Found this in an attic

I don't know where the idea comes from that you can't soak the metal of this rifle down with oil and rub the rust flakes off with fine steel wool. I have been collecting old Winchesters for 30 years and this does not devalue the rifle at all. I don't mean go at it with a wire wheel or anything foolish like that.
 
Thanks Mike! I too have cleaned up old Winchesters -- but due to it's age I, rubbed it down with a tooth brush and G96 -- turned out great with the bore cleaning up nicely. I will leave it to it's future owner to ponder the next move. I'm taking it to the Irishtown gun show on Saturday with the realization that finding a buyer in that venue is small -- I do have a figure in mind and if it doesn't sell, I will list it here and on some other sites on both sides of the border.
Cheers, John
 
Strangeday said:
I found one of these years ago. I found out some very interesting history about the patent etc. These were designed as an experimental rifle during the civil war as a cavalry carbine. Some we actually handed out to those smuggling slaves in the underground railway to Canada. Which is how some of them ended up here. I ended up selling mine for $5000US to the owner of Dixie Gun Works in the US. His name is Hunter Kirkland.

FYI, the ATF describes this as an antique item and you can drive it over the boarder to ship it if you decide to sell it without any permits or paperwork. PM me if you want some more information.
Click to expand...




:eek: $5000, well I would say job well done there!

Maybe the o/p should take some pictures of the rifle and send them to Dixie Gun Works
 
I would like to add my endorsement to the safety of cleaning surface rust with a drop of oil and extra fine steel wool. I have done this for years and carefully tested it. It is remarkably good at removing surface rust with no detectable marring of the blueing. If in doubt, try it on a tiny location under the barrel.
 
At a recent gun show that I was at in the US (Baltimore), which is one of the largest antique arms show in the US. There were no less then 6 Ball Repeating carbines for sale ranging from price of $1800.00 to $3500.00. I don't think any of them sold. The market for Civil War guns has soften in the US unless the gun has strong condition going for it. Most of the Civil War collectors are of the older generation, who in most cases are only looking to improve on condition of their guns.

These are a very rare gun considering the quanity that were made. Most of the ones being seen on the market today are coming from collections that pervious owners that have died off and their collections are being auctioned off.

I have no doubt that Mr. Kirkland paid $5K for the one mentioned in the previous post as these guns were not that common a few years ago when the ones that were out there were tied up in collections.

I am sure you could do just as good in Canada as the US if advertised correctly and get circulated. Both of the ones that I had I sold in here in Canada for good prices. As a point of interest one of the ones that I had I picked up in NB also.

The Irishtown Rd. Gun show this weekend maybe a good spot to show your gun to Joe Salter as he is sometimes at the show or one of his pickers will be there to give you an estimate.
 
Leave it completely as found. Unless you plan to keep it there is no reason to clean it. You will not add to the value and run the risk of adversly affecting the value. The person who buys it would much rather have it as you found it, and do whatever cleaning they want themselves.

RESIST the temptation to mess around with it. You will not add value or interest by doing so and once you start these projects there is always this temptation to go that "one screw too far". I speak from experience.
 
'One screw too far' is definitely good advice. It is very easy to bugger up a screw. My advice is to leave them alone. Do not even touch the buggered up ones; the reason they may be buggered is that the screw is stuck and any further attempt will wreck it even more. One of my main beefs with old Winchesters is the fact that someone got there with a screwdriver and made a mess. It takes a good set of gunsmiths hollow ground screwdrivers plus a healthy amount of experience to remove and re-install a screw without any marring.
 
I went and looked at the letter from 2002

Road King said:
At a recent gun show that I was at in the US (Baltimore), which is one of the largest antique arms show in the US. There were no less then 6 Ball Repeating carbines for sale ranging from price of $1800.00 to $3500.00. I don't think any of them sold. The market for Civil War guns has soften in the US unless the gun has strong condition going for it. Most of the Civil War collectors are of the older generation, who in most cases are only looking to improve on condition of their guns.

These are a very rare gun considering the quanity that were made. Most of the ones being seen on the market today are coming from collections that pervious owners that have died off and their collections are being auctioned off.

I have no doubt that Mr. Kirkland paid $5K for the one mentioned in the previous post as these guns were not that common a few years ago when the ones that were out there were tied up in collections.

I am sure you could do just as good in Canada as the US if advertised correctly and get circulated. Both of the ones that I had I sold in here in Canada for good prices. As a point of interest one of the ones that I had I picked up in NB also.

The Irishtown Rd. Gun show this weekend maybe a good spot to show your gun to Joe Salter as he is sometimes at the show or one of his pickers will be there to give you an estimate.
Click to expand...

the correct amount was $4500 I think when I exchanged the US rate at the time it was almost 5k canadian
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom