Gunsmithing Questions

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

1) For a gunsmithing shop in the Southwest that opens in 1921, it might be possible to get mid-to-late 19th century gunsmithing tools for cheap since they'd largely be obsolete with the transition from black to smokeless powder in the 1900s. The same goes for old BP firearms that couldn't be upgraded to use smokeless powder and farrier equipment that becomes obsolete with the introduction of the automobile.

Any smith/machinist/etc. with enough space and income will have serious packrat tendencies, so it's not impossible that even in the 1950s family members will have access to authentic 19th century gunsmithing tools, parts, etc. That would make it easier for a journeyman gunsmith to make a "masterwork" 19th c. style gun because the tools, jigs, etc. needed would all be in place.

Not only is that true, but old Tomasso Manzano, when he emigrated from Brescia, Lombardy, via New Orleans, Texas and what was still a pretty wild New Mexico Territory, to what would become Albuquerque, had packed all the most portable and valuable tools of his father, grandfather and so on. Tomasso was already a master smith in his own right at home in Italy, he just didn't see any future for his family in a land where half the people still voted what the local gentry and nobility wanted, and the other half were tearing the nation apart with gang violence that passed as politics between Anarchists, Communists, Fascists, Socialists and any number of -ists who justified bombings, murder, riots and voter intimidation in the name of future Utopia.

Tomasso was already making a living shoeing horses, fixing revolvers, making fowling pieces from parts of Civil War muskets and helping figure out the first tractor engines in the region for big-minded farmers before he moved his family the few miles south into the pueblo of the Isleta people to avoid the dry laws of Bernalillo County. That's where he hung up a shingle for a formal business, though, depending on who's telling the story, he could have just been trying to divert attention from the still in his shed by calling it a foundry and thus justifying noise and smell from the shed at all hours.

In any case, Tomasso had a full set of TL6 gunsmith tools (for a skilled craftsman, nothing large-scale, obviously) and all a mule could carry of TL5 tools too. His son Giancarlo would inherit the tools, in the natural course of things, but Tommasso was in no hurry to pass on and Giancarlo had to scrimp and save from an early age to afford his own set of tools, which he ended up using most of his life, as Tomasso lived till 1963, by which time Giancarlo was already sixty and had sired twelve children with his Isleta girl, Juana Abeyta, who in 1934 was denied enrollment in the tribe, despite living on the reservation from birth, speaking Tiwa and growing up Isleta, because by the Blood Quantum laws, her part-Anglo and Hispanic blood made her ineligible at only 1/4 pure blood.

During the Depression, Tomasso, Giancarlo, and his other son, Mose Bruno, as well as their wives and surviving children, became skilled at improvising tools. Various tools served for Carpentry, Machinist, Masonry, Mechanic, Smith and even Housekeeping as well as Armoury (Small Arms). As they prospered, relatively speaking, they added new tools, in the original work shed, in the house, in the garden, and, eventually, in a store and workshop the Manzano men built across from the shed. Advanced TL6 tools and eventually some TL7 ones, as they could afford them.

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

One possibility for a masterwork that wouldn't be too hard would be a shotgun with a damascene barrel. Another possibility would be a heavily engraved presentation pistol, assuming skill with Artist (Engraving).

Even if the final product were engraved, the purpose of the project would be to demonstrate mastery of the Armoury skill. So, it needs to show off the gunsmithing more than the decorating.

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

2) A gunsmith near an Indian reservation in the 1920s or 30s might have a reason to keep making or repairing black powder guns, since Native Americans of the period were (mostly) impoverished. If they couldn't afford a new gun, they could possibly afford to have an obsolete black powder gun repaired, refurbished or upgraded to use smokeless powder cartridges. While the last option is dangerous for high-powered weapons, it might not be unreasonable for small caliber hunting rifles.

BP shotguns would be another possibility, since they'd be decent weapons for small game and bird hunting and black powder and DIY shot might be cheaper or more available than shotgun cartridges. Alternately, it might have been easier to make BP shotgun cartridges using reused brass as the base and new primers and waxed cardboard or similar to make the cartridge. During the Depression, a local gunsmith might have sold reloaded ammo for cheap.

They've sold reloads since shotgun shells were metal and their neighbours were using black powder, some in sporterized rifle-muskets from the Civil War or even trade muskets from a generation before that.

Giancarlo's prized deer gun was a Winchester 1894 in .32 Special. The main purpose of that caliber was to appeal to hunters who wanted the power and flat trajectory of smokeless powder, but made their own ammo and cast their own bullets. The slow twist rate of the barrels made for .32 Special minimizes the lead buildup in the rifling from unjacketed cast lead bullets.

Rechambering firearms which can still provide useful service in another caliber and generally re-using anything valuable from older guns brought to them has been their bread-and-butter for generations, now.

[Icelander]

What are some cool examples of hunting rifles, shotguns or other utility firearms for rural work that skilled and budget-minded gunsmiths could have made from anything available free or at least cheap back in the Depression era?

Using, for example, stocks and barrels from ancient trade muskets or slightly less ancient surplus Civil War guns, either as smoothbore fowling pieces or reboring or lining the barrel for low-pressure cartridges that are still powerful enough for deer.

Or taking the cheap machine-made shotguns sold by Sears, Crescent and similar companies and improving them somehow. Better stocks, cut to fit the owner, maybe work on the action if it needs it for reliability or trigger pull. I'm not actually sure what a craftsman can do to compete on effectiveness per dollar with those ultra-cheap single-barrel shotguns that are almost entirely machine-made, but they'd be trying.

And they'd be trying to find some way to make squirrel rifles that are accurate enough to keep a household fed with small game for the pot, but are cheap to fire, either chambering .22 rimfire cartridges or very economical small centerfire cartridges that are easy to reload (.25-20 and .32-20 are good examples). Again, Sears and other mail-order companies sell ultra-cheap machine-made .22 rifles, so, figuring out ways to add value above that would be something they'd be focused on.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Or taking the cheap machine-made shotguns sold by Sears, Crescent and similar companies and improving them somehow. Better stocks, cut to fit the owner, maybe work on the action if it needs it for reliability or trigger pull. I'm not actually sure what a craftsman can do to compete on effectiveness per dollar with those ultra-cheap single-barrel shotguns that are almost entirely machine-made, but they'd be trying.

Depends on their wages? The manufacturer is quite capable of hiring a gunsmith do to all that work, they just don't because it's not worth what it would cost them, and a local gunsmith has the same problem -- unless they have a competitive advantage due to lower wages or proximity to the end customer.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Depends on their wages? The manufacturer is quite capable of hiring a gunsmith do to all that work, they just don't because it's not worth what it would cost them, and a local gunsmith has the same problem -- unless they have a competitive advantage due to lower wages or proximity to the end customer.

Proximity and working for survival wages, I guess. They're living in a pueblo, a reservation for Tiwi-speaking Native Americans, Pueblo Isleta, and trying to use their gunsmithing skills to feed lots of kids. Obviously, they also hunt birds, small game and deer, do various machining and smith work, and generally anything that a family of mechanically-inclined men could to gather food and income.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Proximity and working for survival wages, I guess.

Given low wages, it's certainly possible. The Khyber Pass gunsmiths are probably your most appropriate real world model.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Depends on their wages? The manufacturer is quite capable of hiring a gunsmith do to all that work, they just don't because it's not worth what it would cost them, and a local gunsmith has the same problem -- unless they have a competitive advantage due to lower wages or proximity to the end customer.

If what they're doing is customizing the rifles to fit the user - in GURPS terms, making it eligible for Weapon Bond - that's something where proximity to end customer is paramount. If they also undercharge for the quality of their workmanship (on account of nobody in their area being able to afford what skill 16 or so should pay) and/or are willing to accept trade in lieu of cash (with the advantage that this often bypasses needing to pay Uncle Sam a cut), they can probably make a modest profit. Modifying stocks to match the user's favored length of pull as well as possibly contouring them to better fit the user, replacing the trigger with one that has the "weight" the user needs/desires, adding and adjusting barrel weights (if those were a thing back then), adding/modifying/replacing pistol grips on rifles, etc, seem like they'd all be things to do with the end user available. The fact the Manzano's are also avid users of firearms will also help them in figuring out what modifications will best work for a given user (in GURPS terms, I would be strongly inclined to allow an IQ-based roll against the relevant Guns skill to serve as a complementary roll to the Armory roll to customize it to the user).

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Anthony

Given low wages, it's certainly possible. The Khyber Pass gunsmiths are probably your most appropriate real world model.

I know it was possible, I guess I'm looking for cool relics which were used at the time and now are family heirlooms that may not be as powerful and easy to use as new 2010s hunting rifles bought at the nearest sporting goods store, but have a lot more character and history.

I'd like to find pictures of such modified firearms, if possible, but if not, at least descriptions of what might have made economic sense when you had lots of skilled men without enough work, but little money to buy stuff. Stuff like the real-world chambering .32 Winchester Special, which was essentially just a rough equivalent of the .30-30 for shooters who cast their own bullets and reloaded, to save a little. It could be reloaded with black powder or smokeless, either way.

I imagine that there were other such cartridges, some factory and some wildcat, and I'd like to find other examples.

Like, what do you do with a Civil War relic like a Springfield rifle, at a time when buying a new hunting rifle wasn't affordable? In the 1860s and 1870s, they rebarreled them for rimfire rounds, but in the 1920s and 1930s, I'm not sure that's cost effective. They could line the barrel and re-chamber it for a fairly big, low-pressure centerfire cartridge, though, one that you can load yourself and cast bullets for, because you're working at lower velocities.

Mail order catalogues were a competitor for any kind of local gunsmith, but they could also use them to order just barrels and a few spare parts, and make fairly nice hunting rifles or shotguns with wooden stocks they've made themselves. It would probably be around the price of a Sears brand shotgun, but instead of a one-size-fits-all, it could be made to fit and, since there were fewer jobs than they'd like, they'd make it look as nice as they could, increase the odds of other jobs.

The Smith & Wesson, Colt and Winchester firearms made during the Depression were famously some of the most beautiful and best finished guns ever made. The gunsmiths who kept their jobs there were very aware of how lucky they were to still have jobs and they got to take all the time they wanted to turn out perfectly finished final products. The factories were all working at fairly low volume, but the owners tried to keep their skilled workforce as long as they could, as they were afraid they couldn't get their business together again if they lost that pool of expertise.

I imagine that even for a much smaller enterprise, with far less revenue, some of the same factors come into play. Every paying job is an opportunity to exhibit and exercise their craftsmanship and thereby, they hope, tempt others into asking them to work on their guns.

I know that a lot of their income was just selling reloaded ammo, providing basic maintenance and repair for those in the community who didn't know how to treat their hunting weapons, and the occasional shaping of a stock for someone shorter than the average shooter.

But I figure that there were some cool and inventive ways in which older weapons were recycled and budget shotguns and smallbore rifles were made into something nicer, which was passed down in the family and families of neighbours.

In ordinary times, if they'd have been earning well, boys in the family would get .22 rifles as soon as they could pull a trigger and tell a squirrel from a kitten, and a .410 or 28-gauge shotgun as soon as they could learn which birds were edible. At some point between age 11 and age 14, depending, they'd get a deer rifle. That's how it worked for many families and, for example, for the generation which grew up in the prosperous 1950s, those guns might be Remington, Savage, Stevens, Winchester and other quality brands, though obviously, simple models without frills.

As it was in the years around 1929-1939, I'm trying to imagine how fathers, grandfathers and uncles figured out ways to make these guns from all sorts of things they could scrounge, not to mention the vast supply of surplus available for mail order, everything from the Civil War to WWI, and chamber them in some caliber they can load cheaply themselves.

Cheap surplus for adult men, in the powerful calibers, there were Mauser G98, Kar98 and the various earlier Mausers, Enfield M1917 and Springfield M1903. But what surplus weapons made good starting point for boys' rifles and shotguns?

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Icelander

I know it was possible, I guess I'm looking for cool relics which were used at the time and now are family heirlooms that may not be as powerful and easy to use as new 2010s hunting rifles bought at the nearest sporting goods store, but have a lot more character and history.

Well, the really cool relics are probably someone's pet project that they spent months or years fiddling with trying to get perfect, and that could be almost anything.

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Icelander

Using, for example, stocks and barrels from ancient trade muskets or slightly less ancient surplus Civil War guns, either as smoothbore fowling pieces or reboring or lining the barrel for low-pressure cartridges that are still powerful enough for deer.

One idea is rechambering Civil War/Old West Era rifle musket barrels as shotgun barrels, especially once the lands are stripped. Bore out a .51/.53 rifle musket barrel a bit and you might just have enough metal left to make a 20 gauge shotgun.

That trick would also work for barrels which are otherwise unsafe due to corrosion, etc. near one end of the barrel since rifle musket/trade musket barrels are long. Cut them down and/or bore them out and sell them as inexpensive shotguns.

I would also imagine that locks and stocks got heavily reused. Butts for long-arms might have been carefully preserved, since good materials for making the wooden parts of guns aren't native to the US SW. There might have been lots of original maplewood rifle butts mated to local stocks made from whatever wood they could get. There are historical examples of Indian trade muskets (albeit from the Northern Plains) which have been repaired multiple times.

In the 19th century Indians were noted for not taking care of their guns (probably due to lack of tools rather than anything else), so a frontier gunsmith willing to deal with Native American customers would be a godsend (great spirit-send?) to the local tribes.

Originally Posted by Icelander

Or taking the cheap machine-made shotguns sold by Sears, Crescent and similar companies and improving them somehow.

Cheap guns break. Sometimes they break a lot. They might have had a steady business in replacing broken springs, realigning misaligned sights and similar.

They might have also had a special deal where customers brought in a newly-purchased cheap rifle or shotgun and the gunsmiths made alterations to improve accuracy, trigger pull, replace parts known to be prone to breakage, etc. Effectively, it would be turning a Cheap-Quality gun into a Good-Quality weapon.

Of course, that would just be part of what they were doing. They might have dabbled in clock and jewelry repair as well in addition to gunsmithing and farrier work.

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

One idea is rechambering Civil War/Old West Era rifle musket barrels as shotgun barrels, especially once the lands are stripped. Bore out a .51/.53 rifle musket barrel a bit and you might just have enough metal left to make a 20 gauge shotgun.

That trick would also work for barrels which are otherwise unsafe due to corrosion, etc. near one end of the barrel since rifle musket/trade musket barrels are long. Cut them down and/or bore them out and sell them as inexpensive shotguns.

Well, with Enfield or Springfield rifle-muskets from the Civil War, you can leave the thickness the same, just smooth out the lands, and you have a perfectly normal 24-gauge percussion cap shotgun. Which you could convert to a breechloading, 24-gauge cartridge-firing shotgun fairly easily, as 24-gauge was once one of the standard gauges, back in the old days when shotguns were personal to their owners and existed in 8-gauge, 10-gauge, 12-gauge, 16-gauge, 20-gauge, 24-gauge and 28-gauge (the .410 is a later addition).

And even older surplus guns are already smoothbore, like the Springfield Model 1842 musket or trade guns sold to the Native American peoples, and given the .69 caliber, you can keep them in 14-gauge (which is a fairly rare cartridge in the 20th century, even during the 1910s), bore the barrel out to 12-gauge and rely on lower shotgun pressures not to burst the thinner barrel walls, or just line the barrel a bit and make it a breechloading Sweet Sixteen shotgun which is also capable of firing musket balls of around .66 caliber, definitely enough for a deer even at modest velocity.

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

I would also imagine that locks and stocks got heavily reused. Butts for long-arms might have been carefully preserved, since good materials for making the wooden parts of guns aren't native to the US SW. There might have been lots of original maplewood rifle butts mated to local stocks made from whatever wood they could get. There are historical examples of Indian trade muskets (albeit from the Northern Plains) which have been repaired multiple times.

Good stocks would always be recycled, but don't forget, mesquite grows in the area, and the Manzano mountains have good maple wood. There's no local walnut, it's true, but they have some wood fit for stocks. And especially after Mose Bruno started experimenting with laminated stocks, then he found he could find all the wood he needed in the mountains that shared their surname.*

*The mountains are named, in Spanish, for a village with apple trees, because that's what the word 'Manzano' means in Spanish, 'apple tree'. The mountains have no apple trees, though, they were planted by the Spanish by a small settlement, they don't grow wild there. And Manzano, in Italian, doesn't mean 'apple tree', it's derived from the Italian word for 'steer', 'Manzo', so in Italian, 'Manzano' basically means 'cowboy'.

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

In the 19th century Indians were noted for not taking care of their guns (probably due to lack of tools rather than anything else), so a frontier gunsmith willing to deal with Native American customers would be a godsend (great spirit-send?) to the local tribes.

To be totally clear on the history, Tommaso and Chiara Manzano brought their baby boy, Giovanni Carlo 'Giancarlo' Manzano, to America in 1907. They got off the ship at New Orleans and drifted west, through Texas, looking for a place to build their future, until they learned about the Manzano Mountains, and Chiara Manzano decided that it was a sign from God, that they would be happy and fruitful if they settled under the Manzano Mountains.

They were settled in what was then the small town of Albuquerque by 1909, when Chiara bore her second son, Mose Bruno Manzano. They lived there for eight years, with Tommaso working as a smith, on anything from horseshoes and nails, through hoes, shovels and all kinds of machining work, to knives, revolvers, rifles and fowling guns.

Giancarlo had learned smithcraft and was almost a man in 1917, when they moved a few miles to the south, to Isleta Pueblo. Tommaso vehemently disagreed with the new dry law in the county and knew they wouldn't even try to enforce it on the pueblos and Chiara had already made many friends there through her church volunteer work. She loved the art of the native women and that they and the Mexican people shared her fervent, emotional and romantic Catholicism, so unlike the prudish, severe faith of the Anglo and Western European settlers in Albuquerque.

Anyway, the point I was trying to come to with this bit of family history is that the Manzanos didn't arrive in the New World or meet any Native Americans until 1907, at the earliest, didn't come to New Mexico until 1909, and did not settle in Isleta Pueblo until 1917. Only from that point on (and especially a few years later, when both boys marry Isleta girls) did Manzanos become the best and most successful, albeit, also the only, gunsmiths for the Isleta Pueblo.

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

Cheap guns break. Sometimes they break a lot. They might have had a steady business in replacing broken springs, realigning misaligned sights and similar.

They might have also had a special deal where customers brought in a newly-purchased cheap rifle or shotgun and the gunsmiths made alterations to improve accuracy, trigger pull, replace parts known to be prone to breakage, etc. Effectively, it would be turning a Cheap-Quality gun into a Good-Quality weapon.

That's a good point. In all fairness, though, Hans-Christian Vortisch did give the budget, mail-order, machine-made Crescent, Hunter Arms, H & R, Iver Johnson, Sears, Stevens and Western Arms rifles and shotguns 'Good-quality', not Cheap, in the extra High-Tech supplements even though they are half the price or less of finer shotguns (with much the same stats). So, they're the Glocks of the turn of the 20th century, new manufacturing methods, good enough for a lot less money.

Nevertheless, there is probably some demand for smoothing off manufacturing defects, burrs and poor finishing, improving the fit of the stock, and maybe replacing a low-quality part or two with a better one. People customize cheap guns today, as long as the customization cost has a normal relation to the cost of the gun in the first place. So, it's not a very lucrative transaction for the gunsmith, but it keeps the Manzanos fed, as they were very willing to take payment in meat during the Depression.

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

Of course, that would just be part of what they were doing. They might have dabbled in clock and jewelry repair as well in addition to gunsmithing and farrier work.

The polishing, finishing, engraving and many other parts of a gunsmith's trade make him familiar with the jewelry profession, yes. Any gunsmith who can turn out a firearm which is a functional work of art will have the Jewelry skill.

Clock repair is tougher. My grandfather and my late great-grandfather went to Switzerland to get their certificates as Meister Uhrmacher and while I think that the skills absolutely fit together in a Talent and they rely on many of the same traits (IQ with High Manual Dexterity if you have it, often floated to DX), the default between them is probably significant, and combined with unfamiliarity penalties, even old Tomasso Manzano, at the height of his skill, would only manage to be a mediocre repairer of watches, through defaulting from his exceptional Armoury skill.