Photos, I hope, of EK's Fusil de Tulle

[Al Parsons]

Overall Shot of Fusil

This is the one, folks. European walnut, Eric's own hand forged iron. More info. on the lock down below.

 

[Al Parsons]

The lock

Eric, in an email, described the lock this way: "...the lock began life as a Chambers 'Germanic' or 'Christian's Spring' lock. I completely reshaped the plate and pan and replaced the cock entirely and turned it into a good French lock".

PS. "Tulle" is the more common spelling. In the 1720s/1730s it was sometimes spelled "TVLE". There are some great pictures demonstrating this on page 2 of the following wonderful site:
[url] http://www.lanouvelle-france.com/tullefusil.htm[/url]

 

[Al Parsons]

The lock - again

Please refer to comments above for Eric's description, etc.

 

[Al Parsons]

The sideplate

 

[Al Parsons]

The butt

 

[Al Parsons]

The nose

 

[Al Parsons]

Stock profile - sideplate

 

[Al Parsons]

Stock profile - lock

 

[Al Parsons]

That's all for now, folks. I'm exhausted. Hope you enjoyed the pics. Most were pretty amateurish but the outside ones tend to show the dark brown colour of the stock quite well. Talk to you all later.

 

[RickD]

Thats a very very nice rifle

 

[Raynor]

Beautiful gun! :thumbsup:

 

[TANSTAAFL]

Eric does some fine work.

Just curious, is the barrel swamped? Appears the muzzle tapers back, could be just the angle of pic.

 

[tg]

Very nice gun,I like the bulbuss ramrod end ask EK how he did it if you get a chance.

 

[Al Parsons]

Yes, the barrel is swamped. Its a 44" Colerain barrel, octagon to round. I was astonished at how light the gun was the first time I picked it up.

 

[rsblack]

very nice gun :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

 

[Okwaho]

Eric does some fine work.

Just curious, is the barrel swamped? Appears the muzzle tapers back, could be just the angle of pic.

These early fusil barrels aren't swamped in the sense that Kentucky rifle barrels were. I have three early fusils fin from about 1690 to 1730 and while they are Liegeois guns two of them were shipped over to New France probaqbly as Chief's guns and I suspect that the earliest of the three {Ca.1690-1715}was also or that it came over as part of an officer's baggage.All three have a slight flare to the barrel from just in front of the front sight.I haven't examined any Tulle iron mounted Fusils de chasse such as the subject gun, so I can't comment on the flaring of their barrels.Eric has dne a fine job on this gun and perhaps the lock reworking will serve to illustrate what Mike Brooks,TG and I have been preaching about.This is what a fusil de chasse or a fusil fin de chasse lock should look like not that German jaeger lock that Track uses for their so called Types C and D. Eric started with a Chambers early Germanic lock and did extensive reworking including a new plate and cock.You can get almost the same affect by reworking an L&R or R.E.Davis lock such as TG did some time ago.Another facet of this gun that I particularly liked was the slenderizing treatment of the stock,especially the forestock.This is a very nice recreation of a late {post 1745} French Fusil de chasse and is gun which I would very much enjoy owning.
Tom Patton

 

[benvenuto]

beautiful gun! The work on getting the lock looking so right should be an example to us all :hatsoff:

 

[hawkeye1755]

This is really some fine work. :bow:
And i hope that it shoots like it looks.
When not, send me an email,i will take the beauty. :grin:
:hatsoff:

 

[Okwaho]

Very nice gun,I like the bulbuss ramrod end ask EK how he did it if you get a chance.

TG as to the rammer,it's not all that difficult, I did one for my Marshall rifle and a pistol that I believe is a trade pistol. You just start with a rod the size of the desired muzzle end and shave it down to fit the pipes.I don't know how much of a taper this gun's rammer has but it can be done. Early tapering was likely done with flat iron plates with holes for various rammers much like the ones used for making round weavers for round rod oak baskets where a square rod of approximately 1/4" was shaved on one end and then inserted onto and pulled through a hole in an iron plate to achieve the round weavers.I'm sure Erik's method is more sophisticated but the technique is the same.I did mine by hand,scraping and checking the pipes as I went.

By the way I failed to mention in my post that Erik's use of French walnut was a really neat choice of woods, a detail that very few builders consider and use.I have a 1740's period fowler in the English tradition by Chris Gilgun who used English walnut.I note that of the two English guns offered by Jim Chambers'one is available only in English walnut and the other is available only in English walnut or cherry.
Again, this is a very fine gun.
Tom Patton

 

[paulvallandigham]

Just to add to this, you can take a steel plate, and cut a U-shaped groove in it, and then file bevels on one side so that the groove becomes a round bottom " V ", The top, or opening can be left at the maximum diameter of the stock you are using to make the ramrod. The bottom of the " u " can be the final smallest diameter you want to achieve, with the sides sloping like the letter " V ".

The other thing that can be used is a spokeshave, which has an arched blade to use to cut a round surface. You can find spokesshaves at antique auctions, and farm auctions, or you can buy them new from Woodcraft, harbor freight, and other tool companies. As long as you have a vise, or clamp to hold one end of the ramrod stock, and you take your time, you can produce a ramrod with that bell-shaped nose without too much trouble. I have done it with nothing more than a draw file, although that is doing it the hard way, and I will not recommend that to you. Scrapers would work faster and produce a more uniform round rod. I know one man who I watched over a couple of days at a BP demonstration our club was holding, make such a rod with only a knife to use as a scraper. It was well into the second day before we figured out what he was doing! ( being ornary, he wouldn't tell us!)