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Reenacters Ageing

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Zonie

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Reenacters Ageing? Well, not really the reenacters but I have noticed on this site and a few others where a newly made rifle which has been aged so that it looks like it was 275 years old is highly praised.

I myself have nothing against these "aged" guns but I have wondered if the people who are REALLY into reenacting, you know, those who raise their eyebrow over a button which didn't exist until 10 years after the Time Period. Do they actually accept a gun which looks 200 years old as being proper? (Remember, if the gun looked 200 years old in 1753 it probably should have been a dog-lock or something similar.)

It seems to me that the people who lived during one of these time periods would have had guns which looked slightly used, but not one that looked like it had been mis-treated for 200 years.

Oh, I admit that some of the people had some old guns but I think they would would have been the subject of quiet little "in your ear" comments like, "My, I thought the Snivleys were doing better than that! Why his gun looks like it came out of the stone age".
I also doubt they would have had varnish or oils which had oxidized giving them a Black appearance.

So, what do you think about carrying a well aged, blackened gun to a reenactment? :)
 
So, what do you think about carrying a well aged, blackened gun to a reenactment? :)

I think your rifle could look dirty, used and well worn. I don't think it should look more than about a generation old though.

We do tend to forget that when someone in 1750 acquired a new shirt, it looked like a "new shirt". It was clean and had no holes. It seems like most of us want to portray a guy who has old, well used items.

I've seen reenacters that look like their stuff is older than the originals that have survived. :winking:
 
I like a dull patina on the barrel, but no pitting, no rust or green brass. Worn shiny in spots. I do not follow the artificial aging myself, that's fakery. Good for replacing missing sections or furniture in original pieces for restoration, I'll grant. Though I've seen some I certainly wouldn't mind owning. I provide all my own scratches and dents and can usually tell you exactly where, when and how they all occurred.

I'm sure the British drill sergeants of 1776 would ream you with your own bayonet if you had a rusty musket barrel. Somewhere I read the troops were instructed to polish them with sand and their own 'jimmyswizzle' as required. The name stuck the passage in my mind.

Also, sergeants were issued musket tools, but the line troops were forbidden from disassembling or tampering with their locks. Never did get a good answer for if that was the case how a flint could be replaced after the prescribed 15 shots?
 
The only reason's I can see to age a muzzleloader is if your making a copy to hang in a museum, or someone's personal collection... Your muzzleloader will age with use and it won't take that long if you get out and use it! We who do use our muzzleloaders faithfully probably age our firearms quicker in five years of todays use then twenty years of use by an old timer of the frontier period... We certainly burn more powder and throw more lead in one years use of; reenacting, target shooting, hunting, and plinking, then that old timer did in a year. For the most part, the frontiersman only shot when he had to, unless he was at a doin's and there was a contest going on... Even then they seldom took more then a few shots. Folks in the old days did buy new firearms! I also think they cleaned their firearms as best they could and tried to preserve the wood and metals with oils as best they could. :) I let my muzzleloaders age with me, gracefully... :)
 
I really like the "aged" and worn look!That is just my opinion.I like the aged powder horns and shootin bags made by Ken Scott and Triple J. I admire the guns and shootin bags and knives made by Jack Hubbard, and also Rustic Arms.It is kind of like fords and chevys and mercedes, we dont all like the same kind of car and we dont all like the same "look" at rondevous.Different strokes for different folks.It may be correct or not-you all can argue that with the experts, I aint an expert on anything.
J.J.
 
Yep, hear the same arguments in cowboy Action shooting.
You can buy guns with the finish completely worn off and even a few pits in the finish, looks over a 100 yrs. old
but would have been new then. :winking:
 
People wear handed-down clothes, people also used handed down firearms...

The trick is not to get a 200 year old looking firearm when you are petending to be someone who was alive during the firearm's second year of production...

New for the era, unless you are being someone at the end of a long production run...
 

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