Beautiful stock.
DG
Lags
a bit of a yarn about Hawkens
my second life as a blackpowder shooter kind of evolved with a definite influence from replica so called "Hawken" style rifles (CVA and browning mountain rifles etc - 50 - 54 calibre - you know the story) how accurate or not they were to the real Hawken - is not the point.
I also erroneously let that morph into the idea that the Hawken was the mountain man gun ...
Then I was on a trip to your country (3rd time) travelling from friends place in the Nebraska sandhills to a workshop in Rapid City SD - so made a brief stop at the "museum of the fur trade" in Chadron - its (pretty much) in the north west corner of the state - the plan was to do this properly on the way back home after a cruise of the Black Hills -- well that didnt happen, I remember coming out of the hotel after our show was over - took a look at the sky and the wind howling down the street - I grabbed my kit and bolted south that evening. Two days later the blizzard had froze 10,000 head of black cattle in the area I was intending to be a tourist so i missed my proper visit to the museum - however I did get a look at it the first day and was amazed at what I saw - overall impression - I you took one of those repro hawkens in there (including the one in Robt Redfields Jeremiah Johnson movie) you woulda heard some grizzled old ghost whisper down from the rafters " whatcha doin with that lil peashooter sonny - the bears are gonna eat ya if ya go plinkin em with that" The mountain man guns were rows of big heavy flintlocks, 58 - 62 caliber, Alex henry, other names I dont recall, big heavy 38 inch barrels, mostly half stock I thought but a good number of full wood guns - they meant business!! ---just a quick impression (I spent maybe two hours there) maybe I didnt see it straight?
I know what you mean Joe.
That is why I built a .58 and a .61 cal Hawken.
And yes.
The Hawkens we're heavier and more durable rifles because of where the mountain men were taking them.
I have seen several kits that were the old style Full stock Flinters like from Pecatonica.
But right now I just have too many rifles I am building , rebuilding or kits for me to order another rifle.
That is why I can wait till Kibler starts making the Hawken Style rifles.
I did look into buying one of those Indian made blunderbusses.
But I bought a kit from someone else so I could do my own building.
Last edited by LAGS; 01-09-2023 at 10:02 PM.
There was a definitive book written some years ago, (The Hawken Rifle, by Chas. Hansen), that describes various original guns. IIRC, the author test fired a .62 with a very slow twist - perhaps 1-100” or thereabouts. A patched ball was used over a stiff charge of 120 grs or more, and the sights were found to be regulated at 200 yds. The conclusion was that rifle would have been ideal for buffalo and elk at typical ranges, and provide a better safety margin against grizzly. I may be misremembering here - but another comment was that some number of mountain men probably carried a second, smaller rifle for additional defense against hostiles, and for small game. No sense shooting rabbits (or Blackfeet) with a 60 caliber ball…
Last edited by HWooldridge; 01-09-2023 at 11:49 PM.
Oh man Frank, that is a fine looking shooter.
What did you use for a finish? and did you doctor the tiger strips with wax to keep a light grain or are they natrual?
Here is an Early Hawken. I like the lines of the Plains Rifles as well as the Southern Mountains rifles.
All this talk on these shooters your going to make me dig mine back out again. Havent made smoke with them for a spell.
After completing the build in-the-white I sanded it all down to 400 grit, raising the grain with alky, then applied aqua fortis (Kibler's iron nitrate - the best I've used to date) and heat gunned it in. No other kinda staining was done. I paid a hefty premium price for the stock alone but I knew I'd sell the gun and bling finishes are the apple of most gun crank's eyes. The natural grain popped out quite nice. Sometimes you can get what ya pay for in very expensive wood. The final finish was about a dozen coats of Tru-Oil that I rubbed in with fingers only, being mindful of my shop's air temp and humidity levels, lotsa curing time, and 4/0 steel wool buffs between coats. Finishing alone took almost two weeks. Even with a big .54 bore swamped bbl, the completed rifle weighed near 10lbs. Ugh.
The SMR .45 kit I ordered will have plain maple wood will make for a nice schimmel flinter. The Woodsrunner .54 kit I also ordered will have a premium extra fancy tiger maple stock wood. Both of these guns will be in the 7 to 7-1/2lb total weight range, where the lighter weight and swamped bbls are more to the liking of an old 77yo man like me for offhand shooting. Now all I got to do is stay above the grass on a daily basis so's I can build 'em.
I like Hawkens and have assembled a gaggle of them with offshore patent breech kits - I don't like patent breech plugs, Hate 'em - and all are flinters, I don't like them newfangled cap gun locks.
The .45-70 is the only government I trust.
That is good work Frank.
The Hawken in my post I wanted to age the wood and I also used the Kiblers and darkened over the gas kitchen range for the effect I wanted work very well. Mine is a .58 I wanted to use for Buffalo and moose but it never made the trip. I relied on the .44 sharps three times filling the freezer with Bison.
I have enough parts for one more early Hawken and Pecatonica is just a 1/2 hr from me I might see what they have for wood.
Way back when, I was asked to pull the breechplug and show some pictures. Since I had neither the tools not the inclination, I never got around to it. I've decided to polish the bore a bit, so I rigged something up and finally popped the plug. Here are a couple of pictures.
The threads look decent. This sucker was TIGHT!
You can see the neutralized rust on the the threads from the one round of pyrodex that I fired through the gun. I had to soak that thing with Kroll for a month before rust stopped seeping out of the seam between the plug shoulder and the barrel. That stuff really is the devil.
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 |