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Thread: My Whitworth

  1. #1
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    My Whitworth



    ...........It's supposed to be representative of a British 1862 Military Match rifle. It's a reasonable facsimile in any regard.



    It's a very well made rifle, all things considered. I also paid more for this rifle then any other I own. The front sight was originally a beaded post in a hood. I added the insert tunnel.



    The rear sight is your standard Enfield ML'er style except it had a windage adjustable plate with a "V" in it, on the fornt of the staff. I replaced it with the plate and peep deal.



    The lock is straight military Enfield, just marked differently. The barrel was made by Parker-Hale, but the rifle was assembled in Italy, with also at least the finishing of other parts. Most did have the P-H cast in, but I do not think the internal lock parts had recieved the same care of fit and finish that Parker-Hale would have provided. I had to do some smoothing and refining.



    A closeup of the bore configuration and it's namesake is noted on the left side of the barrel in the right photo.

    ................Buckshot
    Last edited by Buckshot; 11-15-2009 at 05:22 AM.
    Father Grand Caster watches over you my brother. Go now and pour yourself a hot one. May the Sacred Silver Stream be with you always

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    ............Several years ago when I took this photo, these were all the slugs I'd used in the Whitworth. From the left: The Polisar slug was one that was offered for sale, and the couple examples I had were samples I'd bought. They were advertised as sawaged to form and came paper patched. The paper patched Lyman 457121-PH is a current design ment to be fired as a grease grooved slug in the Whitworth. It drops at about .452" cast of 20-1. An as cast example is at the far right of the photo.

    If you're hunting an available reasonably priced mould to use for paper patching for use in a 45 cal cartridge rifle, this'd sure be a fine one. A fine flat nose and 475 grs is a good combination. In the Whitworth it's a very fine shooting slug naked OR patched. Next is the Lyman 457132 @ 525grs, and patched. Cast of 20-1 and rolled on a case lube pad, it's easily sized to .450". Then patched with 9# airmail paper and re-sized to .452". The nose on my example drops too small for me at .448", but may be fine for a BPC rifle as it may clear the fouling when chambered?

    The next up is a so called 'custom' brass mould I had made. At the time a guy south of me was advertising custom moulds in the Shotgun News. This was probably about 1997 or so. His dad had been a modelmaker and had a small British 7" lathe. The dad passed away so the guy decided he'd go into the custom mould business He was actually quite a nice guy and admitted making moulds seemed like a good idea at the time! He really didn't want to send the mould to me and wanted to refund my $65 as he said it hadn't turned out to well.

    I wanted it anyway so he sent it to me and sent back half of my money! The whole reason for it was I had a 2 piece set of swage blocks to form the hexagonal slugs. Or so they (Gibbs Rifle Co) said. The instructions said to use a 50 cal slug with the blocks. Uh-huh, right. Your supposed to use the blocks in a vise. Squeeze the bejabbers out fo them (lead squeezing out all over) take the slug out and then trim all the 'flash' off. Replace the slug in the blocks and get after it again. A send flash trimming session was required.

    They DID make a hexagonal slug, but as you might imagine it shot poorly, to be generous. Having said all that, a company in Tennessee had made theblocks and they were a work of art, truly. And harder and tougher then and anvil too. I used them to take 'as cast' 45 cal slugs @ like .459/.460" and swage a partial hex shape on them. They shot no better then one lube-sized .459" and then run through a Lee .452" size die.

    Anyway, the custom mould was an adjustable cavity with a cup base and dropped at .465". The guy had totally blown the ogive. The radius on the alignment pins was apparently put on with a wood rasp. Other that it worked.

    The Kranen design was made by a gentleman who produced the actual moulds to make them. He lived on an island in the English Channel, and was a Belgium IIRC. Due to the shape of the boolit to get a sharp casting with the correct twist, it's impossible to use a mould with only 2 blocks. I'm guessing here but he apparently slit a steel (or iron) rod lengthwise. Then held them together somehow and turned them back truly cylindrical again on the outside. I assume he then machined half the shape into each half of the cylinder. I don't how else it could have been done?

    So now he had the cavity formed into a cylinder. This cylinder was then closedly fitted into 2 normal looking block halves that accepted handles. The cylinder with the cavity essentially becoming like a cavity in the square blocks. To each half of the cylinder was a flat piece of steel which also connected at an angle to the block it was nested with. There was a sprueplate attached to one of the sqaure blocks, and there was also a bottom plate as is common with nose pour moulds.

    After pouring the slug and striking the sprueplate, when you opened the handles causing the 2 square blocks to move away form each other, the above mentioned rods caused each half of the cylindrical cavity piece to ROTATE away from each other as they also moved apart in a shallow arc as is normal to a regular 2 piece mould. Ingeneous if you ask me, but not worth the trouble! The remaining slugs are self explanatory.



    In the meantime I'd bought a Walnut Hill swaging press, core mould and swage dies to produce slugs for paper patching. Those on the left were my first effort before I knew what I was doing I forget now what they weighed but they were too heavy. It was either 560 or 580 grs, but I really wanted 525/535 gr slugs, as those on the right are. I did shoot those heavy ones but they didn't do anything better then the more common weighted ones.



    Whitworth. 530gr Swaged paper patched to .451". 85.0grs Elephant 2 Fg, lubed felt wad. This is pretty common for the rifle. If I had better sights, or more honestly if this was the only rifle I had to fool with, I could probably cut that group size in half.



    Five shot groups at 200 meters aren't much larger. This was shot the same day. Same load at 200 meters and would have been tighter had it not been for the flyer. I suppose at 100 yards the slugs might still be 'hunting' but I don't have enough evidence one way or another to say for sure.

    ...............Buckshot
    Father Grand Caster watches over you my brother. Go now and pour yourself a hot one. May the Sacred Silver Stream be with you always

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    "The Republic can survive a Barack Obama, who is, after all, merely a fool. It is less likely to survive a multitude of fools such as those who made him their president."

    Shrink the State End the Fed Balance the budget Make a profit Leave an inheritance

  3. #3
    Boolit Master oldhickory's Avatar
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    Please don't do this to me!...A Whitworth has been on my "someday" list for a while now!
    Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

    Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759

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    Boolit Master
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    just go ahead and rub it in, willya!

    Rich

  5. #5
    Boolit Master
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    An older gentleman at the range I shoot at brings one every now and then.
    At one time he had one of those long Malcom scopes on it. The thing just oozed cool.
    Ah, someday......

  6. #6
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    Buckshot,

    I have always liked the idea of the Whitworth but never got one. Now the good ones are gone. How does your Whitworth stack up to the Target Enfields?

    Thanks
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  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by StrawHat View Post
    Buckshot,

    I have always liked the idea of the Whitworth but never got one. Now the good ones are gone. How does your Whitworth stack up to the Target Enfields?

    Thanks
    StrawHat, i have an original first gen. Birmingham PH Whitworth and a total Italian made Euro Arms model. although the PH has a much nicer stock, barrel bands, lock, and general workmanship it shoots no more accurately than the Euro Arms model. i have no problems with the fit and finish of the Italian model. i am currently working on a hex mould prototype with hollow base and grease grooves. it is very complicated machine work. once i get it right i will take it to my friend who has a machine shop so he can write the CNC program for it.

  8. #8
    Boolit Master Lead Fred's Avatar
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    My fav muzzle stuffer ever. Got to shoot a friends years ago.
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  9. #9
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    Buckshot, I have wanted a Whitworth for years; every time I get myself convinced that I don't want one, you post more pictures of yours for me to drool over.


    Robert

  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mk42gunner View Post
    Buckshot, I have wanted a Whitworth for years; every time I get myself convinced that I don't want one, you post more pictures of yours for me to drool over.


    Robert
    ............IIRC I think I paid $875 for mine about 12 years ago, and it doesn't seem like they're gettng any cheaper. If you check the usual suspects weekly you can run across a used one for sale every now and then.

    .............Buckshot
    Father Grand Caster watches over you my brother. Go now and pour yourself a hot one. May the Sacred Silver Stream be with you always

    Proud former Shooters.Com Cast Bullet alumnus and plank owner.

    "The Republic can survive a Barack Obama, who is, after all, merely a fool. It is less likely to survive a multitude of fools such as those who made him their president."

    Shrink the State End the Fed Balance the budget Make a profit Leave an inheritance

  11. #11
    Boolit Master
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    I would give my lefnut to have that gun. If interested pm mailing instructions.

  12. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by dualsport View Post
    I would give my lefnut to have that gun. If interested pm mailing instructions.
    ...............Pecantonica River offers a Rigby clone kit. I built one some years back.



    Not a real good photo, as it was an old camera.



    The walnut stock was exceedingly well inlet, leaving only about 1/16" to be finished around the lock. It comes with a 32" Green Mountain 18" twist 45 cal bbl. I had them install the breechplug. The kit does NOT include a forend tip, or sights. A minor thing is that the breech doesn't have a blow out plug, which a rifle like this would have. It does have a patent breech (powder chamber) and a breakoff breech for easy barrel removal.There are 2 problems with the kit as I see it. First of all the lock is not a 3 pin lock. The sear is carried on a bridle screw instead of it's own, but the tumbler does have a fly. The other problem is that the tang of the breechplug isn't long enough for a tangsight.

    You either have to inlet a metal plate into the wrist to attach the tangsight to (Assuming you were planning on using one) or do as I did. That was to cut off the original one and weld on a longer piece of steel, shape it and then inlet it.



    The tangsight was one of the less expensive Italian ones. I made the mounting block, cut the staff off it's base and welded it to mine, then made the brass knobed attaching screw. The front sight is one for the Swedish Ag42B semi-automatic rifle. I filed the base to fit the octagon barrel and silver soldered it in place. It has some windage adjustment, and it looks rather at home

    It is very accurate, and like the Whitworth is pretty much a muzzle loading 45-90.

    ..............Buckshot
    Father Grand Caster watches over you my brother. Go now and pour yourself a hot one. May the Sacred Silver Stream be with you always

    Proud former Shooters.Com Cast Bullet alumnus and plank owner.

    "The Republic can survive a Barack Obama, who is, after all, merely a fool. It is less likely to survive a multitude of fools such as those who made him their president."

    Shrink the State End the Fed Balance the budget Make a profit Leave an inheritance

  13. #13
    Boolit Mold
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    This is the Leon Kranen mould for the Whitworth bullet. I think it is an amazing piece of precision engineering.My guess is that it is produced by spark erosion. The bullet is formed by three components not two halves. He also makes a mould without cannelures. The catch is that the mould is very expensive.

    Last edited by Minorkey; 09-06-2010 at 01:32 PM. Reason: Extra information and correction.

  14. #14
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    can I give dualsport othe nut and be on a wannit list too ?
    " I said I never had much use for one. Never said I didn't know how to use it. " Matthew Quigley

  15. #15
    Boolit Master oldhickory's Avatar
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    Welcome to the asylum, Minorkey. I was wondering when you would make it.
    Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

    Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759

  16. #16
    Boolit Master northmn's Avatar
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    I keep resisting the urge to build one of those rifles, like the Rigby because I have a RB 45-70. However I know prcatical will succumb to want to. Have always thought the Whitworth to be an interesting gun also.

    Northmn

  17. #17
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    The fact that Pedersoli will be releasing a new Whitworth in a few months got me snooping, and I found this old thread of Rick's.

  18. #18
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    My two original Whitworth Rifles.The Military .451 type is by Beasley Bros,The Match Rifle in .568 Calibre is by Joseph Whitworths Manchester Rifle and ordnance company.The 451 has a 1 in 20 twist,the 568 has a 1 in 26 inch Twist.I have modified a Lyman minea mould to near Whitworths specifications With a Hollow Base and hollow nose.The nose having a wooden Plug as follows.
    Last edited by Col4570; 12-11-2015 at 02:02 AM.

  19. #19
    Boolit Master
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    Here is the side pour mould to produce a longer bullet with Hollow base and Nose.

  20. #20
    Boolit Master
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    A sectioned bullet.

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Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check