Thread: single shot actions

Having recently bought a milling machine and finally getting my shed sorted out , i would love to build a single shot action. I know there are books by people like de hass etc but those actions don't really interest me as they don't have the lines of the victorian/edwardian british farquharson actions (on which ruger based his fantastic no.1). I don't intend to actually build an entire rifle as that would walk me into trouble here in ireland but i would love to make one as a project. does anyone know where i might get designs , plans or blue prints for these old actions ? They must be all well over a hundred years old and so public domain now.

p.s , i have asked over on the assra forums already.

Ronon get your hands on a copy of the british falling block rifle

http://www.trackofthewolf.com/imgPart/book-bfbblr_1.jpg

It covers many different designs and patents including the farquharson in detail, although it does not contain dimensioned drawings, only the patent drawings and descriptions are covered.

A fields patent action will be considerably easier to build, it is a side lever design and you could do it with a mill, lathe and lots of spare time. A look at the farquharson action will perhaps change your mind about it, even the farquharson patent extractor is an interesting complex item.

ronan,
Get in touch with The Rifle Shoppe and let them know that you are interested in the Rodney Storie castings. They claim to have the tooling and will plan to release them in the near future. These are the way to go, because they will require all of the machining and hand work, but you get all of the complex parts in raw form to start with. I last heard from them about 4 months ago, saying that they would send a copy of their catalogue once the castings were released. I did not bother to ask which ones will be released, but Storie had an amazing collection that he had reproduced, of some vintage single shots of the 19th century, the likes of which, some are unknown today.

Mark