I read a little quip today that was saying Lyman has stopped selling muzzle loaders. Has anyone else heard this?
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Has Lyman stopped selling muzzle loaders?
- Thread starter Bert621
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user 56392
32 Cal
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I’m looking for my first BP rifle and could not find them on Lyman’s site. As usual, I’m late to the party. It’s a shame, I’ve read they are great rifles.
I wouldn't be surprised at all, Service out of Italy is a bust right now.
Coolhand
Ozark Mt. Daredevil
You can catch a used one every now and again in the classifieds on the forum.
Invest Arms is still selling the same guns under the Investarms brand name. Still hard to find, but the rifles are out there.https://www.investarm.com/en/muzzle-loading-rifles.html
dr.s.goerisch
32 Cal
This discussion makes me smile... When I started in blackpowder shooting competitions in Europe, in the mid-seventies,
Italian made guns were all over the continent. They came under a wide variety of brand names, but were basically all the same - let's politely say junk. By mere chance you might even catch a "Tennessee" or a "Hawken rifle" that would work, somehow, out of the box...but the greater part of the Italian production was really lousy. If a part broke (like that hammer on my Italian made flintlock pistol), or threads wore out, you were lucky to find any replacement part - and even if that part came from the same manufacturer, it often would require know-how and tools to make it fit.
Germans like me that Italian junk anyway. Guns from Spain (like Dikar) weren't any better.
It took a while till the word got around among the top shots that there was a new line of US made blackpowder rifles in this world, by the name of T/C, and they were good, reliable quality.
My first T/C Hawken rifles were brought to me by the helpful friend of a late shooter friend,
who happened to fly a jet to the promised land of blackpowder every week. First he found that 45s were sold out at that time... so he brought me a .50 cal. This bad mother all but broke my bones when I first fired it, loaded with a Maxiball bullet and about 90 grains of blackpowder, as T/C suggested. Maybe European blackpowder provides more of a punch...anyway, that Hawken punched a line of holes in my good leather motorcycle jacket, right around my bruised shoulder. Anyway, I was happy to finally have a good working rifle... My friend later got me .45 flintlock T/C Hawken, and I had barrels switched, so I could shoot percussion .45 loading Maxiballs, and (lighter) .490 round balls from the flintlock Hawken (German rules don't allow any other than round balls in the 50 Meter flintlock competition). I had both barrels proof shot after switching the tail screws - German law calls for proof shooting after gunsmith work, as well as for any gun upon its entering of the German market.
Almost 50 years later, I'm reading the above thread.
Recently I learned thru this forum that T/C has stopped making Hawkens.
If you guys care to check into www.egun.de just for a minute....ten minutes ago on that German auctioning platform I found 324 blackpowder rifles and 366 blackpowder pistols. Top of the list today was a T/C special edition Hawken... followed by at least a dozen of European made Hawken rifles, many under the name of Invest arms (which has been quoted in previous contributions to this discussion). The sell for about 120 to 200 Euros. You might even find unused guns, which have been used as decoration pieces. But in Germany all guns must bear that proof mark, so even used ones usually are safe.
So all you need to find is a good friend who is travelling to Europe - Invest arms and others are here, just waiting to be picked up (most sellers don't ship international).
Italian made guns were all over the continent. They came under a wide variety of brand names, but were basically all the same - let's politely say junk. By mere chance you might even catch a "Tennessee" or a "Hawken rifle" that would work, somehow, out of the box...but the greater part of the Italian production was really lousy. If a part broke (like that hammer on my Italian made flintlock pistol), or threads wore out, you were lucky to find any replacement part - and even if that part came from the same manufacturer, it often would require know-how and tools to make it fit.
Germans like me that Italian junk anyway. Guns from Spain (like Dikar) weren't any better.
It took a while till the word got around among the top shots that there was a new line of US made blackpowder rifles in this world, by the name of T/C, and they were good, reliable quality.
My first T/C Hawken rifles were brought to me by the helpful friend of a late shooter friend,
who happened to fly a jet to the promised land of blackpowder every week. First he found that 45s were sold out at that time... so he brought me a .50 cal. This bad mother all but broke my bones when I first fired it, loaded with a Maxiball bullet and about 90 grains of blackpowder, as T/C suggested. Maybe European blackpowder provides more of a punch...anyway, that Hawken punched a line of holes in my good leather motorcycle jacket, right around my bruised shoulder. Anyway, I was happy to finally have a good working rifle... My friend later got me .45 flintlock T/C Hawken, and I had barrels switched, so I could shoot percussion .45 loading Maxiballs, and (lighter) .490 round balls from the flintlock Hawken (German rules don't allow any other than round balls in the 50 Meter flintlock competition). I had both barrels proof shot after switching the tail screws - German law calls for proof shooting after gunsmith work, as well as for any gun upon its entering of the German market.
Almost 50 years later, I'm reading the above thread.
Recently I learned thru this forum that T/C has stopped making Hawkens.
If you guys care to check into www.egun.de just for a minute....ten minutes ago on that German auctioning platform I found 324 blackpowder rifles and 366 blackpowder pistols. Top of the list today was a T/C special edition Hawken... followed by at least a dozen of European made Hawken rifles, many under the name of Invest arms (which has been quoted in previous contributions to this discussion). The sell for about 120 to 200 Euros. You might even find unused guns, which have been used as decoration pieces. But in Germany all guns must bear that proof mark, so even used ones usually are safe.
So all you need to find is a good friend who is travelling to Europe - Invest arms and others are here, just waiting to be picked up (most sellers don't ship international).
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Getting a gun into the US from the EU is an expensive and troublesome proposition. You first have to find an exporter in Europe, then an importer in the US and pay them both plus shipping. Not cheap and a true PITA.
I have (10 years ago) prior to the latest and greatest EU regulations imported quite a few guns from Spain and it was burdensome then. Now it, quite frankly, is what they set it out for it to be...not worth it.
You simply can't box it up and put it on a plane, as suggested.
I have (10 years ago) prior to the latest and greatest EU regulations imported quite a few guns from Spain and it was burdensome then. Now it, quite frankly, is what they set it out for it to be...not worth it.
You simply can't box it up and put it on a plane, as suggested.
To answer OP's question: Yes. I called Lyman at the end of November and was told that they "gotten out of the gun business" in early 2022. Another member, Minish, said he had been told the same by them earlier in the year.
Hopefully, some firm will step up and fill the void by importing and marketing Investarms (IT) and Ardesa (SP) guns. But I fear that with the in-lines taking up all the current "new" demand that it will not happen.
Sabots, in-lines, scopes, 209 primers...all the unmentionables....as long as they are allowed for hunting in "muzzleloader" season folks are going to use them and the demand for traditional guns will continue to wane.
The average consumer/hunter will buy what is readily available, will be value focused and be more interested in the efficacy of in-lines and scopes. If you can't find primers of any type, can't find black powder and can find all the required things that the modern muzzleloader uses and CAN USE THEM hunting, unless you are old traditionalist curmudgeon like most of us are, you aren't going to waste your time with the traditionals.
I don't see domestic mass production nor a "Jerimiah Johnson" like movie to stimulate a return of the general public to traditional ML like what happened during the 1970's anytime soon. And so begins the circling of the toilet bowl.
Now get off my lawn.
Sabots, in-lines, scopes, 209 primers...all the unmentionables....as long as they are allowed for hunting in "muzzleloader" season folks are going to use them and the demand for traditional guns will continue to wane.
The average consumer/hunter will buy what is readily available, will be value focused and be more interested in the efficacy of in-lines and scopes. If you can't find primers of any type, can't find black powder and can find all the required things that the modern muzzleloader uses and CAN USE THEM hunting, unless you are old traditionalist curmudgeon like most of us are, you aren't going to waste your time with the traditionals.
I don't see domestic mass production nor a "Jerimiah Johnson" like movie to stimulate a return of the general public to traditional ML like what happened during the 1970's anytime soon. And so begins the circling of the toilet bowl.
Now get off my lawn.
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dr.s.goerisch
32 Cal
Chorizo, I wasn't thinking about importing guns on a commercial scale. A few years ago, I took a percussion pistol on a flight from Europe to the the land of the free, and had no problem doing so, and taking it to a period encampment and blackpowder shoot at Angel Fire, NM. And back into Germany.
A group of friends from a local Cowboy Action Shooting club has taken their cartridge guns (each of them brought two sixguns, one lever action rifle, plus a shotgun!) into the US, and back to Europe, for a couple of times, to compete at the SASS championships at Albuquerque, NM.
But maybe the PITA and all of the hassle has just gotten too big over the last few years...
If you are returning to point of destination it is completely different than "importing". A round trip with the owner accompanying the gun for a specific reason is a completely different animal.
But if you are actually importing, even for non-commercial use (as all of mine were), with the final destination the USA from the EU, you are, to semi-quote the famous Hemingway "Well and truly screwed".
The last time I imported a sporting SxS shotgun from Spain in 2012, the gun was technically a curio and relic (older than 50 years) it took 8 months just to get the export certificate from Spain, based upon the EU regulation in force at the time. by then my import certificate has expired and I had to do a dance on this end to get an extension. Total cost at the time for 125 EUROS and USD 100 plus shipping. Export/import cost plus shipping will easily double the cost of purchase making a "cheap" used gun, no longer cheap by any means. I doubt that anybody is doing it for less 10 years later.
Commercial importation, with end use certificates and the like along with the EU's stringent arms regulations, I simply can't imagine doing.
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