to get over looked!
My thoughts about your question is to go for the one you like, I don't think Penna. fowlers would have been that significant at that time frame, especially in that area. Remember there weren't too many highways from the Lancaster area to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton area then! LOL

 

[Hatman/2nd line]

I had bought some aniline dyes to use in my new fowler kit and in the mean time after looking at my J P Beck flint pistol I noticed some rust on the one bolt and decided I better take a closer look. After taking the lock off I decided to polish everything up and make sure all was ok. Well one thing led to another and I decided to try out my new dyes, I think I like it better but everybody has their opinion!
I'll post pic's of the gun before, during and after, still have to complete the build, just wanted to show the color.