Faking a Kibler Fowler into an earlier British import?

[Bark-eater]

The coffee can is getting close to full, and I'll be ordering a Kibler Fowler soon.

Kibler describes it as having "Styling from the 1760's - 1770's"

My interests are a bit earlier, say 1750's

I'm wondering what I can do to make the "Styling" more representative of an earlier commonly available, bog standard "Hardware store Fowler"?

A walnut stock is a definite, and I will hand scrape it, but I don't have a real feeling about what kind of stock finish to use.

I also have no idea how to approach the metal finishing. I'm assuming that browning and bluing treatments came along later, so I'm inclined to finish the barrel and lock bright, and maybe do a bit of ageing from there.

I'm also thinking about having my initials engraved on the thumb piece. I don't want to spend to much extra on engraving, but are there any engraved embellishment's that would help "Fake" an earlier origin?

Thanks, Woody

 

[dave_person]

Hi,
Jim's fowler can represent guns from the 1740s through the 1770s without any changes. It cannot represent higher end guns from the 1750s onward because it does not have a standing breech and flat barrel keys. I want to clear up some misconceptions about English guns during the 18th century. They were not made by solitary gunsmiths in small shops located in some rural corner of England. Each gun was the product of many highly skilled tradesmen all of whom had apprenticed to master tradesmen and they could produce higher quality products at much lower prices than any colonial American gunsmith. Not many colonial American gunsmiths could produce guns of even the modest quality represented by Kibler's fowler. A challenge for many modern builders is that the skills needed to actually produce a decent quality English gun from that period are great and diverse. Fortunately, Jim's machines do all the hard work for you that those highly skilled workers once did. But you still have to finish the gun. I've seen quite a few Kibler fowlers finished as someone's idea of a "plain workingman's gun" . Usually they use some sort of oil finish that is low sheen, "in the wood", and very 20th century. There was no mass market for "workingman's" guns in England. Gun ownership by working people was discouraged and hunting was a gentleman's avocation. The market hunters were not using light and lively sporting guns to mass slaughter waterfowl on the water. English gun makers made fortunes making cheap trade guns for the frontiers of North America, the African trade, and arming the East India Company but Kibler's fowler represents none of those. It is a decent English sporting gun of export quality that was commonly imported into colonial America not primarily as a trade gun (although it could be a higher quality Indian gift gun) on the frontiers but rather as a hunting gun for colonists of modest means, which meant most male Americans at least in the northern and mid-Atlantic colonies, including Virginia. As such, it would not have a "hand scraped" appearance even though scrapers were used in the finishing process. The English "setter uppers" or "screwer togethers" were far too skilled to leave rough scrape marks on the stocks. The finish would not look like someone soaked the stock in linseed oil. It would be a slightly glossy oil varnish (emphasis on varnish) that completely filled the grain of the walnut stocks. No open pores left showing just a smooth finish. The stocks would also not be all stained dark. Colors ranged from light orangey brown to reddish browns, to dark chocolate browns. Finally barrels and locks would all be polished bright but not by polishing wheels. It would be a stone, emory, and oil polish. During the very end of the period (1770s) barrels might be browned but I believe that would mostly be on higher end guns using stub twist barrels because the browning gave the twist barrels beautiful patterns of marbled brown and red.

dave

 

[CuNosecap]

Thank you for that treatise, Dave. We are so fortunate to have people like you willing to take the time to educate the masses with such a well organized "article".
Rick

 

[Brokennock]

F

Hi,
Jim's fowler can represent guns from the 1740s through the 1770s without any changes. It cannot represent higher end guns from the 1750s onward because it does not have a standing breech and flat barrel keys. I want to clear up some misconceptions about English guns during the 18th century. They were not made by solitary gunsmiths in small shops located in some rural corner of England. Each gun was the product of many highly skilled tradesmen all of whom had apprenticed to master tradesmen and they could produce higher quality products at much lower prices than any colonial American gunsmith. Not many colonial American gunsmiths could produce guns of even the modest quality represented by Kibler's fowler. A challenge for many modern builders is that the skills needed to actually produce a decent quality English gun from that period are great and diverse. Fortunately, Jim's machines do all the hard work for you that those highly skilled workers once did. But you still have to finish the gun. I've seen quite a few Kibler fowlers finished as someone's idea of a "plain workingman's gun" . Usually they use some sort of oil finish that is low sheen, "in the wood", and very 20th century. There was no mass market for "workingman's" guns in England. Gun ownership by working people was discouraged and hunting was a gentleman's avocation. The market hunters were not using light and lively sporting guns to mass slaughter waterfowl on the water. English gun makers made fortunes making cheap trade guns for the frontiers of North America, the African trade, and arming the East India Company but Kibler's fowler represents none of those. It is a decent English sporting gun of export quality that was commonly imported into colonial America not primarily as a trade gun (although it could be a higher quality Indian gift gun) on the frontiers but rather as a hunting gun for colonists of modest means, which meant most male Americans at least in the northern and mid-Atlantic colonies, including Virginia. As such, it would not have a "hand scraped" appearance even though scrapers were used in the finishing process. The English "setter uppers" or "screwer togethers" were far too skilled to leave rough scrape marks on the stocks. The finish would not look like someone soaked the stock in linseed oil. It would be a slightly glossy oil varnish (emphasis on varnish) that completely filled the grain of the walnut stocks. No open pores left showing just a smooth finish. The stocks would also not be all stained dark. Colors ranged from light orangey brown to reddish browns, to dark chocolate browns. Finally barrels and locks would all be polished bright but not by polishing wheels. It would be a stone, emory, and oil polish. During the very end of the period (1770s) barrels might be browned but I believe that would mostly be on higher end guns using stub twist barrels because the browning gave the twist barrels beautiful patterns of marbled brown and red.

dave

Fabulous information....
I really wish you would write a book.

 

[Cruzatte]

F

Fabulous information....
I really wish you would write a book.

I second that. I'd buy it.

 

[James Kibler]

Thanks for the nice description, Dave.