Check out this 7mm Lefaucheux Belgian made pinfire revolver I picked up. It’s from mid to late 1800’s. Fully functional. Except it costs $350 to buy a specialty kit to make 12 pinfire cartridges to fire it. I believe it would fire and be reasonably accurate despite some minor barrel pitting. I wouldn’t fire it though. Going to display it with an old slipjoint knife and some coins. I may fabricate some fake “spent” cartridges out of brass tubs and pins to make it easier to explain to people what pinfire cartridges are. Going to display it in my house.
>>65551375I think I saw some Youtube video about a Norwegian(?) guy DIY-ing 11mm Lefaucheux cartridges
>>65551375neat, you could buy the $44 test kit and fudge together some rounds i bet.
>>65551620Cool, I’ll see if I can find some videos. I wouldn’t mind loading some that could potentially be fired. Using a #11 cap and fine black powder. I wouldn’t fire it but I’d like to make something that “could” be fired. I reload modern ammo.
>>65551664Oh I didn’t even see that option. I don’t need the die, I can probably get those bullets to seat. I’ll practice seating bullets in a modern bullet and case and once I figure out how to do it without a die I just try with that kit. That’s awesome. Hopefully he responds to the email.
>>65551664I emailed the guy. We’ll see if he responds.
>>65551375Anon, guns are worth shooting, and I think that it would be worth trying to load some ammo and shoot it at least once or twice, just for the now rare experience.There's kits, but there's also other means. 9mm Pinfire can be made from 9mm Parabellum casings, and 11mm Pinfire can be made from .45 Auto casings. Possibly, 7mm Pinfire could be made from something like .32 Auto, .30 Super Carry, or similar.It's gonna be some work, if you have even just a minor hand with tools, it could be done.>>65551668If you're already a handloader you should be able to do it all DIY.>>65551620Rakum? If he's Norwegian he's not got an accent.Here's a vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2cVc34vOtAs
Here's an old dude who's made 7mm Pinfire casings.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RXcCbJnK1H4
When you see diagrams of pinfire ammunition, often it shows the percussion cap sitting all the way on the side wall of the case, and that was done and you CAN do that.But, probably because this was goddamn annoying as shit for production even back in the actual pinfire era, this wasn't always done, and if you look at these cross sections of various cartridges, you'd see that some of them used a construction or added spacer which would have made it a THOUSAND times easier to assemble the cartridges.You could probably 3D print this sort of thing, or make it out of wood or cardboard or something. Maybe clay. Funny how especially close some of these get to centerfire, like just a hair away.
>>65553238He turned .32 bullets down on a lathe and wedged them too to make them fit. I don’t own a lathe. I wonder if I can fabricate my own bullet mold pretty easily by just drilling holes in two pieces of metal and clamping them tightly together. I own a 3d printer and can print a stepped plug to align the two ddrilled metal pieces concentrically. It would just be for display purposes. I really don’t feel comfortable firing this gun. On the unlikely chance it blows apart.
I looked further down the barrel and discovered it is plugged up. The portion of the barrel in front of it looks in good shape and I’m starting to think I might actually try firing this thing. But I got to unplug it first.
I got in unplugged. Barrel looks great. I’m gonna fire this thing. Fuck it. I’ll never get this opportunity ever and can share the experience with others at the outdoor range.
Cylinder chamber measures 0.310 and barrel is just under 0.300 both ends
>>65553474You might be able to 3D print a casing, given that blackpowder is low pressure and you wouldn't be fitting an awful lot in there. You would need to us a TPA material for it though.
>>65553619Possibly. I’ve been trying to figure out how to make the case. I was looking at brass tubing. I found half millimeter size. 8mm OD tubing converts to 0.315”. Measuring inside of the cylinder with calipers tends to underestimate since you can’t hold the calipers perfectly, and because the flat rectangle edge of caliper can’t measure rounded inside all the way. So I order some 8mm tube and see if it fits. It has 0.2mm wall so if it fits I’ll get some 7.5mm round stock to go inside and figure out a way to secure it. I can either crimp the end of the tube so the plug can’t come out or something like that.
>>65553474>He turned .32 bullets down on a lathe and wedged them too to make them fit. There's less overcomplicated ways to go about it. Exactly .300 caliber is very unusual, but not unique, that's what the 7.35mm Carcano is loaded with, you may be able to adapt unjacketed projectiles or molds for that cartridge. Optionally resizing unjacketed .303 caliber projectiles. They may also have to be cut off, but that'd be the easy part. (Don't breathe this!)
>>65551737The guy responded but said he was retired now!!!
>>65553790That’s an idea. I’m also considering 3d printing the cases now. I have design software I can do it all myself.
Here is my Belgian RIC copy in .450 Adams.
>>65554075Ooooohhh, I really like this.
>>65551375Pay the $350, you fucking pussy. Then you can have the satisfaction of firing it, and display both fired and unfired cartridges along with it.
