[Oldnamvet]

Here is my summer project. Lets see if I can manage to not screw it up and have something nice in a couple months. A couple of questions: I intend to brown the barrel and hardware. The lock has some kind of black finish on it - possible blued? Am I stuck with that or is there some way to remove it and brown it to match everything else?
Also, it looks like there is a substantial amount of wood to be removed from the stock, especially around the triggers. The back of the trigger assembly seems to be recessed leaving at least 3/16" inch of wood. Shouldn't this be flush? Easy to take more off but diffcult to put it back. I don't want to take off so much that the stock breaks at the wrist the first time I fire it.
The wood looks like it has nice grain to it. I want to put a dull finish on it, not the bowling pin type glossy finish. From other stocks that I have refinished, I find tru-oil and tung oil to be too glossy. BLO is about right but isn't very rugged. Any suggestions?

[mykeal]

Lyman flintlock Great Plains Rifle. Excellent choice - what's the caliber?

The lock finish may be removable with straight vinegar in about 30 minutes, but if I were you I'd call Lyman and ask their advice first. You'll need to take the lock apart before dousing it with the vinegar.

I have two GPR's, one a factory finished percussion gun in .54 cal and the other a flintlock kit (also .54 cal) that was my winter project this past year. The trigger assembly on the factory finished gun is indeed recessed 1/8" to 3/16" inch and looks just fine that way. The trigger guard covers most of it and there is no obvious problem. On the kit gun I did remove wood to make it flush, and I like it better that way, but there's no problem with leaving the wood if you're concerned about strength. BTW I've had no issue with cracking in the wrist, although I do not shoot heavy (over 100 gr) loads, either.

http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o254/mykealsm/Guns/Lyman%20GPR%20Flint/P4300056.jpg
http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o254/mykealsm/Guns/Lyman%20GPR%20Flint/P4300059.jpg
http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o254/mykealsm/Guns/Lyman%20GPR%20Flint/P4300062.jpg
http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o254/mykealsm/Guns/Lyman%20GPR%20Flint/P4300063.jpg
http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o254/mykealsm/Guns/Lyman%20GPR%20Flint/P4300077.jpg
http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o254/mykealsm/Guns/Lyman%20GPR%20Flint/P4300079.jpg
http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o254/mykealsm/Guns/Lyman%20GPR%20Flint/P4300087.jpg
http://i122.photobucket.com/albums/o254/mykealsm/Guns/Lyman%20GPR%20Flint/P4300091.jpg


I browned and then antiqued the metal on my kit gun but left the lock alone. It was an unusual case hardened brown and looks just fine with the way I finished the barrel.

The stock on your gun (and my kit gun) is English walnut. I stained mine with two coats of Herter's French Red Stock Filler and Stain, then whiskered it twice (important to do that with walnut as it is an open grain wood) and finished with four coats of tung oil finish. To remove the gloss (I don't like it either) I rubbed it with 0000 steel wool after each coat (that's quadruple ought, don't use anything coarser) until it was the sheen I wanted. The pictures were taken before the final rubbing, so the current finish is duller (and nicer) than what you see there.

[Oldnamvet]

Mykeal
Thanks to another Michiganian. If I am not mistaken, you are not that far away from me (Tri-cities area).
Mine is a .50 cal. A friend has a bunch of free balls for me so I went that way rather than .54. Targets (or deer) probably won't notice any difference.
Yours looks nice with that reddish color. I probably will try to get things flush on the stock. I may leave the lock alone and see how it looks with the barrel and trigger guard browned. I can already see that I am going to be replacing the ramrod. Looks like they took a dowel from Home Depot and put tips on it. Grain doesn't look straight enough for me to trust. Whole thing will keep me occupied in the evenings for quite a while, especially since I will only be using hand powered tools. Power tools are fine for some things but I can get into trouble real fast with them on something like this.:D

[mykeal]

I have between 80 and 90 hours in mine, starting back in January. No power tools here either.

If you'd like to try out some different finishes, Menard's in Bay City has some English walnut planks for specimen boards. Expensive ($30 for a 4 foot 1x4) but cheaper than a new stock.

Absolutely get a solid brass or steel rod; either a range rod, which is what I did, or just replace the gun rod altogether. No way I'd trust the factory rod in either of my Lymans.

Take your time and you'll be very pleased with the results. They are fine shooting guns.

Sand Lake area, halfway between Tawas and Hale.

[Voodoochile]

Man guys with my little project near finished "waiting on some more parts that I want for it" & thinking that I want to do a nice kit makes me re-think the Lyman GPR in .54 because they are quite resonable in price by comparrison to some of the others that I see through Track of the Wolf & your mykeal looks absolutely beautiful.

[Oldnamvet]

I found one at Grafs (.50cal were backordered elsewhere) which came to $373 delivered to the door. Midsouth has the .54 flinter kits for about $345 + shipping. So far, everything looks goo -- meaning that I only have to take wood off and not try to put some back on somewhere.

Mykeal - we are about a 90 min drive apart. Since wife and I like a long weekend in Mackinaw now and then, I probably pass close by on 75.

[scrat]

Ya im getting jealous. Im going to have to get a kit. My time though has been pretty short. Most of the time im doing work on my computer for my job and reading on here the same time. so not a lot of actual free time.

[Oldnamvet]

Scrat -- retire! Then you have lots of time, well, more time anyway, sometimes. You just have to be a little more frugal (wife calls it cheap). On second thought keep working so you can finance your hobby.:D

[Oldnamvet]

I had planned on spending a couple hours max on this project. But --- once I got started on something I would sometimes look at the clock and realize I had been working on it for 3 .. 4 .... 5 hours at a time. Sometimes I would be asked if I was going to go to bed at all that night or would I be skipping another meal? It was my first rifle kit so I learned a lot. Many small things were not quite right so I had fun figuring out how to deal with them. Thanks to several people (especially Mykeal) who answered some questions to keep things going. The rifle barrel and hardware is browned and the stock has 6 coats of a 1/3 paint thinner:1/3 BLO: 1/3 satin PU varnish that is rubbed on, soak for about 10 minutes then excess rubbed off. After 24 to 48 hours, this is repeated. Gives a somewhat dull finish but is easy to repair and fairly tough. I had to move the tang back about 1/8" so a bolt would mate with the internals which moved the vent back so it is not centered in the pan. I enlarged the pan a little and buffed it out but the vent is still about 1/3 of the way across it. Hope this doesn't present a problem. The rear sight was loose in the dovetail so I added a coating of solder to the bottom and sanded it down until it fit very snug. Next step will be to take it to the range --as soon as I get some powder (a 40 mile trip or on-line order, haven't decided as yet) -- and see if it works.

[scrat]

Retire i wish.

hahahahahahaha

[Smokin_Gun]

Oldnamvet
A job well done ... have to put that yours is one of the nicest Lyman kits I have seen.
Including Mykeal's of coarse a real work of art.

Well done Soldier! I wanted to be an armor, but I liked a shooting a wide variety of weapons, so I was 11B '72-74'...13B20 till 79, and 1 more year 13B20 in '85 just to be sure I wanted to stay out of Uncle Sam 's Swamp, Mud, Sand, and Snow Soldiers of the U.S. Army.


SG

[RoaringBull]

OK, I need to know if I get a kit like this do I need to know anything about metal workig? Most of the wood working I can handle but I know nothing about the metals. I really want to get a kit and make something of my very own, but I'm a bit nervous.

[mykeal]

Metal working, no. Metal finishing, a little, perhaps.

The barrel and most of the furniture is unfinished steel and will require some sort of preparation and rust prevention finishing. There are many options, most of which are pretty simple and foolproof IF YOU FOLLOW THE INSTRUCTIONS. It's no more work than finishing a bare wood stock.

[Smokin_Gun]

Something like a Traditions Kentucky Pistol .50 cal or the Lyman Great Plains Pistol Kit, in .50 or .54 cal. Can see if you like doing it for $150 $200 and still have a Pistol.

Then decide if you want to get a really nice kit and you'll know how to do it. Plus have a BP Pistol backup.

SG

[RoaringBull]

HUUMMM? I do need (want) a pistol.

Momma said no more longarms for a while. That would be the best bet, plus I would get that pistol, too.

Gonna have to get a little extra OT now to get that kit.

[Oldnamvet]

1st time out, main charge fired on first attempt about 3 times out of 10. Took rifle home, cleaned and drilled out vent to 1/16". 2nd time out, main charge fired on first attempt about 8 times out of 10. Took it home and drilled the vent to 0.070" (#50 bit). 3rd time out will be in a couple of days. I expect that ignition will be 100% then. Then I can focus on filing down the front sight to get POI up to where I want it.

[mykeal]

You can safely take it out to 5/64" (0.0781), but if that #50 works, stop there. Most people are stopping at #51.

The GPR has a patent breech, so be sure you thoroughly clean each time; I remove the vent liner each time I clean just to make sure the patent breech crud accumulation has someplace to exit. If, over time, you start having ignition problems again, it's likely because the patent breech needs to be cleaned out. Remove the vent liner and use a small (approx .32 cal) copper/nylon brush and your favorite cleaning solvent; you can see if the brush is entering the patent breech by looking in the touch hole when the vent liner is removed. If you don't see the brush tip, use a smaller diameter brush.

[Oldnamvet]

That is what I have been doing so far. I have a worn out .38 brush that fits well into the patent breech with a patch wound on it. I just worry about slowly wearing out the screwdriver slot in the vent liner, no matter how carefully I use a properly fitting screwdriver. That slot is pretty shallow.

[mykeal]

If you use anti-seize on the vent liner threads that shouldn't be a problem. It should tighten and release smoothly every time.

[Oldnamvet]

OUt again today and with the .07" vent I had 100% ignition --- very rapid. Not even enough time to flinch. Just when things were going well I ran out of patches :cuss:. Guess I forgot to put some in my box. But I did have a bunch of 250 grain REAL bullets so gave them a try. Lowered the powder charge by 10 grains to 50 and put 5 of them into 3 inches at 50 yds. For my old (beat up by surgery 3 times) eyes with open sights, I felt pretty good about it. I also liked the way those REAL bullets loaded. Once you got them down the first 3 inches, they slid down very easily. Now for some more patch material so by the time my shoulder area bruise is gone, I'll be ready for another go. No real reason to go now, just practice and enjoying it going off. I may need to get either a .32 or .36 flinter just for fun so I can shoot it more without getting a sore shoulder. Or at least that is what I'll tell my wife.:D

[Rachen]

Oldnamvet, deer season is coming up in three months. Your new rifle hasn't been baptized yet, but starting October, you go work on that:D

Whats more beautiful than a custom built flinter resting right next to an 8 point trophy buck it just took? And the color of autumn foliage and trees in the background.

[mykeal]

Sore shoulder? From 60 gr?

That curved butt should not be up against your shoulder. It's meant to be held against the junction of the shoulder and upper arm, so the lower point is aimed at the armpit, and the upper point is pointed over the shoulder/arm joint. That should be a comfortable hold and take recoil very well.

[Oldnamvet]

:) That is where I hold it. Feels comfortable until it goes off. Part of the problem is that I am shooting from a bench and you have to scrunch down to shoot under the baffles the club had to install. No blue sky can be seen from the firing line to keep anyone from shooting over our 35 foot berms. Kind of a cramped position and you get smacked regardless of the gun being shot. (other than pistols of course).

[mykeal]

Man, you have my sympathy. That sucks. And the really bad part is that the rounds that go over the berm are usually skips or ricoshets from shots that are actually short of the berm.

[Omnivore]

Very nice looking project. Congrats. Now you've got me interested in kits.

Oldnam; Sounds like you need another place to shoot, one where no one's around. I tell you, there's nothing like being alone in the elements with your rifle, lots of ammunition, targets, and plenty of time.

[Oldnamvet]

To get that around here requires $$ to buy land. Even the public land is crowded anymore. At least during the week the club range is usually deserted so us old retired guys can take our time and not be bothered by the guys with the ultramagnums shaking dust from the roof supports with the concussion.
Kits are fun. Now if Lyman would just come out with a full stock flint lock kit for smaller calibers.......................

[mykeal]

You don't need to wait for Lyman; there are many custom shops that would be good sources for such a kit. Here's just one of many; these guys are in Vassar, MI.
http://www.sittingfoxmuzzleloaders.com/intro.html