Morphed a Zouave into a, a, .............kinda carbine thingie

[Buckshot]

..............Adding some traffic to the BP forum. I've had this Zouave since forever. I guess back in the mid 60's due to the Civil War centential muzzle loaders were a craze and lots of retailers carried them. I was too young to drive when I bought the thing. It was made by CIE, and was probably Spanish. It was an el cheapo to be sure, with just a notched brass V for a rear sight and a brass blade up front. The buttstock was 2 pieces along the lines of the Jap Arisaka.

When a buddie's son got interested in BP I gave it to him and he had it for several years. When he went off to college he gave it back. It sat around in the way for some time until I hit on making a carbine of some description out of it.

This was one of those 'Low Tension' type deals where if you make a mistake to really mess it up you could toss it in the trash without a 2nd thought.
I had no idea or intention of spending ANY money on it at all. I'd seen the various CW type carbines, and figured it would just be a generic and not a copy of any one type.


So this is what it turned into. A 'Partial Completion' photo for the record. You can see the different wood used to make the bottom portion of the buttstock, and it's all Beech or Birch even!

I have some old barrel bands floating around, but they all looked like a lot more work then I wanted to spend on making them into some nosecap looking deal. Rooting around in a couple junk boxes I came up with the noseband setup of a M48 Yugo Mauser that a poster on the old Shooter.com board had given me.


I ended up having to do more then I wanted to get it to work. I had to install it backwards. Well, it WORKED! No one yet has said, "Hey isn't that a front band setup from a M48 Yugo, on backwards?" Hard to see in the photo but I soldered on a H&R front sight from one of their Trapdoor rifles.

Since I wasn't bound to any model of carbine, and was unlimited I decided to have a ladder and elevator setup. Since I wasn't going to spend any money to buy one I decided to make one.


Flycutting in the lathe for the barrel curvature. Milling finished, cleaning up and drilling for the ladder pivit to be done.

And that's about it. I have a photo of it finished and on the carbine but the pic is so bad there's no sense in posting it. While I don't recall the Zouave as being particularly noteworthy in the accuracy dept, I also never really knew what I was doing when I was shooting it years before. It makes no real difference as the little carbine is nicely accurate. Amazing the difference in recoil you feel!

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

[shooter575]

Buckshot, If anyone would of said put a Yugo front band on,I would said your nuts. Dang thing looks OK. You need a flat steel lower band now.That brass one clashes. :-]