Yesterday's Weapons Forums

My Francotte Martini from Nepal is 95% done! All that remains is to give the wood another sanding and stain with minwax until it matches. No more cut-n-try!

What a struggle! When I got it, I thought it would be a few easy fixes, but boy was I ever too idealistic! The metal was pretty much okay - like yak fat ( really!) has to be one of the best metal presertives ever - but the more I looked the stock & fore arm over, the more rotten, soft wood I found. So I cut & drilled out old wood - then cut & fit replacement pieces which were glued in place with 2 part epoxy. ( 60 minute epoxy is the best - the quick stuff is junk!)

As received, it lacked the original brass butt plate. During both world wars, the Nepali armories were looted of brass for Hiz Majesty's needs. By chance, I had an old Win model 97 steel butt plate that was a close fit. I drilled out the old screw holes, glued in dowel fillers and cut flat. I had a chunk missing at the heel & that was a real pain. Had to cut off a bigger piece so I could glue and contour fresh walnut. But it worked out.

Then it was saw saw saw - file file file - grind grind grind... it fits like a champ!

Now the butt stock fits tightly to the receiver with no wobble - the fore arm also no longer wobbles. Had to drill through a barrel lug and make a hardened pin for that. All that was due to the rotten wood under the barrel. Rust flat ruins wood!

The lever retaining cup under the butt stock now retains the lever. I had to remove that - soak in oil and free up the spring so the heel of the lever will pop in & out like it's supposed to when you eject a cartridge & load another.

"First rank... FIRE! Second rank... FIRE! etc & so forth!

Is it pretty? Heck no. Is it functional and ready to be fired? Yep! Is it for sale? Maybe.

Thus endeth my last yak fat special. Well, I have that Pattern 1841 musket... with a shattered stock that was held together with yak fat glue. Might be a while on that one.

Now I can order that flint grinder pistol stuff with a happy heart. SW


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Francotte 006 (640x129).jpg [ 90.93 KiB | Viewed 4601 times ]

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Slava Ukraini!!

Cool Beans! Nothing like making the old ones 'sing' again!!!

Nice work Hogger!

Now for that 4-bore double rock-lock

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It's 5 o'clock and it's watermelon time.....................
because you can't drink beer & load rockets - TXPete

Very nice, some of y'all really impress me with the talent and patience on these restorations.

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Any government big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take everything you have.

I grabbed 5 rounds I made up with a .457 400 grainer & 30 grains of AA5744. The Francottes have a tight bore like the Gahendras. I've also heard they have a taper bore so I stayed away from the .468/469 bullets the 577/450 needs.

The wind is blowing like a bastage here, so it was just a fiunction test. I am happy to report that contrary to popular reports, a Francotte Martini does not self-destruct or detonate when you press the trigger. Well, this one didn't anyway.

The critical issue is that most of these barrels were pounded around a mandrel & have a seam that will come unglued. Like Damascus steel, they rust at the seam & this barrel was plenty rusty - pitted all over the place.

This one was apparently bored out because I can't find any kind of a seam, spiral or linear.

All 5 rounds went off like they were supposed to. No primer protusion which indicates the headspace is close. The extractor kicked the cases right out, but it seems to shoot way high. I was shooting pretty close, so that might not mean much @ 100M or farther.

Anyway, I was thinking of selling it, but I'm going to mess around shooting it some more.

Now if the wind would just go down so I could take my chronograph out! SW

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Slava Ukraini!!

Very nicely done, saw you first pictures and am truly impressed with what you were able to do to bring the old war horse back.