I owned a .45 for a few years. It was a good shooter and I got it on a sale. The negatives ”“ the sights are horrendous and the ramrods are even worse though that’s easy enough to remedy. The stock architecture doesn’t represent anything specific in the historic record and it leaves a ton of extra wood on the entire fore end. Furniture isn’t inlaid, but screwed on which was no doubt a cost saving measure. The barrel is not pinned, but uses screws under the rod thimbles ”“ pretty weird, but if one doesn’t care about historicity, then not that big of a deal. The lock is pretty good (though larger than it should be in relation to the rifle size), but it is a real flint basher. It is muzzle heavy, but that’s par the course for longer barreled rifles with straight barrels. Finally, these use a ridiculous (in my opinion) patent breach that is totally unnecessary and can cause ignition issues if not regularly attended to. I’ve heard that the chamber isn’t as much of an issue in the larger calibers, due to the chamber being larger. A small (say, .22 cal) cleaning brush is required to get down in there and scrub fowling.
Still, these are probably the best off the shelf factory long rifle made. If you can get one for under $500, it’s a good deal. I’ve seen a couple that had extensive work done to them to make them look pretty good though the time and effort to do so would be around what it takes to put a good kit together. The cost to have someone do this would prohibitive as well.
. Ps.........the ram rods are indeed junk!
