What the heck is a Hooked Breech Block?

[Weird Guy]

I see that Pedersoli's website has a Gibbs target rifle listed, and it features a hooked breech block.

What gets me is that the Gibbs aparently has no ramrod as part of the rifle. I think that might be that way because it is a target competition rifle and you carry the ramrod seperate.

What I don't get is what the hooked breech block is exactly? At first I thought it might be some sort of breech loading rifle (the lack of the ramrod started that thought going in my head), but after looking around for exploded views of a pistol that had a hooked breech block. I think it is just a way to mount and demount the barrel to the wood furniture.

You hook the breech block under the back of the wood furniture into a metal part that stays on the furniture, then lower the barrel down into groove in the wood foregrip, and hammer in a wedge pin through a foregrip slot, which also goes through a tab on the bottom of the barrel, securing the barrel to the wood.

That is what a Hooked Breech Block is, correct?

 

[ribbonstone]

Got it right.

Idea here is that the barrel is held to the stock with cross wedges...and the breech has a "hook" that locks it into a metal tang on the stock. To remove the barrel for cleaning, you drive the cross wedges and rotate the barrel up and out of the stock...the beech being "hooked" to alow that rahter than being screwd down to the stock.

Just makes taking the barrel off for cleaning easier this way. If the breech plug was not "hooked" would have to remove teh screws that hold the tang and take the whole thing off...with a chance of distrubing the wood to metal fit every time you did it.

Real old traditional guns (Long Rifles, like "Kentuckies") were corss pinned to the stock and very seldom had their barrels removed...cleaning pretty much done with wood and metal still attached.

 

[taralon]

Yeah pretty much what your description says. Though most of the hooked breech block that I own will set the wedge pin with nothing more than some forceful thumb pressure. Hooked breeches are from what I've seen just as accurate as fully pinned guns, and a whole hell of a lot easier to clean as you don't have to worry about the wood soaking up the cleaning water and warping.

 

[Hafoc]

Right. Theoretically a hooked breech shouldn't affect the rifle's accuracy because the sights are fastened directly to the barrel. Can't disturb the sight-to-barrel alignment by removing the barrel if the sights come along too.

If you had a cowboy lever gun with a tang sight it might be a different matter, but as far as I know people don't disassemble those for cleaning as far as they do with front-stuffers.

 

[Weird Guy]

Ok, time to bring this up again.

If the hooked breech block is still a muzzle loader, then that Gibbs must have a seperate ramrod.

I like breechloaders. I own two Sharps rifles, one crappy one from Pedratti, and a good one from Pedersoli (thank you dixie gun works).

Is there any other type of breechloader other than the Sharps?

 

[taralon]

If you are talking loose powder and ball or paper cartridges, yes.

There's the Ferguson (one of which is on sale at trackofthewolf.com ) and the 1819 Hall, which unfortunately are all that I can recall off the top of my head right now.

 

[4V50 Gary]

Wierd Guy - there are countless #s of breechloaders. The defender of Culp's Hill at Gettysburg, General Greene, invented a breech loading bolt action rifle in time for the Civil War. It featured an underhammer for ignition. Greene was more modest than Chamberlain (20th Maine) but holding Culp's Hill was just as significant as Little Round Top. He's largely forgotten today but anyone who studies that battle knows of his importance. His men erected a bronze statute of Greene on Culp's Hill so he maintains his vigil to this day.

There were also breechloading magazine fed flintlock guns too. One chamber in the stock contained powder and the other chamber the ball. By rotating a handle, you dropped powder into the chamber and then a bit further, a ball. The rotating block was then rotated back into firing position. I'd pass on shooting it.

 

[taralon]

There were caplock and flintlock 'harmonica' guns as well. Had a big magazine looking thing with 5-10 preloaded chambers. Gun grabbers of today living back then would have probably labled them 'assault rifles'.