I finally took some time to upload pictures of Darkalleydan's Rolling block project...
Made in 1874 this old girl has seen a lot of life. The goal of this project was to ensure she gets to see a lot more of life, while at the same time, honoring her past.
Turning the RKS .30cal blank in prep for a 1/2 octagon profile.
Hard to get and sort of pointless, but I've always found chamber pictures to be mesmerizing...
On the mill...
Off the mill...
Next up was stock work. Once again, we wanted to honour her past. As such, we refinished the original wood; Shortening the fore end, improving wood/metal fit and taking out many of the dents and dings.
Anything more was left as a testament to her past and reminder of her service.
One of the things we came across was exposing the cleaning rod hole when shortening the fore stock. The solution was to mill a dowel from the cut off portion and try and match the grain as best possible.
It's sort of cheating to use wood from the same stick but it does make for a good result.
Next up was metal finishing. We polished the hammer/breech block and trigger, Salt blued the barrel and larger pins/screws and flame blued the small screws. The receiver/buttplate were sent to Oskar Kob for CCH.
And finally, engraving, dovetails and holes for sights...
The final result? A trim, pretty little thing that points like a dream and, well lets just say I kind of hated to turn it over to Dan when he came to pick it up....
And once again, Mr Kob's contribution to the project is the undeniable show stopper!

I have to say, we are very fortunate to have access to a man with his skills and abilities here in Canada. I recommend his services unreservedly.