A French percussion gun with a 27 mm diameter heavy barrel.

[Cerjak]

A French percussion gun with a 27 mm diameter heavy barrel.
The lock with maker name F Claudin A Paris
This gun with his heavy barrel look like a rampart gun but I think it is a civil hunting gun.
The weight is about 7.2 kg ,the barrel 93 cm and total 136cm
The barrel internal diameter 27 mm and external 35 mm
Any comment on it will be welcome.
Best
Cerjak

[kronckew]

smooth bore or rifled? that's really big for a large ball at 1/4 pound of lead or even more if a minie ball, if it's rifled - rather large for a shotgun too. around a 2 or 3 bore...it'd be a son of a <expletive deleted> to shoot with anything approaching a decent powder charge and shot load. fancy punt gun for market bird hunters who want to hit dozens at once? i'd want to mount it on a tripod and stand well back...

with no sights i'm going to assume it's it's a smoothbore shotgun. what's that small projection on the lower part of the stock? sling swivel? - no upper one tho.

p.s. - the inside gauge seems to be reading 16.9mm give or take, or a 16 gauge shotgun size, a ladies shotgun size, most US hunters use at least a 12 gauge.

[fernando]

Ferdinand Claudin
célèbre famille d’armuriers du 38 boulevard des italiens à Paris.
Made around 1850 ?
There will be further marks inside the lock.
With this calibre, a "4 GAUGE", this is a big game hunting gun.
Two things surprise me Jean-Luc; your taste for such 'vulgar' pieces and how you manage to measure the bore with the pied a coulisse in that position ... like reading 16,9 mm .

[Jon MB]

Très beau, bravo!

[Fernando K]

Kronckew

To the measure that marks the caliber should be added 1 cm, and the measurement is 26.9 mm

Fernando K

[Cerjak]

Originally Posted by fernando

Ferdinand Claudin
.
Two things surprise me Jean-Luc; your taste for such 'vulgar' pieces and how you manage to measure the bore with the pied a coulisse in that position ... like reading 16,9 mm .

Hi Fernando,
I bought it because with this very heavy barrel & big diameter this gun is out of the ordinary.
And so could stay in my heterogeneous weapon collection.
as explained by Fernando K you have to add 1cm to have the inside diameter.
Best

Jean-Luc

[fernando]

Wow; i have never heard of that; on the contrary, to my understanding, the actual muzzle aperture marks the calibre (bore/gauge) and the bullet to fit there has a narrower diameter... assuming we are talking smooth non rifled barrels, obviously. Why would you have to add one centimeter to quote the gun's calibre ? .

[Cerjak]

Originally Posted by fernando

Wow; i have never heard of that; on the contrary, to my understanding, the actual muzzle aperture marks the calibre (bore/gauge) and the bullet to fit there has a narrower diameter... assuming we are talking smooth non rifled barrels, obviously. Why would you have to add one centimeter to quote the gun's calibre ? .

Fernando,
When you using a" pied à coulisse" ,for internal diameter you have to add 1 cm to the mesure shown to have the internal diameter.

[fernando]

Guys, where do you buy your pieds a coulisse / paquímetros / calipers ?


.

[Roland_M]

Very nice musket Cerjak, congratulations.

Does it have a stecher-trigger (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stecher_(arme))? This would be the evidence for a hunting weapon.

Do you plan to test this beauty on a range? If it would be mine, I would definitely make a shooting range test. The sound of a 27 mm barrel must be overwhelming! My biggest caliber is a .54 pistol, which already sounds like a cannon.

To shoot with black powder is an enourmous fun, which is only outclassed by Mr. Wilson Combat Classic 1911 long slide!


Roland

[Cerjak]

Originally Posted by Roland_M

Very nice musket Cerjak, congratulations.

Does it have a stecher-trigger (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stecher_(arme))? This would be the evidence for a hunting weapon.

Do you plan to test this beauty on a range? If it would be mine, I would definitely make a shooting range test. The sound of a 27 mm barrel must be overwhelming! My biggest caliber is a .54 pistol, which already sounds like a cannon.

To shoot with black powder is an enourmous fun, which is only outclassed by Mr. Wilson Combat Classic 1911 long slide!


Roland

Roland
I don"t see any stecher-trigger .
Yes for sure it would be very impresive to shoot with this big gun ,But I don't have any material for that and also no Knowledge.
Best

Cerjak

[Roland_M]

Originally Posted by Cerjak

Roland
I don"t see any stecher-trigger .
Yes for sure it would be very impresive to shoot with this big gun ,But I don't have any material for that and also no Knowledge.
Best

Cerjak

Cerjak,

there are at least two types of stecher-trigger, the German stecher, which has two triggers (one for the mechanism and one for the hammer) and the French stecher with only one trigger (imho better and more sophisticated than the German solution), which must be pushed forward a little bit.
Please try to push the trigger gently forward and see what happens.

If you can push the trigger to release the hammer without moving the trigger forward before, it has no French stecher-trigger.


Best,
Roland

[fernando]

Sorry my ignorance Roland ...
Is this trigger set you refer the same resource as the so called 'hair trigger' ?. If so, isn't it more a device for (sports) target shooting ? I realized a heavy game gun like that of Jean-Luc is more like for 'crude' shooting; the target to aim at being large enough .
Here is one with similar caliber (4 bore) and similar weight (7,7 Kgs.) made circa 1848 by Harris Holland for Sir Samuel Baker, who used to call it 'my baby'. It was damaged during an elephant charge and was repaired with elephant skin, covering the stock comb and lockwork.

(Courtesy "Oito Séculos de Historia em Portugal").
.

.

[Roland_M]

Originally Posted by fernando

Sorry my ignorance Roland ...
Is this trigger set you refer the same resource as the so called 'hair trigger' ?. If so, isn't it more a device for (sports) target shooting ? I realized a heavy game gun like that of Jean-Luc is more like for 'crude' shooting; the target to aim at being large enough .
Here is one with similar caliber (4 bore) and similar weight (7,7 Kgs.) made circa 1848 by Harris Holland for Sir Samuel Baker, who used to call it 'my baby'. It was damaged during an elephant charge and was repaired with elephant skin, covering the stock comb and lockwork.

(Courtesy "Oito Séculos de Historia em Portugal").
.

.

Hi Fernando,

yeah, technically "Stecher" and Hair Trigger means the same, a very light pressure on the Trigger is enough to release the hammer.

Western Revolvers had hair triggers with only ~60 gramms or two oz of trigger-weight for example. Nowadays a carry gun pistol got an average trigger weight of 2kg and more.

I think the difference is that American hair triggers are simply adjusted to release the hammer at a very low pressure (Western Revolvers or modern Ruger Colt 45 if one remove the small springs under the handles), while European stechers had an own pre-stressed mechanism.

Such triggers had been preferably used for duelling and for hunting purposes. Many better duell pistols in the 19ct. had a stecher trigger.


best wishes,
Roland

p.s. and Mae again
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2GLbXR3-HI

just

[Will M]

Most impressive shotgun with over a 1 inch bore.
I built a 1 inch bore cannon weighing 60 pounds and with 450 g of BP it recoils over 2 feet.
I would not want to be behind this shotgun, could kill at both ends!

[Roland_M]

Originally Posted by Will M

Most impressive shotgun with over a 1 inch bore.
I built a 1 inch bore cannon weighing 60 pounds and with 450 g of BP it recoils over 2 feet.
I would not want to be behind this shotgun, could kill at both ends!

Will,

please watch "Mae and The Wall Gun" on Youtube. I saw the video with an open mouth, she is incredible brave.

Prof. Othais WW1 gun reviews on the same channel are absolutely brilliant!


Roland