The interesting Comblain type rifles

[Buckshot]

............The Comblaines were a Belgium invention, and were of the falling block type action. They were a diverse lot, and generally produced by various consortiums. It's all a gnarly Belgium incestuest mess, It's interesting if you're really taken by that kind of thing. Me, I was mainly interested in the ONE Comblain that I had acquired, yet had to get muddy up to the armpits seeking info on it. And I will not relay any here except the bits that are needed for clarity.

I'll probably have to do this in possibly 3 installments. The first here, will merely be some exterior shots.


Yup, it's a handy little carbine. The bbl is about 22" long with 2 brass bands. The action is VERY compact, and simple in it's operation but somewhat ingenious and 'Picky' in it's design.



That odd appendage sticking down from the action contains the trigger, mainspring, hammer and the extractor. In the photo above labeled One & TWO it is in it's "Ready to fire Position. In photo 4, the trigger guard has been rotated forward to eject the spent case, cock the action and open the breech to accept a new cartridge. The lever/trigger guard, along with the action body containing the trigger, etc, rotate with it. They rotate on the shaft of the largest screw (of 3) there at the bottom left front corner of the action.



In photo 3, you can see that the hammer is shrouded. That is rather odd as in the early days of self contained ammunition, the primer was not all that dependable. It often required a 2nd or 3rd try to make it go bang. But, never the less the hammer IS shrouded.




The sights are also very rudimentary. Cute, I'll admit but not for long range action at all.

[Buckshot]

....................PART 2,

Obviously the above is a photo of the bore. Four lands and grooves. The twist is a turn in 16" which would seem to be rather quick for it's vintage. The grooves are .455" and the bore is .433", which is .011" and that's very deep considering most modern firearms sport a .004" deep groove, so the Comblain's grooves are almost 3 times the normal depth.



The above is a chamber casting, and enough of the lands/grooves were captured to illustrate their depth. Also oddly enough you might notice that there is no neck. Not that a neck HAS to be present, ya know like a 45-70 and such don't HAVE a neck, because they don't NEED a neck. Odd that the chamber wasn't reamed to include a neck, yet the cartridge HAS to have one to hold the bullet.



In the above photo of various Comblain cartridges, the one for my carbine is the illustration marked "CO4".



On the left are the cases (32 guage CBC shotshells used).On the right are fired and re-sized cases. Explanation in the photo.



(LEFT) Reloaded cases using the new made dies. The white address tape was required as these brass shotshell cases were still a trifle small in OD before firing. The tape guaranteed they'd expand evenly when fired. Obviously I was using the original CBC cases (Berdan primed) modified to use shotshell battery cup primers. (Right) I finally broke down and HAD to make a shellholder and a sizer and seater die. The material was the 7/8" OD front strut rods I'd replaced in our '86 Chevy Celebrity. Come to find out when I chucked the material up in the lathe to cut and thread them, they were hard Chromed.

The HSS parting bit didn't even squeal. It simply turned red and died. Carbide to the rescue to part them off, and carbide to get through the chrome for threading. Internal turning/forming was done via several hand ground HSS forming tools. As you can see, I turned the size die internally to NOT produce a close copy of the chamber. I HAD to have a neck to hold the slug, but ran the line from body to neck as gradually as I could obtain. I suppose the military ammo wasn't reloaded so they wouldn't be concerned with reloading/case longevity.

[Buckshot]

.....................So with a sizer, seater die and shell holder made it was on to other things to make.



A collet was made that would hold one of the 32 ga shotshells, with the correct amount exposed so it could be parted off. The 5C collet in the lathe spindle opened, then the ho-made case holding collet could be removed, the shortened case replaced with a new one, re-inserted in the 5C collet and IT parted off. All done without being required to start and stop the lathe to perform the operation.



LEFT: Another small thimble collet was made, to again hold the cartridge case in the 5C collet, this time base end outboard so that mods to the primer pocket could be made. Again the lathe needn't be stopped, just the 5C collet opened, case and thimble collet removed, new case placed in the collet and stuck back into the 5C collet, without the lathe being shut off.



Now that we had the tools to create cases, we had to maintain them so a case trimmer set was made up. First was a cutter body, next the case length gage, and then finally the shell holder and clamp nut.



The above tools were made up to de, and reprime the cases that had been altered to utilize shotshell battery cup primers. CBC/Magtech now uses large pistol/rifle primers.

[Buckshot]

...............One more tool needed to be made, and that was a mainspring compressor, below:





The above are ALL the works of the Comblain action, minus the receiver itself. Starting at the bottom and working up, you have the TRIGGER GUARD/action lever. You'll see at the front of this curved lever there are 2 pivot holes. The one to the left hinges to the RECEIVER body. The hole directly to it's right hinges to the ACTION HOUSING, utilizing the hole directly below the breech block. Next to the trigger guards' right is the TRIGGER, to the right or that is the ACTION HOUSING. This action housing is all one piece with the exception of the hammer shroud, which is dovetailed into the back of the breech block. Above the trigger is the case extractor. To it's immediate right, on the other side of the action housing is the HAMMER.

The firing pin is a seperate piece of the hammer. You can see the cross screw which retains the firing pin in the hammer. Directly below the hammer is the mainspring, a common type 'V' spring. This spring fit's into the bottom right of the ACTION HOUSING. The top of the spring with it's claw, and the claw is then hooked onto the swinging tail of the hammer providing the force to cause the hammer to strike. So all these parts are part of, or act off of the ACTION HOUSING. Very darn ingenious if you ask me.

However, it's hard to disassemble this tightly fitted group of mutually interdependent parts, due to the main spring's relation to them.



So by using this mainspring compressor, you may easily disassemble this complete firing mechanism.



The quality of the photo is poor, but I'm making a replacement firing pin as the one in the hammer was fairly well eroded and corroded, so the new pin is being turned out of S-7 steel.

Buckshot

[725]

Very interesting. What caliber & what cartridge?

[cwtebay]

You've definitely piqued my interest!

Sent from my Pixel 5 using Tapatalk

[tomme boy]

Amazing all the ways people came up with for gun designs. And no modeling software on a computer. They had to use the computer on their shoulders. Something most people of today can't imagine.

[Jniedbalski]

Nice like to know more

[Buckshot]

.............So far as I can tell it was considered an 11mm. I called it the 11.4 x 42 Comblain. But that won't turn up much if you do a search for it, unless you just specify "Comblain".

On the left side of the action it is marked "EM and L Nagant (Same Nagant as in the Russian Mosin NAGANT.) Below that is the number '98'. Those are the TOTAL of ALL markings on the exterior of the carbine. Several of the larger action parts are stamped with the '98' number. All I can surmise is that is the firearms' serial number.

Here is an interesting bit of infor. Action of the rifle is SHAPED like mine, but mine is a steel or iron piece. The barrel reinforce is also octagonal where it fits to the action.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iRdM5FUlaM

This one (Below) actually portrays carbines just like mine:

http://www.militaryrifles.com/Brazil/BrazComb.htm

.............Buckshot

[Bad Ass Wallace]

I have one as a 410 shotgun. Thinking of a rebarrel to 40/70 Sharps straight.

[cupajoe]

" Tuesday At The Range " report?

[Jedman]

I have one as a 410 shotgun. Thinking of a rebarrel to 40/70 Sharps straight.

I have a Belgium made miniature Comblain actioned 410 shotgun. I waited for over 5 years to find a Comblain I could afford. It really is a marvel of a design !

Jedman

[Hogdaddy]

??? Watching closely,, Very interesting ; )
H/D

[Buckshot]

"Tuesday at the Range"

..................I was lucky enough to have a group of friends to shoot with, who were able to shoot during the week. This was either due work schedule, or 'Non work" Or retired. We'd shoot every Tuesday at the local range. It was 4.2 miles from my driveway. Also, we all pretty much enjoyed about every aspect of shooting, reloading, and casting lead. One guy kinda had an issue with muzzle loaders, but other then that he was okay I never realized how unique this was.
Once a week we'd have a shooting match. Usually standing offhand at 50 yards, rifle or pistol, or MLrs, and variations. We'd each kick in a buck (just to put some skin into the game) and high scorer won the pot. Might have been a whole $6 ! So, each week I'd write up a report on the "Burrito Shoot". Called that because just a couple miles up the street was Rosa Maria's restaurant. We'd call in the order and then one or 2 of us would go pick it up. Sit at the range at a picnic table behind the line and solve the worlds' and each other's problems.

Since we all pretty much like the same thing, reloaded, etc, it was easy to put together money saving orders on line (I had an O-1 FFL) Graf @ Son sometimes had a deal where if you bought 96 Lbs of powder, they'd cover the shipping so long as it went to a business address. I'd have it come to the range. Since we ALL reloaded, and we shot EVERY WEEK ..................................

...................Buckshot

[wrcook45-70]

You indeed have a Brazilian Comblain. Mine, just like it has a Rio stamp on the butt. Brazil sold a number of these and rifles to Chile during the Pacific war.