I live in David Thompson Country and hunt and trek in areas he travelled along the North Saskatchewan and Brazeau rivers. Many of these areas are accessible by foot or horse only and really haven't changed in the last 200 years. (no human disturbance, logging oil and gas etc). I really want to get a nice trade rifle that would be correct for the time he travelled this country but right now that's not in the cards. Looking at Rob's builds I am so envious! I have never met the man but from his posts and his responses to my questions he seems like a real down to earth fella that can appreciate anyone's efforts to try and get themselves shooting, what I call a "run what ya brung" kind of guy. I don't have his skills to build from scratch and the dollar exchange for us Canadians, and shipping kills us even more. So anyway enough chat. I have made a few posts in the smoothbore and flintlock forums as I was trying to figure this out so there's more of the story there. Basically, I bought a traditions Kentucky percussion kit relatively cheap here in Canada. I already had a Kentucky flintlock, but it was a factory built rifle with blued barrel. I took the percussion barrel from the kit and browned it up real nice and used the percussion lock with it to covert my old Kentucky to a percussion 50. It's done and shoots like a hot dam. I ordered a 7\8" Octagon barrel with the last 4" round, in 54 cal smooth from Colrains. I have the breech plug fitted and fitted to the stock, tang cut and shaped and drilled, and the barrel, lock trigger and trigger guard all fit. Some sanding to fit the butt plate and bits as well. I left the nose cap off as the octagon part was a little short, and I like the look of the trade rifles without the brass nose cap. I have the barrel tenons marked and next step is to file in the dove tails and solder on the front site.
