I’ve had the opportunity to look at many Indian made charlevilles from Loyalist arms and Veteran and Military Heritage.
I think loyalists arms contractor in indian uses drilled bar stock, which is perfectly fine. However, some others ive see had seems under the breech and along the side…. Not a good thing.
For one…. I dont’ mess with the barrels, i only look them over, I will not drill a vent hole on one of these.
A few things about how they’re made, there seems to be a lot of people who think they’re made the same way originals were made, this is not true.
Everyone has seen the video of the Indian shop cold lap welding over a sheet of steel into a barrel, and everyone has seen Wallace Gussler lapweld a sheet of wrought iron into a barrel.
Well, the one key variable between these two is the wrought iron, wrought iron lap welds under lower temperatures much easier than mild steel or high carbon steel, because it has almost no carbon in it.
Point being, they’re not made the same way… and further more 18th century barrel makers in Europe did drill barrels from bar stock, and used many other methods too such as the french Ruban and chamise and Spain welded coiled barrels.
North American barrel makers such as the one Wallace Gussler depicted in his film made those barrels over a mandrel because they had no other choices on making them, they didn’t have the equipment to drill, the British laws were against them, and raw materials were very limited.
Lap-welding a sheet steel is not the same as lap welding a sheet of wrought iron, not even close.