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Lifespan of a Rifle?

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From what I have read, the Land Pattern Muskets used by Santa Anna's troops were the Third Model pattern and would have been about 20 to 30 years old.
This comment is for the thread…not really directed at Grenadier1758…

I think you have to be careful using military arms for an answer in this context. Many, maybe most, sat in armories until they became obsolete and were surplused.

I have a very early Winchester M1 that is all original including the barrel. I’m certain this gun spent the war riding in a shipboard armory, it is mechanically nearly new.
 
I've collected & shot mostly original flint & percussion guns for 60+ some years. & often those that remained in the best condition were those that were actively used & cared for.
The bores & locks on guns I've acquired that have been stored in closets or museums often suffered.

One example of long usage is the Original Frontier Pistol I have posted for sale on the forum.
I believe this pistol was originally a flintlock & later converted to percussion by fitting a new lock
rather than converting the old lock that maybe was worn out.

Wouldn't we love to hear the stories & travels these historical firearms could tell !!
 
Back when I started shooting @13 , old originals were pretty cheap & can recall buying 58 Remingtons from barrels
of a surplus store for under $10.00 :)
Fortunately there are still some very affordable original rifles & pistols available that can be made safe to shoot if thats what an individual wants.

However, most of us who do shoot original firearms don't recommend they be fired unless you buy from a trusted knowledgeable source or have the gun checked out as safe by an individual who has experience evaluating & shooting antique firearms.
Most modern firearm gunsmiths are not qualified.
 
I think it is very plausible.

What really bugs me when I see reenactors who have as a weapon of choice a top of the line for the time firearm that few people would have been able to afford. Yes the weapon is HC/PC, but come on now you are portraying a dude that was likely poor as dirt.
I can understand why you'd think that but the riflemen that got into the various rifle companies during the Revolutionary War (primarily from Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia) were not normally "poor as dirt". Reason for that is that most of them had been longhunters, especially the ones in Virginia that I am most familiar with. They would do their "longhunting" for 6 to 9 months a year to harvest deer hides and would hunt for their own families sustenance when the season for harvesting hide closed.

There were huge numbers of deer in the eastern US then because vast populations of Native Americans had been wiped out by illnesses and diseases that they had no resistance or immunity to. Some estimates are that more than 90% of their populations died because of that. Even if that number is way out of whack, the net result was there were comparatively few people hunting deer in the 1600's because deer were a major food source for the Indians and they died. So by the 1700's there had been a major explosion in deer populations .

Longrifles in the 1700's typically cost about 1-year's wages, whereas a smoothbore fowler, like most guns used in New England, at the time cost about 1/4th of that. According to British law, every able-bodied man between the ages of 16 and about 65 had to belong to they local or county militia and had to supply their own firelock (flintlock) in good working order. Smoothbores like a fowler could be used for bird hunting with shot or deer with a lead ball, so they were the most common arm.

But the longrifle allowed a longhunter to kill deer at distances a smoothbores couldn't even imagine. These longhunters were quite proficient in taking deer at 200 to 250-yards. It also allowed for accurate neck and head shots at closer distances, which would result in a "prime hide" because they don't use the neck and the head in the hide. A prime hide has no bullet holes in the hide and commanded a higher selling price. There was a huge market for these deer hides in the 1700's. In fact deer hides were the 2nd largest export from the colony of Virginia to England until the beginning of the war. Tobacco was their #1 export.

With a longrifle that cost about a years wages, a rifleman could make three times the cost of the rifle in the first year and continue to make that rate in subsequent years. That's the main reason we know that they weren't, as a rule, "poor as dirt". I'm sure there were some, but not the ones you found in rifle companies during the Revolutionary War.

We know that they were accurate out to those 200 and 250-yard distances because they had to hit a pumpkin at 200-yards to be accepted into a rifle company. If they couldn't do that, they couldn't be in the rifle company. AND, if too many of them qualified hitting a pumpkin at 200-yards, they would either move the pumpkin out to 250-yards, or depending on the time of year, replace the pumpkin at 200-yards with a smaller target such as an orange. These folks were highly skilled with their open sights (iron sights) and telescopic sights wouldn't be invented for almost another 100-years.

However, with few exceptions, you didn't normally see the heavily decorated longrifles during the Rev War. They appeared after the war in what is called the "Golden Age of the Longrifle." They would typically have a pierced brass patchbox and brass hardware with perhaps a thumb medallion behind the tang of the barrel, weeping hearts inlet around the wrist, small hunting stars on the forearm where the barrel was pinned and often a hunting star or other decoration on the cheek rest. They could also be heavily inlaid with gold or silver wire in the stock.

The Pennsylvania Longrifle from Traditions was my first longrifle and I bought it because it said it was approved for Rev War reenactments by some reenactment group...I never could verify that group. One of the men in my reenactment group was a gun-builder and said that Traditions was a much later rifle design more typical of the Golden Age of Flintlock Longrifles. He also said I probably wouldn't meet any resistance to using it at a reenactment, but if I did, he would loan me one of his fowlers to use at that reenactment. A few years later I bought an Early Lancaster rifle that was Historically Accurate to as early as the 1750's but still not unusual to see during the Rev War. So those heavily decorated longrifles are not really HC/PC for the Revolutionary War, but at least they are not a percussion longrifle. ;)
 
I think it is very plausible.

What really bugs me when I see reenactors who have as a weapon of choice a top of the line for the time firearm that few people would have been able to afford. Yes the weapon is HC/PC, but come on now you are portraying a dude that was likely poor as dirt.

I recently watched a reenactor describing his persona as a "Scottish emmigrant who worked for a Fur company" and describing his English Gentlemans Sporting Rifle as "those rifles didnt come cheap"; so did he win the Lottery ?
 
I've never done reenactments, just shoots at rendezvous, club & state matches.
Seems everyone I've met has different tastes in types of firearms & how they enjoy
our sport & thankfully the forum brings us all together :thumb:
 
I think the British Military expected a life of about 10 to 13 years before a musket was declared unserviceable.

We have records of the 1792 contract rifles being almost totally unserviceable by 1803 when Lewis was at Harper's Ferry to get the rifles for the Corps of Discovery.

A lot will depend on the usage of the rifle.
I wonder if some of it had to do with the brick dust used to buff the barrels bright.
Shine like a mirror thin as paper by ten years old
 
I recently watched a reenactor describing his persona as a "Scottish emmigrant who worked for a Fur company" and describing his English Gentlemans Sporting Rifle as "those rifles didnt come cheap"; so did he win the Lottery ?
Fur paid well and one could come in to money enough to get a high dollar gun. For the most part rifles were supplied to a new hire and he paid for it at inflated prices out of his catch.
Leman, Darringer ,Henry ect sold guns at $13 to 18 to the fur companies Hawkens charged twenty to twenty five dollars for their guns.
Henry specifically made “English style’ rifle, looking like a civilian version of a Baker military rifle, these were highly prized by the fur companies but today I think Chambers is the only one to offer a kit version of this
 
I can understand why you'd think that but the riflemen that got into the various rifle companies during the Revolutionary War (primarily from Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia) were not normally "poor as dirt". Reason for that is that most of them had been longhunters, especially the ones in Virginia that I am most familiar with. They would do their "longhunting" for 6 to 9 months a year to harvest deer hides and would hunt for their own families sustenance when the season for harvesting hide closed.

There were huge numbers of deer in the eastern US then because vast populations of Native Americans had been wiped out by illnesses and diseases that they had no resistance or immunity to. Some estimates are that more than 90% of their populations died because of that. Even if that number is way out of whack, the net result was there were comparatively few people hunting deer in the 1600's because deer were a major food source for the Indians and they died. So by the 1700's there had been a major explosion in deer populations .

Longrifles in the 1700's typically cost about 1-year's wages, whereas a smoothbore fowler, like most guns used in New England, at the time cost about 1/4th of that. According to British law, every able-bodied man between the ages of 16 and about 65 had to belong to they local or county militia and had to supply their own firelock (flintlock) in good working order. Smoothbores like a fowler could be used for bird hunting with shot or deer with a lead ball, so they were the most common arm.

But the longrifle allowed a longhunter to kill deer at distances a smoothbores couldn't even imagine. These longhunters were quite proficient in taking deer at 200 to 250-yards. It also allowed for accurate neck and head shots at closer distances, which would result in a "prime hide" because they don't use the neck and the head in the hide. A prime hide has no bullet holes in the hide and commanded a higher selling price. There was a huge market for these deer hides in the 1700's. In fact deer hides were the 2nd largest export from the colony of Virginia to England until the beginning of the war. Tobacco was their #1 export.

With a longrifle that cost about a years wages, a rifleman could make three times the cost of the rifle in the first year and continue to make that rate in subsequent years. That's the main reason we know that they weren't, as a rule, "poor as dirt". I'm sure there were some, but not the ones you found in rifle companies during the Revolutionary War.

We know that they were accurate out to those 200 and 250-yard distances because they had to hit a pumpkin at 200-yards to be accepted into a rifle company. If they couldn't do that, they couldn't be in the rifle company. AND, if too many of them qualified hitting a pumpkin at 200-yards, they would either move the pumpkin out to 250-yards, or depending on the time of year, replace the pumpkin at 200-yards with a smaller target such as an orange. These folks were highly skilled with their open sights (iron sights) and telescopic sights wouldn't be invented for almost another 100-years.

However, with few exceptions, you didn't normally see the heavily decorated longrifles during the Rev War. They appeared after the war in what is called the "Golden Age of the Longrifle." They would typically have a pierced brass patchbox and brass hardware with perhaps a thumb medallion behind the tang of the barrel, weeping hearts inlet around the wrist, small hunting stars on the forearm where the barrel was pinned and often a hunting star or other decoration on the cheek rest. They could also be heavily inlaid with gold or silver wire in the stock.

The Pennsylvania Longrifle from Traditions was my first longrifle and I bought it because it said it was approved for Rev War reenactments by some reenactment group...I never could verify that group. One of the men in my reenactment group was a gun-builder and said that Traditions was a much later rifle design more typical of the Golden Age of Flintlock Longrifles. He also said I probably wouldn't meet any resistance to using it at a reenactment, but if I did, he would loan me one of his fowlers to use at that reenactment. A few years later I bought an Early Lancaster rifle that was Historically Accurate to as early as the 1750's but still not unusual to see during the Rev War. So those heavily decorated longrifles are not really HC/PC for the Revolutionary War, but at least they are not a percussion longrifle. ;)
funny thing I was thinking about a 'plains hunter' I met in the past
won't say nothing about his gear or his persona name as I am not about to call anyone out on the chance they are on the forum, and it is bad form

but that plains hunter musta robbed a bank to have his kit and gun
 
The OP asks a question that has no definitive answer.

The lifespan of a flintlock acquired in 1740 is the same as a new rifle bought today, in my hands quite a while, in the hands of some I know 10-20 years at most, some shorter than that because they have no regard for it.

Anyone who has been in this sport has seen modern reproductions, TC's, besses etc. that have been trashed.

Edit: And I might add there are flintlocks from the 1700's that have survived in good condition.
 
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A bit relevant, one of my first questions when I joined this forum was to address a comment I often heard when I began shooting at our range and at muzzleloading events: "My barrel is shot out." Someone responded that the iron of the older rifles was softer and prone to that situation, whereas modern muzzleloaders are made with better quality steel and less likely to encounter the same issues. I also recall seeing rifles "bored out" into shotguns, too. Care and use can determine how long a rifle or say, an automobile, will last.
 
For how long on average were rifles used? Would it be realistic for an early 1760s era Virginia rifle to show up in use years later during the fur trade? Say 1820s-1830s?

I’ve got a Kibler Woodsrunner but don’t really know what “period” it would be correct for. Just around the time of the revolution? Or could it reasonably be assumed such guns, if well taken care of and passed down, could still be in use 50-60 years on down the line?

-Smokey
I have an original jaeger rifle, it was made in 1695, at some point it was converted to percussion 1840s, so I would say that a high quality gun would be used for as long as it lasted. Mine is still shootable condition. Though I won’t do that. But clearly it was in use for 150+ years.
 
...."My barrel is shot out." ....
In my experience, which is granted limited, that's more relevant to centerfire rifle bores than to muzzleloader bores. And I've centerfire rifles whose bores looked absolutely terrible and might have been characterized as "shot out" that still shot just fine. With a muzzleloader shooting a round ball I'd think just using a thicker patch or a larger ball might produce acceptable results from a "shot out" bore. The advantage of a round ball muzzleloader is that you're not dealing with headspace or chamber erosion issues.
 
For how long on average were rifles used?
Tough question, maybe. I’m still shooting guns made during the American Civil War, though not that much. I also shoot in competition handguns and rifles made before and during WWI, WWII, the Korean and Vietnam Wars without issue. This coming weekend I will be shooting a bolt action rifle made by Winchester in 1917. Original barrel, action and stock, though I imagine that some internal components were replaced over the years, guessing some would call it maintenance. How long did the British use the Brown Bess? How long were 1903s and 1917s in use by the US military and their allies? Imagine some are still in use.

Just for giggles and kicks, go read up on the data on average lifespans back in the day. Seems if one could make it out of childhood, average life expectancy was similar to what we experience today. Imagine with firearms, average life could depend on whether or not there was a major conflict going on during said lifetime, though that is speculation on my part.
 
I often heard when I began shooting at our range and at muzzleloading events: "My barrel is shot out." Someone responded that the iron of the older rifles was softer and prone to that situation, whereas modern muzzleloaders are made with better quality steel and less likely to encounter the same issues. I also recall seeing rifles "bored out" into shotguns, too.
More likely ‘shot out’ from poor maintenance rather than wear from actual shooting. Just can’t see a patched roundball or a greased Minie shooting out a barrel. And even into the 1950s the US Military was using corrosive ammunition (to this day you can buy corrosive ammo) which caused damage to barrels made from modern steel if they were not properly cleaned.
 
I also have a 1896 Krag carbine, in as good a shape as the day it left the armory

A well taken firearm will last a long time. How many ACW reenactors carry original rifles, have a friend who carried a 1855, the only thing missing was the tape primers
Me too. I carried my sharps carbine but didn’t have tape primers to fit it.
 
For how long on average were rifles used? Would it be realistic for an early 1760s era Virginia rifle to show up in use years later during the fur trade? Say 1820s-1830s?

I’ve got a Kibler Woodsrunner but don’t really know what “period” it would be correct for. Just around the time of the revolution? Or could it reasonably be assumed such guns, if well taken care of and passed down, could still be in use 50-60 years on down the line?

-Smokey
The original Woodsrunner and Feather rifle made it to the 21st Century!
 
I also have a 1896 Krag carbine, in as good a shape as the day it left the armory

A well taken firearm will last a long time. How many ACW reenactors carry original rifles, have a friend who carried a 1855, the only thing missing was the tape primers
Lucky Man. A friend in RSA also has one and I have an 1899 Cal Gustav 96 Mauser that is almost like new with lovely Arctic Birch Stock. Shoots Well also..O.D.
 

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