doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Ballistix999 Ramblings on Restoration - Long Post

Hi all, I wanted to post this. It's also on my blog. It is NOT intended to become a flame-fest. If it does I'll ask for it to be removed. I hope it's read as just my opinion and view on something I love to be involved with.

Truth is I've tried to analyse myself here and came up with the below.

Having breakfast this morning I pondered on some of the numerous conversations I�ve held, both face to face and virtually, on the process of restoring shotguns and the diverse opinion that divides people across the World when it comes to their restoration. When I first started on restoring my first shotgun I went in pretty much �green� and wanted to learn quickly and restore the gun to how I thought it might have been first created all of those years ago. Clearly for me then this was, and still is to a certain extent, a subjective view on how a gun may have looked when it was first created.

When one first takes a sidelock apart it�s difficult to imagine that many of these parts were forged from a single piece of steel. The time and effort that goes into each and every piece is mind numbing but the quality of the work is second to none. The many books I have read have also concluded that workshops full of men hunched over benches doing �there little bit� towards the creation of the gun adding to the notion that these items were lovingly created by many hands over many hours. I�m of course talking about the top end guns of the era not those that were assembled to patterns for mass production and used in the various civil wars throughout the 17th and 18th Centuries.

So back to the main point of this topic. What constitutes a beautifully restored shotgun? Maybe that should be phrased as; a faithfully restored shotgun? This is of course where the debate comes in and the reason for my ramblings here. My own opinion has settled somewhat. Whereas before I wanted everything right; even down to re-case colour hardening components to make a gun look like it had just again come off the workshop floor albeit 120 years ago; Now I think about the gun I am looking at and how it might be sympathetically restored not necessarily fully re-coloured but what is �best for the gun�. Yes, subjective again, but I feel I�ve learnt from so many other people that I have spoken to over the last 3-4 years that I can now take a more rounded view on what that restoration process might be and how it affects the gun in question.

Whilst thinking about this and listening and watching people that I�ve met (and watched) on the Double Gun Forums I�ve built up a number of �types� of restoration enthusiasts. This article isn�t supposed to be judging anyone. It�s fair to say that I can be judged also based on the work I do and I am happy for people to do so. There are certainly a few people that are clearly industry trained. I could not hope to be as good as any of them but I do intend to learn from them. I cannot engrave or checker a stock because I don�t have the skill or time to do so. Nor can I re-stock a vintage shotgun. But I have learnt how to black barrels the old fashioned Birmingham way, brown barrels the old slow traditional way and numerous other long held traditional processes that I have enjoyed learning and love to apply. Back to the �types�. This is where I ended up. The good restorers take strands from all of the �types� here and apply them (other than the hacker!). One thing I really love is listening to people that �have done it� and can teach me something based on their experience. One thing I really dislike is people telling me how I should not do something when they themselves have no practical application at all.

The purist.
I�m not sure this is the right term, but here we go. This is the person that knows about guns but doesn�t like restoring them to anything but the basics. Taking muck out of the checkering is fine, possibly a bit of new oil on the stock is fine, re-checkering, colour case hardening are definite no-no�s and this is where I sometimes disagree. I can see why people feel this way. Why fiddle with the gun if it�s original? Well to me the answer is obvious. Too many times we find that guns are in poor condition. Leaving a gun like that, to me, is an offence. Something needs to be done about it to offer it some love and attention. Some that read this will think I�m drawing a big fat line between what I call purist restoration and sympathetic restoration. I like to call what I do sympathetic but of course anyone who hates re-casing of metalwork will beg to differ.

However, I have spoken to many people. who like to tweak less than I do and I�ve learnt a lot from them. Sometimes less is more but my basic ethic is that you have to take and look at each gun in turn and decide what is best for it. I like to case all of my guns too. I go to great lengths to find a case and label (not necessarily together at once) because I want to be able to show the gun in its former glory, case and all. So, thank you to those that are minimalist with their restorations. I think it really important that the lesson I have learnt from this section of my friends is that one should look carefully at a gun before embarking on the work to restore it. Take in views from as many people as you can.

The Hacker.
This one doesn�t take much to explain. I don�t know of any personally but these people take guns at auction, hack them up, and flog em. Torch colours, buggered screws, you name it. You see them and feel sorry for them. I applaud anyone to try to restore something but I insist they research and test before deciding. Let someone do it for you if you cannot yourself.

The Sympathetic Restorer.
This is me. It�s another �wrong term� I suspect. But what I am trying to do is draw on a balance of not going too far and making a gun look new and making sure that a rusty old thing doesn�t depreciate any more than it already has. Now of course the boundaries there are quite wide and where I do not like warn out checkering to remain others will cringe at the thought of having my checkering guy bring a lovely gun back to fully checkered..the way it would have been. Same with colour case hardening. I don�t do every gun, some I have to. A recent example was a composed pair of Stephen Grant sidelock guns I�m doing. The first gun has been re-stocked. It had to be; the other piece of wood was rubbish and ill fitting. Surely a prime example for �sympathetic restoration�. The second gun was worse, although the stock was fine, the owner had allowed the metalwork to corrode, either in its case or in a cupboard, none-the-less corroded it was and it needed sorting out. This was no mean feat, proper taking back of the plates, top tang and other areas and then professional laser welding over the top. Not the end there, filing back by hand taking many hours and then finally annealing the action and other parts in preparation for colour case hardening. This gun would look very poor unless it was done this way. But that�s just it, to me, restoring a gun to its proper position is my aim.

The Scientific Restorer.
Dangerous this one. I�m a little bit of this person. This person will restore to the full, each and every time, even if a gun just needs a cleanup and maybe stock re-finish. Case hardening everything and making everything look new. I�ve changed very much my bias from this. However there is something else about the scientific restorer. My definition of such a person includes their belief that they want to restore using old techniques and processes. Something I very much subscribe to. If there is one thing that makes me want to continue restoring old shotguns it�s my desire to learn more about the old fashioned things and the way they were done. Making springs the old fashioned way, browning and blacking of barrels using the old hot boiling water and carding method just to name a few processes that I really enjoy. That is really what the scientific restorer does in my eyes. They learn and use the old techniques that go back 150 years or more and use them to bring life back into the shotguns that they restore. Finally, for the last two types I think that these types of restorer will use bone and charcoal if the factory used bone and charcoal methods�but will not use bone and charcoat if the factory used Cyanide CCH process�. I�ve not personally done anything other than bone charcoal.

My Conclusion.
For me it�s not just the shotgun. It�s the history, the process, the nostalgia, the shooting of the gun. Importantly, and this is where I may differ from others, it is the process of the restoration itself that I delight in. Understanding a new trigger action, patent or engineering feat is as important as the shotgun itself. I relish in learning something new whether it be a new type of action, mechanism or whether it be a new way to restore something. For sure for me it�s the �doing�. I often smile at things I see and I enjoy the challenge of repairing something that is broken. I�ve made several top springs for several guns. Some may think that to be a horrid excersise left to those that are pay by the hour to do such work but I love it. This is just it. I guess I sometimes over-engineer my restoration work because I love it so much. I take much too long in restoring guns and could never make a living from it. But my guns are not for this purpose, they are for me to enjoy restoring, shooting and passing down to my son who will cherish them and pass them onto his children. �My father restored these guns� will be the biggest credit he can give me and I hope that one day he will be proud enough use them all.

Dead On, very well written........Thanks for posting Tony.....

Lot's of pleasure is derived from restoring old guns.......

Cheers,

I think you do a beautiful job....I just wish I had half of your talent.

Only advice I could offer is don't get taken up by a makers name and learn the ones not to waste your time on.

A gun is only as good as it's barrels.

Thanks Doug.

Joe thank you. It's a good point the makers names and I definately have favourites. Barrels totally agree also.

T

Right on!
WE APPRECIATE YOUR THOUGHTS AND CLARITY

very well spoken[written] it appears you looked into your inner self and answeared your own questions something very difficult to do let alone share them thoughts with others. thank you for your insight. regards bob

very good report, I think everyone here says, no matter what "keep on keeping on" on work like this that gives you so much pleasure.

Tony-

Good thoughts. Thanks for sharing. I enjoy many of the same aspects of old guns and it's good to see these feelings put into words.

One thing: I have a problem with the idea of "restoring" a double. Personally, I think this is a very misleading word. I believe "refinishing" is a more accurate.

Restoring implies that a gun had been returned to its original condition. When a gun is original, the bbls have been blacked once, the action has been colored once, the checkering has been cut once, the locks have barely been fired, etc.

Unless a gun is returned to this condition, I believe it is refinished, not restored.

From what I've seen in the gun-buying world, the market agrees with this. That's why original condition always commands top dollars.

BTW: I don't mean to disparage your work or skills by bringing this up. I only mean to raise this issue for discussion. As good guns get scarcer, more dealers are telling buyers that restored/refinished guns are just as good as original ones. This troubles me.

Thanks again,

OWD

Tony,
Someday when your son is your age with children, he will appreciate the gun and the sentiments you felt as you restored it. If it were me, I would print the above and tuck it away with the gun so that when he grows up to use it, he will have not only have an appreciation of how you felt about him but he will also know that more than a little bit of you went into the gun as a labor of love for him.
Gil

Owd. I hadn't considered this phraseology aspect at all and will consider it. It does make sense I think although some have to be restored too.

Gil. Great idea. Thanks
T