Originally Posted By: Ted Schefelbein
Good Lord. The more I look, the worse it gets:



This is a view of the removed breech block, with the opening key closed. It shows the rising bite that engages an extension on the barrels, and it should NOT be a perfect half moon shape. It is, because a piece is rather neatly sheared off, in the exact shape as the extension on the barrels. The bite is making a bit of contact with the extension, as someone added a bit of braze to the bottom, to force it further up into the extension on the barrels.

However, when the clever devil who did that little piece of re-engineering tried to fire the gun, I'm pretty sure he did this:



This view shows the mortised plate that is fitted into the lower action, which forms a perfect wedge when the action of a Darne is completely closed. It is just in front of the piece of steel with the hole in the center of it. However, the braze repair kept the action from closing all the way, and the stress of firing, either the first time it was fired, or, sometime after that, broke the plate right off.

My friend bought this gun for $325, perhaps a decade ago, from someone who had fired it a few times, but, reported the breech was "loose" when the gun was fired. It was purchased as a wall hanger, and hasn't been fired since, Thank God. If you look at the front of the breech photo, you can just make out a crack starting at the corner of the rail the breech slides back and forth on.

This view, of a later V model breech, shows what the rising bite is supposed to look like:



Be careful out there.

Best,
Ted

I doubt, from a metallurgical standpoint, that we are looking at a "braze" on the rising bite-- the trace is the color of dirty mustard, not of brass/bronze with flux, and there is no indication of a HAZ (heat affected zone)- silver soldering at a somewhat lower temp, possibly no HAZ "footprint"- also, as a braze build-up to a sheared off section, would show grind and possibly file marks as the build up needs must be ground smooth to the surface of the parent piece of hardened steel. In looking at the French as metallurgists, one might care to remember that they developed the first successful Electric Arc melt steel furnace, around 1905-- and shortly thereafter, perfected the what we now know as AISI 6150 chrome vanadium alloy steel- and Henry Ford, following a visit to France in that era, introduced it to the American steelmaking industry- How good is 6150 Chrome-Vanadium alloy- Hunter Arms used it for the cocking rods and lifter lugs, how many of those in the great Baker cocking system used by Hunter Arms are known to have broken, one might ask??

"The field is the touchstone of the man"..