How do I take the barrel out of the stock?

[John Shields]

I have my TVM late Lancaster, and it "looks" like all I have to do is remove the lock, and the barrel will come out. But I am not sure, and I most certainly don't want to break anything!

 

[nchawkeye]

Don't, no need to...I have had a flintlock since 1977 and have never removed the barrel...

But, to answer your question, remove the lock, remove the tang screws and the pins that hold the barrel to the stock...

 

[Rifleman1776]

Do not remove unless absolutely necessary. Without the barrel the forestock, which is very slim and delicate will have nothing to support it. If that stock is fancy wood, I guarantee it is looking for a way to break. :shocked2:
If you are determined to remove the barrel, first remove the retaining pins then the rest of the job CAREFULLY.

 

[Coot]

As already noted, there is risk in removing the barrel and it is not necessary for routine cleaning. If it needs to be removed, I learned this method from a very respected builder & his proceedure has worked well for me:

First partially unscrew the lock retaining screws & gently push the lock out, then finish removing the lock screws & lock. Never try to pry the lock out as this will damage the wood at the edge of the inletting. On some loosely inlet guns, the lock will simply fall out.
Next, remove the tang screw. As with the lock screws, a properly fitting gunsmith screwdriver should be used to avoid buggering up the screw slots. To me, buggered screw slots are a red flag that someone who didn't know/care what he was doing has messed with the gun. Care for your investment.
I assume that your gun has a pinned in place barrel (musket barrels are generally held in place by bands of iron or brass and later era gun often hold the barrel in place by little wedges that fit thru slots in oval metal plates inlet into the forestock). The pins are typically stiff wire about 1/16" in diameter and typically are cut just a bit shorter than the width of the stock where they are inserted. The holes are often obscured by wax or dirt but must be carefully found. There will be similar holes where the pins holding the ramrod thimbles are located & these should be left untouched. Using a straight sided machinist punch, VERY carefully push the pins out (with the butt near me & looking from above, I push out from the left & back in from the right. It is not necessary to push the pins more than about 3/4 out from the stock & leaving them started in will reduce the chance of losing one or damaging the pin hole in the stock when reinserting or of getting them out of order as they are likely different lengths - BUT, be aware that the stock (particularly in a well made gun) is VERY thin & fragile & must be handled with great care.
Now, with the lock & tang screw removed and the pins pushed far enough out to clear the lugs under the center of the barrel, hold the stock & barrel together with both hands spaced along the barrel & gently place it upside down on a blanket or rug, holding the barrel firmly in place. Then, lift the butt end a few inches & give it a good bump with your hand. The barrel should fall out. The idea here is to use gravity & have the tang end of the barrel drop clear the stock BEFORE the muzzle end. If you try to lift the muzzle end clear first, you run the risk of chipping out the stock at the tang inlet which is often tight and on some guns, tapered as well.

Hopefully after reading the above you will be able to remove your barrel without damage, and, realizing the process & risks, decide if removal is a good idea.

 

[Len Graves]

I agree whole hearted lay with the above suggestions. With the full stock you have I always leave the ramrod in place to help stiffen the above mentioned flimsy stock. If possible you could use a steel or brass rod while the barrel is out. I don't even like anyone to get around the stock while the barrel is out. I was building a southern style long rifle and a ham fisted acquaintance picked up the stock and crushed it right in the middle. There was no fix to it, about 80 hours down the drain. I may have had evil thoughts at that time.

 

[Patocazador]

I had to remove my barrel in order to repair a defect and glass bed the barrel and tang. The pins in mine were not at right angles to the barrel, some were on a slant. If the gun maker was good, he probably rounded the pins so they would find the hole better. About half of mine were rounded and on one that wasn't, I punched out the edge of the wood when reinserting it when bedding the barrel.
If it's not necessary to remove it because of a repair, listen to the guys who posted before me. Leave it alone.
If you have to do it, use a 1/16" brass punch and buff down the shaft to make it a little less than 1/16" it will work much better. Also use one with a straight shaft - not tapered.

 

[54ball]

Why do you need to remove the barrel?

 

[John Shields]

While cleaning it, water ran down the outside of the barrel, and I was concerned about it getting between the barrel and stock.

But after reading all the replies, I figure I will just let some oil run down there to displace any water.

Thanks for all the info guys.

 

[crockett]

That's an issue I never thought about. I'm wondering about the original guns. Was any sort of beeswax sealant, etc. ever put between barrel and stock?
IAE taking off the barrel is a bad idea IMHO.

 

[Artificer]

Linseed Oil was commonly applied to barrels to keep them from rusting and also seal the barrel channel. Some folks did also use bees wax.

Gus

 

[Artificer]

As already noted, there is risk in removing the barrel and it is not necessary for routine cleaning. If it needs to be removed, I learned this method from a very respected builder & his proceedure has worked well for me:

First partially unscrew the lock retaining screws & gently push the lock out, then finish removing the lock screws & lock. Never try to pry the lock out as this will damage the wood at the edge of the inletting. On some loosely inlet guns, the lock will simply fall out.

I applaud you for being so generous as to type all that out!

However, I must add two things that must be done first.

Number 1. Remove the ramrod. The reason for that is some times on both original and reproduction rifles, the front lock screw had to be turned or filed smaller in diameter to clear the ramrod hole. If that is the case, you can't tap the front lock screw out with the ramrod in the gun. So it is best to do this first, whether or not you later find it had to have been done.

Number 2. Pull the Cock (AKA hammer) back so it locks into the half cock position. If one does not do that on some original and reproduction guns, the tail of the sear and/or the mainspring MAY be below the bottom of the lock plate when at rest. If that is so, one can easily bust out a chunk of wood around the bottom of the lock plate when trying to remove the lock. Cocking the Cock to Half Cock almost always ensures that can't happen unless the lock has broken parts on the inside.

This is probably why the gunsmith you mentioned suggested not to take the lock all the way out.

Gus

 

[Artificer]

Linseed Oil was commonly applied to barrels to keep them from rusting and also seal the barrel channel. Some folks did also use bees wax.

Gus

Oops, I should have said Linseed Oil was used on the barrel to prevent rusting and AROUND the sides of barrel at the top of the barrel channel to seal out rain/snow. Normally on original guns, they did not bother to oil most of the barrel channel in the flintlock era.

However, I am a firm believer in sealing the entire barrel channel under the barrel, as they often did during the percussion period.

Sorry I wasn't more clear earlier.
Gus

 

[Artificer]

To add a bit more to what Patocazador wrote:

On many original guns and some repro’s, the barrel retaining pins were filed flush with the wood on the sides of the stock. This means the ends of those pins are curved and difficult to start them moving and drive them out. When you deal with that, you MUST have a short starter punch that is smaller in diameter than the diameter of the barrel retaining pin. Then you use a longer punch, that is also smaller in diameter than the barrel pin, to drive the pin far enough to get the barrel out.
.
There is an ancient rule in gunsmithing that pins in guns should go IN from the right side, though not every gunsmith then or now follows this ancient rule. Still it was and is common enough that one should normally try to drive pins out from the left side of the gun first. That means you place the starter punch on the pin on the left side of the gun, to drive the pin out.

Hope this helps,
Gus

 

[jamesthomas]

That's an issue I never thought about. I'm wondering about the original guns. Was any sort of beeswax sealant, etc. ever put between barrel and stock?
IAE taking off the barrel is a bad idea IMHO.

That's what I have done to my rifles. A little beeswax at the juncture of the barrel and stock and down from the muzzle about 6 inches to prevent any water from cleaning from getting between and under the barrel and stock. I do take my barrel off about twice a year though just to double check, so far so good.

 

[Col. Batguano]

I've always gotten a little bp residue on the barrel around the lock area and never seem to get a decent enough seal with those hose clamp dealiemabobs to keep water out of the barrel channel, around the lock and off the wood. To me, it seems easier and simpler just to drive out the pins, unscrew the bolts, and pull the barrel for cleaning.

With a percussion gun, I pull the nipple and flush it once that way (lots of strokes with the breech in the warm water bucket) and then re-install the nipple, and have the water flush in and out through the cleanout bolster screw the second time. Let everything dry really well, and then reassemble. I would rather reassemble dry components than leaving a damp or slightly wet barrel in the stock.

 

[Patocazador]

IMO it would be wise to glass bed the barrel and tang if you have to remove the barrel for any reason. This would both seal and reinforce the stock to preclude future problems.

 

[Artificer]

I feel your pain as to “those hose clamp dealiemabobs.” Grin. I’ve tried them as well as trying to stick a feather in the vent hole and using a piece of wood to block the vent. It always seemed like I could never find the right size quill when I needed one, or broke it or the wood plug off when I did not want to.

Back in the 90’s, I wanted some “period correct “C” clamps” for other uses and found what were probably early 19th century hand forged Quilting Clamps, but the style was perfectly correct for the 18th century as well. One day when I was going to clean my Brown Bess, I got the idea to handsew a thick leather sheath around the curve of the “C” clamp to protect the stock wood. I cut a piece of leather a little larger than the touch hole and oiled it. That went against the barrel and a piece of rag went between it and the round jaw of the C clamp. Works great, but typical of an Artificer, I probably over engineered it about 5 times. Grin.

I prefer not to take barrels out of stocks to clean them unless they have a hook breech plug and barrel wedges. It is way too easy to crush the tight fit of the barrel and tang to the wood, that the original gunsmith took such care to make when the barrel was first inletted. That tight fit of the barrel and tang to the stock was both for craftsmanship and barrel accuracy.

In the period when barrels were made of iron, they did not rust as fast as later steel barrels. So talking out the barrel was normally never considered necessary unless the stock got broken.

I normally only take barrels out every other year or so and at most find mild surface rust, even if the gun had been rained or snowed on. But that’s just me and to each their own.
Gus

 

[Cpl. Ashencheeks]

I honestly don't know if the following information is of any help or not, but here it is anyway.

Since I have bought a (near) full stock rifle and in the slow process of building another true full stock rifle, I have wondered about how to go about cleaning it, because those pins seem kind of tricky on taking them out and putting them back in too often.

It seems like it would cause undue wear and alignment problems if I took them out everytime I would want to clean the rifle. Another problem mentioned already by others in this thread is the potential fragility of the forestock areas.

I was even somewhat surprised by what little there was was holding everything together on my flinter pistol. The best thing it had going for it was a good tight stock fit, but that go easily the wrong way if I removed it improperly, which would increase in chance the more often I would try to do it.

I found this video below, but it is for percussion rifles.

I do believe some outlets sell flintlock adapters for the same kind of cleaning tools similar to the ones used in the video though.

http://www.thegunworks.com/custprodgun.cfm?ProductID=501&do=detail&Cat2Option=yes

The tool is usually just some tubing and a nipple adapter for percussion and some kind of clamp for flintlock with certain types of barrels.

[youtube]watch?v=GUJkXKHLY5w[/youtube]

The only other way I could think of cleaning a full stock rifle would be similar, but using a funnel stuck through paper plate at the muzzle or something like it to protect from spilling down the stock area and a waxed filled and covered quill, rubber covered toothpick, or some kind of small rubber plug at the touchhole.

I hope this idea does not seem too hair-brained, but I am just as curious on how to go about solving the problems of cleaning a full stock rifle and particularly one in flintlock or matchlock.

 

[Coot]

As already noted, there is risk in removing the barrel and it is not necessary for routine cleaning. If it needs to be removed, I learned this method from a very respected builder & his proceedure has worked well for me:

First partially unscrew the lock retaining screws & gently push the lock out, then finish removing the lock screws & lock. Never try to pry the lock out as this will damage the wood at the edge of the inletting. On some loosely inlet guns, the lock will simply fall out.

I applaud you for being so generous as to type all that out!

However, I must add two things that must be done first.

Number 1. Remove the ramrod. The reason for that is some times on both original and reproduction rifles, the front lock screw had to be turned or filed smaller in diameter to clear the ramrod hole. If that is the case, you can't tap the front lock screw out with the ramrod in the gun. So it is best to do this first, whether or not you later find it had to have been done.

Number 2. Pull the Cock (AKA hammer) back so it locks into the half cock position. If one does not do that on some original and reproduction guns, the tail of the sear and/or the mainspring MAY be below the bottom of the lock plate when at rest. If that is so, one can easily bust out a chunk of wood around the bottom of the lock plate when trying to remove the lock. Cocking the Cock to Half Cock almost always ensures that can't happen unless the lock has broken parts on the inside.

This is probably why the gunsmith you mentioned suggested not to take the lock all the way out.

Gus

Agreed, I forgot to mention placing the lock at half cock. But to avoid confusion, the lock is fully removed. Partially unscrewing the retaining screws & then using them to gently push the out of it's mortice avoids pry marks/damage to the sharp edges of the lock mortice. The screws are then fully screwed out & the lock fully removed.

 

[Artificer]

Agreed! Good point.

Gus