Precision smoothbore target rifle

[bob308]

ok i guess i am the only one that will get called on misspelling. it is silhouette but then i find if they disagree with you and they know you are right then they pick on the person.

now back to this smoothbore thing. i don't care what you put on it a rear sight a scope a computer controlled aiming system if it does not have rifling then it is not a rifle.

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

Now Bob, I apologize. Don't get your sillottes in a knot. :surrender:

You need to study a little firearms history before you go around asserting that there is no such thing as a smooth rifle. There is, it existed in the past and was called such and we have explained to you what a smooth rifle is. It is perhaps an archaeic term but it is nonetheless real. You seem to have a very modern mindset regarding firearms and that often spoils a person's fun on a traditional forum such as this one. I just had a terrible thought Bob :shocked2: --that .45 target rifle you mentioned--it is a front loader, right? It isn't an in-line, right? Bob? :v

 

[Capt. Jas.]

What's the earliest documented reference anyone has for the term "smooth rifle"?

 

[roundball]

What's the earliest documented reference anyone has for the term "smooth rifle"?

According to this, the term was used at least as early as 1750...
http://www.moravianhistoricalsociety.org/mcall/martnez-rifle.php

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

The earliest mention I have found is an ad for a runaway apprentice or indentured servant.

"Run away on 6 Inst. from Thomas Rees of Heydelburg Township, Lancaster County....took with him a smooth rifle gun..."

The ad is dated 13 September 1739

 

[bingo1952]

Maybe they meant he picked the one that wasn't rusted up? :rotf: :blah: :surrender:

 

[bob308]

no it is not a inline. it is an underhammer as stated in the patch cutting post. the barrel is a part round made with a muzzle that makes it easy to center the patch. made it my self it has a 1-52 twist. i worked with bob hoyt for about a year.
i have my own rifling machine and gun drilling machine that i built myself.

i also have a .40 cal barrel that i use on a gpr stock. i shoot it most of the time with round balls. but i did make a false muzzle so i could use .38-40 bullets in it.

 

[faw3]

Don't tell the guys that built them and shot them the last few 100 years, in the late 1600s and 1700s a smoothy with front and rear sight that shot a tight grp at 60 and 110 yds and looked like a rifle( I think it read) was a smooth rifle. Ck your history gun books or just back aways on here. They have shot some 5 shots at 110 yds that I find real hard to belive Fred :hatsoff:

 

[faw3]

Been somehing in Muzzle blast or Muzzleloader the last few months about this ya might want to ck it out. Fred :hatsoff:

 

[faw3]

Not to make fun of ya or anything, what would you call a long gun that took 2 hands to shoot? not a hand gun but 2 hand gun? no rifle sounds better. Fred :hatsoff:

 

[roundball]

As I understand it, the primary features of a smoothbore ML that puts it in the classification of a "smooth rifle" is that it has a rear sight and the stock shape of a rifle instead of a fowler, even to include cresent shaped buttplates.

I sometimes even refer to my cobbled together T/C Hawken stocks and GM smoothbore barrels having rifle sights, as my "smooth rifles"...rifle stocks with cresent shaped butts and all.

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

Basically, they're rifles without rifling and would reflect the style of the era and area where they were built. This would apply to furniture as well.

 

[faw3]

Roundball and Russ I think ya got it. I tryed to look back a few years when this got hot and we had guys on that built and shot these in matchs....But all I could find was this - it may be of intrest?? Have a good one all! Fred :hatsoff: http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/...d/217714/post/531532/hl//fromsearch/1/#531532

 

[Many Klatch]

Bobby, maybe the correct phrase is "surprisingly accurate". Most of my smooth bores shoot about as well as a rifle out to 70 - 75 yards. That is about where the spinning ball becomes useful. At 100 yards with a smooth bore I can hit a 36 inch gong 3 out of 5 times. Now don't forget that this is with a gun with no rear sight. If I had rear sights on my smooth bores they would be smooth rifles and might be more accurate but I haven't shot one of them.

Many Klatch

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

Fowlers often had rear sights fitted, but they were still fowlers. In order to be considered a smoothrifle the gun would have to have the physical attributes of a rifle minus the rifling. Just adding a rear sight to a fowler or musket won't make it a smoothrifle.

 

[faw3]

Just parting stuff I had laying around the ed when I was packing for the hospital that I might take and read......The Telescopic sight in the American Revolution (see Muzz Blast April 2001 for ref)Well known Americans Charles Wilso Peal did the best known paaaainting of G Washington, and David Rittenhouse known as Americas Astronomer. 1775 the American Philosophical Society petitioned the Pa legislature to have him run a observatory since he could And make all the instruments, he built clocks,orrery,and Telesopes. In 1780 was the first to use spider web as reticles. They hung out with people like Washington and Ben Franklin. OK moveing on before you or I go to sleep. I'm going to cut his diary short giveing you the "jest of it from Dec 27 1775 to March 2. 27th "bought a set of gun mounings" Jan 1st "attened Mr Rittenhouse all day about a rifle with a Tellescope to it" He boght a gn that the lock was messsed up and spent time getting that in order from the 3rd to 8,9th. 9th "stocking rifle" attened Rittenhouse and Palmer all day about gun" the 13th it gets fun "Paid Joseph to make box loops ect (he had put the sight on his gun by then but all his RBs fell out going to shoot it the first time as set up.)"made a shot bag" on Feb 4th and the 5th thru 8th "trying to sight my rifle" 9th and 10th makeing springs to preven Eye from being hurt by kickking of he gun" THE 16th "Shootin the rifle!" 19th "shot small piece of papier at100 yards" 27th "shooting rifle Feb 29th " Went to see Ritten who tells me he has often heard that large loads never shoot true ,accounts for it by air being suddenly pressed together" " Lighting flyingso very crucked which goes straight in vacum." March 2 "shot riffle in Stadt House Yard left barrel and lock with Mr Palmer. This same incident is recorded by Dr Maurice Babb "as Peal and he ( Rittenhouse) almost put eyes out experimenting with telescopic sight sights on rifle". Its 3 pages worth so get a back issue if you want to read more I covered the better parts. Great men back then, now we fight over what sight is right in what match when back in 1776 they shot small papier at 100 yards with a scope :rotf: Sory but it is funnny. The BEVEL BROTHERS use Black Max to glue scopes on to the chunk guns they have like me they aren't much on real purrty as much as how well will it shoot and they get dined up being shot every day like I did. The Dixie will work too I use those if I keep my loads down to 70 grs or so.About the smooth rifle Jim Chamber makes a " Va Smooth Rifle" !760 to 70 era 20,24,28 gague. A term from Germ before 18th cen, smooth rifle a long arm that has most of the characteristics of a rifle but not rifled.From George Shumway "the relative numbers of true rifles, smooth rifles and long fowlers leave no doubt that the smooth rifle were Very popular. Ok I've worn you and me outm got to go back to hospital in mornning Fred :hatsoff:

 

[Capt. Jas.]

Fowlers often had rear sights fitted, but they were still fowlers. In order to be considered a smoothrifle the gun would have to have the physical attributes of a rifle minus the rifling. Just adding a rear sight to a fowler or musket won't make it a smoothrifle.

Russ,

Thanks for the pre-1750 reference to smooth rifle guns.
I knew there was at least one but did not have it. I assume it's from the PA Gazette?

Many of the English guns that had rifling and were true rifled guns used the same hardware and held the same lines that we consider a "fowler" except for it's rifled barrel. Many also did not have cheek pieces.

Many Germanic and other continental fowlers had cheek pieces and rear sights and looked very much like what we would readily accept today as a rifle profile but were dedicated fowling pieces.

With that in mind, are we looking at a purely American creation that is specificaly nothing but an AMERICAN longrifle with a smooth bore?
Are there any other references to this terminology other than American?

 

[CoyoteJoe]

Hope you boys get this ironed out soon, then you can work on "rifled musket". :grin:

 

[bingo1952]

:rotf: :rotf: :rotf: HeeHaw :rotf: :rotf: :surrender:

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

Rifle-musket: a muzzleloading military firearm resembling a musket, except that the bore carries rifling and it has front and rear sights. Generally fires an elongated projectile with an expanding base often referred to as a Minie ball in place of the ball load used in a smooth-bore musket. Howzat Joe? :rotf: