Questions about IMA

[Mitch97]

Has anyone handled or ordered from IMA? I've been eyeing a few of their EIC 1771 Bess's, but at $1300 they claim they are not intended for firing and won't do inspections verify barrels, etc. Is this just a legal loophole they are using to avoid liability? I've seen people online shooting them, but figured I'd ask the knowledgeable people here what they thought.

I'd like an original piece - as they seem to gain value (rather than just hold it as a repop).

https://www.ima-usa.com/collections...tlock-musket-nepalese-gurkha-marked-lock-html(link for those curious)

 

[Mustakrakish]

Back when IMA first started selling off the contents of the Nepal Cache, I bought a P53 and one of those locally baked Francotte-Martini-Henry unique-to-Nepal rifles, both as wallhangers. Both were missing some small parts and neither was operable. As a lockdown project back in 2020, I restored both to full operation. The P53's nipple unfortunately came out in pieces and took some of the threading with it, so I had to bore the hole out and helicoil it to a modern standard thread pitch. It survived several test shots but will never be much of a shooter, at least not unless I replace the stock. The F-M-H as a series of rifles was not safe to shoot even when they were brand new, and mine will not be test fired.

More recently, I ordered one of their EIC Pattern F muskets in restored condition and let me say that they did an outstanding job. The stock had rotted out in areas and IMA's repairs were excellent. There was significant pitting on the barrel below the stock line, but given that these barrels had been made in England and had survived the proofing process, I had enough faith in its metallurgy to test fire it a few times. It seems to be a shooter, but given that it's an original, it will be a fair weather shooter, basically meaning that I'll only be bringing it outside during the summer months.

What you need to understand about any of these Nepal Cache guns is that in most cases they were rode hard and in all cases they were put away wet. Each spent a century or so in an abandoned stone building with a leaky roof and no climate control of any sort, and saw no maintenance at all during that time. There will almost certainly be some pitting under the wood. The wood itself will usually have problems. (In my case, IMA took care of those problems as mentioned above.) Any parts made in Nepal should be considered suspect until proven otherwise, as while the local metal workers were (and are) extremely good at what they do, they were working by eye, meaning that the heat treat and composition of the alloys that they were using can be inconsistent. In the case of the Bess you're looking at, it seems that the barrel is English and was proofed, so there probably aren't any safety concerns unless it's severely pitted...but you won't know whether it is or not until it's in your hands.

In my opinion, the claim of them not being intended for firing is just avoiding liability, all the while expecting their customers to shoot them. Heck, at the bottom of the page they have a video of a customer firing one. I'm not going to tell you not to, but I would warn you that you'd be dealing with a firearm made a long time ago, without modern quality control or steel, that was then given to Nepal as surplus which was used and abused for a bit before being left in a basement for a century and a half. Besides that, make sure that you understand the difference between an antique that's safe to shoot and one that isn't, or at least have someone available that can determine that for you.

Based on my experiences and the experiences of others that I've read about, most of the guns that IMA's people have reworked show up in a condition that allows them to be shot safely. However, you may get a wallhanger as well. It's a bit of a gamble. If I were ordering one with the idea of shooting it, I'd probably opt for a hand select one and specify that I was looking for a barrel with as little pitting as possible, as it's probably going to be deep pitting that gets you into trouble from a safety standpoint. If it survived the proofing process when it was new, about the only thing old age would do to it that would decrease its strength would be to rust it out.

 

[hawkeye2]

What you get can be hit or miss. Their description pretty much tells the story. The guns were coated with yak fat and stacked like cord wood in an open faced building for 150 years. You might be lucky or you might end up with a wall hanger. I bought one of their untouched Gahendra Martinis a few years back taking the chance it might be made into a shooter but I believe it's closer to a relic. I bought an Evans carbine from them a couple of years ago. It was said to be functioning but I expected it to be rough from the photos. It arrived totally locked up. I called them and they took it back return shipping paid and refunded 100% plus the original shipping.

 

[Mitch97]

Right, this will be something to collect and occasionally shoot. I would choose hand select and ask for a barrel they believe to be in best condition. I figure locks can look bad, be operable, and be safe - barrels are where most of the concern is at.

Without getting into politics, I'm looking to diversify into collectible to avoid some of the rampant inflation. A indian made gun or a pedersoli may hold some value, but they certainly won't gain in value. I believe once these dry up from IMA that the prices will sky rocket for all original Bess's. Small stocks of originals may continue to be found, but this seems to be the last of the large caches.

 

[TNBandit]

I bought one of the Brown Bess "kits" from them a couple years ago and rebuilt it and it turned out fine. I fired it once on the 4th of July a couple years ago and then hung it on the wall. I'll give my honest opinion about these and possibly piss off some of their buddies but I'm not one to sugarcoat anything. Their descriptions I feel are quite an exxageration and borderline deceptive. These are NOT East India Company Besses that had their original markings removed and replaced with Gurkha markings. They are entirely Nepal made and fairly crudely compared to British manufacture. The ones with "original" EIC markings in fact appear to have had Gurkha markings ground off and fake EIC engraving done on top of that. Blowing up some of the pictures I can still see the remains of the Gurkha crest on some of them. Now I have zero proof they had that done but these guns were placed in storage in Nepal over 200 years ago and remained there until IMA bought them so you do the math... I've been told by folks who have gone there and hand inspected some of these that they did find a small handfull that had genuine British proof marks on the back side of locks, etc but it's my opinion that's very rare and not the norm. ALL of the barrels appear to have the Nepal "feet" stampings and zero British proofs. So with that said if you want a shooter buy a reproduction. If you want an original British made Bess buy it somewhere else.

 

[Mitch97]

Interesting that some question the origin. Still they seem decently made from what I can gather (originally, before they sat for 150 years). I suppose one should ask if they believe these are worth the asking price? They are certainly more affordable than almost any original Bess in half decent shape.

 

[TNBandit]

Interesting that some question the origin. Still they seem decently made from what I can gather (originally, before they sat for 150 years). I suppose one should ask if they believe these are worth the asking price? They are certainly more affordable than almost any original Bess in half decent shape.

My friend please don't misunderstand my comments. I do question the origin and many others do as well and these are people who have bought them, taken them apart, worked on them, and built guns from them. Not just some armchair "experts" repeating what someone else told them. These are certainly legitimate antique Brown Bess muskets. However I do not believe they are British made and then had the original British markings removed any more than the guns coming out of the Khyber Pass in Afghanistan were originally made in the UK. I believe the Nepal government had some original guns and copied them and made their own to keep up with demand during a time when originals were unavailable to them in large numbers. Nothing wrong with that and they have historical value. My comment is simply that IMA has embellished the descriptions of who produced these guns. I even believe the owners of IMA to be decent honorable folks. I think their advertising people took some liberties with the "facts" though. Take one apart beside an original British made Bess and compare the quality of the work, etc. and get back to me...

 

[Mitch97]

My friend please don't misunderstand my comments. I do question the origin and many others do as well and these are people who have bought them, taken them apart, worked on them, and built guns from them. Not just some armchair "experts" repeating what someone else told them. These are certainly legitimate antique Brown Bess muskets. However I do not believe they are British made and then had the original British markings removed any more than the guns coming out of the Khyber Pass in Afghanistan were originally made in the UK. I believe the Nepal government had some original guns and copied them and made their own to keep up with demand during a time when originals were unavailable to them in large numbers. Nothing wrong with that and they have historical value. My comment is simply that IMA has embellished the descriptions of who produced these guns. I even believe the owners of IMA to be decent honorable folks. I think their advertising people took some liberties with the "facts" though. Take one apart beside an original British made Bess and compare the quality of the work, etc. and get back to me...

I could definitely see that being the truth and thank you for sharing that. I was under no impression these were original British made firearms. I figured they were contracts for EIC by Indian makers (or, I suppose Nepalese). Their description of the barrel reads as such "Barrel made by the East India Company in India and features Anglo Indian proof marks." The British and British EIC made firearms all over their colonies for various reasons and I'm not a snob about pedigree. I suppose the value isn't as great if it is truly of Nepalese origin, but it is true to form copy of a Bess of the era. I believe the Nepalese worked with similar technology to either the Indian makers or the gun makers of London.

Finding a legitimate all parts made British Brown Bess for under $2,500 is quite a impossibility these days. But I appreciate your warnings - I asked for them, I hear them, and I understand them.

 

[Mustakrakish]

Rather than edit my earlier post, I figured that I'd add a new one. I re-read the description of the kit that you're looking at and the barrel is not advertised as being British, but rather was made in India for the EIC. That may or may not be a problem. I honestly don't know enough about it to have an opinion, as I'm not familiar with how weapons made in India for English use were proofed. That's another thing to take into consideration if you're looking for a shooter.

Personally, I don't shoot any gun that old until it's been bungied to a tire and shot remotely several times with a charge more powerful than the one I'm planning on using. England's proofing system is well and good, but if you're not already familiar with how firearms were made in England in the late 18th and early 19th century, you might be a bit astonished. Modern firearms have a large safety margin built into them, but that wasn't necessarily the case in 1820. Add a century or so of neglect and the idea of remotely proofing a potential pipe bomb before shooting it next to my face makes a certain amount of sense to me. Call me overly cautious if you'd like, but it's worked for me so far. I've had the displeasure of experiencing a firearm exploding (unmentionable milsurp, caused by bad ammo) beside my head and while I survived it with minimal permanent damage, I have no wish to do it again.

Finally, all this talk of maltreated Besses has me thinking about getting one of these kits. I've enjoyed building the few that I've done so far (even that atrocious Traditions 1842, do not get me started on that) and I'm a sucker for big bore smoothbores, and a Bess would look swell on the dining room wall. I can understand the appeal, Mitch.

 

[TNBandit]

Don't get me wrong, I'm happy with mine..

 

[Mitch97]

These replies really do help. Seeing what actual owners think of them is a tremendous help. I'd be cautious to shoot this one more than a handful of times a year - I'd likely never shoot a full power charge out of it. The reason I ask about shoot-ability has more to do with the product quality itself. It is my opinion that buying a musket that is un-fireable holds substantially less value - not because people are going to want to shoot it 40 years down the road, but because it's a sign of overall health of the product.

It's like collecting cars - car collectors don't want an "all original" only to find out that they must replace the engine due to a block crack.

 

[Mitch97]

Additionally, I suppose I could have a barrel made for it that would allow it to be a shooter and keep the original barrel for display. I assume that I would need to send the original off so that one could be worked up to fit the stock without additional fitment. Thoughts?

 

[TNBandit]

Additionally, I suppose I could have a barrel made for it that would allow it to be a shooter and keep the original barrel for display. I assume that I would need to send the original off so that one could be worked up to fit the stock without additional fitment. Thoughts?

Bobby Hoyt could put a liner in it and make it better than new and keep the original barrel.

 

[Mustakrakish]

Additionally, I suppose I could have a barrel made for it that would allow it to be a shooter and keep the original barrel for display. I assume that I would need to send the original off so that one could be worked up to fit the stock without additional fitment. Thoughts?

I spent a few hours today trying to figure out the provenance of these things and wound up going pretty far down the rabbit hole. To summarize, nobody is sure. The theory that IMA went with is that the locks were English and the barrels were Indian, and there is evidence that supports (but certainly does not conclusively prove) this. Another theory is that the barrels are English and the locks are Indian, and again there's some evidence to support this as well. Most of the folks that are really into this field seem to believe that wherever the locks were made, most of them weren't made in Nepal, as they simply couldn't make something like that in sufficient numbers at that time. As if this wasn't confusing enough, Nepal was historically famous for recycling parts from DX'd guns into new ones, locally fabricating parts to get incomplete foreign guns operational, and generally doing what had to be done to make things work. Thus, it's perfectly within the realm of believability that a few of those Nepal Bess locks were indeed from EIC...but almost certainly not all of them, or even the majority of them. According to some of the guys that have spent time digging through the piles of old guns at IMA, most of the locks appear too good to be from Nepal, but a bit crude for England - hence the India theory. Of course, the competing theory goes that those locks were from England as that would have been the least expensive way to get them at the time, but the locks that were sent were not the best, possibly including locks that had failed inspection and been rejected. No one really knows for sure.

Why would Nepal take EIC-marked parts, grind the original markings off them, and apply their own? I can think of a few. They certainly didn't know at the time that EIC markings would make the parts more collectible a century and a half later, so there wasn't a compelling reason for them not to do this. If the theory about second quality English locks being sold illegally to Nepal via India is true, it may not even have been the Nepalese that ground the English markings off.

What did I get out of all of this? Unless I were there picking out my parts personally, I'd pass. A well made lock doesn't always look all that different from a basket case while it's mounted in the stock. If I knew for a fact that the lock was made in Nepal, I'd certainly pass; I've already had to fight with one of those things and I don't want to do it again. That having been said, plenty of people out there have restored them, so I may still just be overly cautious after my experience with my Traditions Springfield. Based on a couple of build threads that I read, these IMA kits often require a bit of tinkering to get running and I'm presently all tinkered out.

If you were going to go ahead with a project like this, it might be worth holding off on a replacement barrel until you know for sure that the original isn't going to cut it. It may turn out that the one that they send you is perfectly sound.

 

[Mitch97]

I spent a few hours today trying to figure out the provenance of these things and wound up going pretty far down the rabbit hole. To summarize, nobody is sure. The theory that IMA went with is that the locks were English and the barrels were Indian, and there is evidence that supports (but certainly does not conclusively prove) this. Another theory is that the barrels are English and the locks are Indian, and again there's some evidence to support this as well. Most of the folks that are really into this field seem to believe that wherever the locks were made, most of them weren't made in Nepal, as they simply couldn't make something like that in sufficient numbers at that time. As if this wasn't confusing enough, Nepal was historically famous for recycling parts from DX'd guns into new ones, locally fabricating parts to get incomplete foreign guns operational, and generally doing what had to be done to make things work. Thus, it's perfectly within the realm of believability that a few of those Nepal Bess locks were indeed from EIC...but almost certainly not all of them, or even the majority of them. According to some of the guys that have spent time digging through the piles of old guns at IMA, most of the locks appear too good to be from Nepal, but a bit crude for England - hence the India theory. Of course, the competing theory goes that those locks were from England as that would have been the least expensive way to get them at the time, but the locks that were sent were not the best, possibly including locks that had failed inspection and been rejected. No one really knows for sure.

Why would Nepal take EIC-marked parts, grind the original markings off them, and apply their own? I can think of a few. They certainly didn't know at the time that EIC markings would make the parts more collectible a century and a half later, so there wasn't a compelling reason for them not to do this. If the theory about second quality English locks being sold illegally to Nepal via India is true, it may not even have been the Nepalese that ground the English markings off.

What did I get out of all of this? Unless I were there picking out my parts personally, I'd pass. A well made lock doesn't always look all that different from a basket case while it's mounted in the stock. If I knew for a fact that the lock was made in Nepal, I'd certainly pass; I've already had to fight with one of those things and I don't want to do it again. That having been said, plenty of people out there have restored them, so I may still just be overly cautious after my experience with my Traditions Springfield. Based on a couple of build threads that I read, these IMA kits often require a bit of tinkering to get running and I'm presently all tinkered out.

If you were going to go ahead with a project like this, it might be worth holding off on a replacement barrel until you know for sure that the original isn't going to cut it. It may turn out that the one that they send you is perfectly sound.

I think that's where buying one of their complete guns has an advantage. They've cleaned them up and have done a lot of the foot work for you. I may still have to send the lock off to someone more capable, but the lock should be serviceable to some degree. The barrel is the wild card in my opinion and could certainly be a lemon.

I'd spend the extra cash and opt for hand select and hope that actually helps. I could see the whole gun having been made in India as an off the books copy - they were certainly capable of making a large amount of Muskets back then. I appreciate the research on these things.

 

[TNBandit]

I think that's where buying one of their complete guns has an advantage. They've cleaned them up and have done a lot of the foot work for you. I may still have to send the lock off to someone more capable, but the lock should be serviceable to some degree. The barrel is the wild card in my opinion and could certainly be a lemon.

I'd spend the extra cash and opt for hand select and hope that actually helps. I could see the whole gun having been made in India as an off the books copy - they were certainly capable of making a large amount of Muskets back then. I appreciate the research on these things.

With mine a couple of the threaded holes in the lock plate were stripped and I had to tap them out for bigger screws which required me to also drill out the holes in the bridle and come up with appropriate screws. The square shank on the tumbler was badly worn causing the hammer to be loose and I had to have the tumbler welded up and then filed back down to make it square. The top jaw screw hole in the hammer was also stripped so the screw wouldn't tighten down properly. If I remember correctly I had to put a helicoil in the hole in the hammer and rethread the screw. These are not a good choice if you're not able to do these type of repairs. All of this stuff is 200 years old with hand cut threads on the screws and are fairly well worn out.

 

[sportster73hp]

Paying for hand select doesn’t always get you a great part. Most places say the best of 5 or 10 pieces. You may be getting the best of 10 pieces of scrap or if picker is having a bad day it will be the one on top.