First flintlock rifle question

Do NOT over fill the pan...
Click to expand...
Fill he pan only to the bottom of the touch hole. The bottom.

You want the flame front to dance it's way right through the hole,
not have to burn its way through gobs of powder piled up over it....
 
I threw away the leather and pounded a round ball flat and used that to wrap the flint.

It held the flint FAR more securely than the leather ever could have hoped to.

Go to a gunshow and see if you can find any English Chert knapped flints. The sawn flints that you can buy are, in my experience, absolute crap. I normally could get no more than 20 or so shots out of a sawn flint.

I could easily double that with English Chert.

Also, the brass ferrule on your short starter (if it has one) makes a dandy flint knapper for quickly sharpening your flint. No need for a small hammer and weird screw. Just learn it through trial and error how to strike and how hard to strike.
 
Mike, I also like lead but Jim Chambers (Siler Locks) once warned me that with casted hammers, that the additional weight of the lead can cause the hammer to bend. Almost all locks nowadays have casted hammers, unless you get the hand forged lock by Mike Miller. Since then I went back to leather. I'm thinking of using leather soaked in water and then allowed to shrink over the flint.

Got to inspect it at Bowling Green when Jim Wright brough it to the Gunmakers' Seminar. I asked him if it was a bonus freebie if I bought the two Mark Silver DVDs. Nope. :(
 
Interesting about the lead and weight.I never heard of that.There is sheet lead used for sound deadener and flashing. Might be .050? I have used that.
I suppose rawhide might work...long as the weather was nice.
 
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