First shots from the Pennsylvania Lancaster Flintlock Rifle Built by Ed Hale

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Below are the first 4 shots ever taken by this brand new Custom 50 Caliber Pennsylvania Lancaster Flintlock Rifle (CIRCA 1775) that I have invested around 100 hours to build based on a Jim Chamber’s Flintlocks Custom package of top end parts.

CHECK IT OUT!!!

The wood is Tiger Maple and was roughed in as I received it. The barrel is a 50 caliber Swamp Barrel (with rifling) where it it thicker on each end and slender in the middle. And the leather sheath I crafted for it.

A steel custom lock has a very well made mechanism and hammer below.

My first attempt is at this is highly successful with lots of fits and starts along this journey back in time during the Revolutionary war where Jacob Dickert a German Immigrant Gun-maker built them for the Continental Army.

My rifle has no stain on the Tiger Maple wood to grace it at this time but I asked myself, CAN IT SHOOT? It sports a 44 inch barrel and stands almost 5 feet tall.

I tested it using FFG black Powder at 80 grains at 25 yards to see if it will even hit paper at the first shot. So here goes…Click on the video.

Honestly, this is my first ever Flintlock Rifle build and you can read my other articles this past June on this Rifle.

 

Below some of the scroll work I carved just as Jacob Dickert did in 1775. Wait till I stain it!

And the brass patchbox…that needs to be set a bit deeper and has yet to be engraved by me as well. More to see on this patchbox in coming weeks.

I am very pleased with Jim’s Flintlock Product but even more pleased with my success in building an accurate and most beautiful Rifle indeed. In the coming weeks I will stain it and add some additional brass inlay. My 6th great grandfather and many of my Hale Cousins were soldiers in the American Revolution as I and my two sons are society members of The Sons of the American Revolution.

Good Shooting! Happy Independence Day!

© 2017

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About Ed Hale

I am an avid hunter with rifle and Bow and have been hunting for more than 50 years. I have taken big game such as whitetail deer, red deer, elk, Moose and African Plains game such as Kudu, Gemsbok, Springbok, Blesbok, and Impala and wrote an ebook entitled African Safari -Rifle and Bow and Arrow on how to prepare for a first safari. Ed is a serious cartridge reloader and ballistics student. He has earned two degrees in science and has written hundreds of outdoor article on hunting with both bow and rifle.