.69 Calibre Trapdoor Conversion?

[JOHN42768]

Granted a .58, but showing one of the many conversion options that were used.

 

[Jeff in Ohio]

I believe this is a jezail, not positive. It doesn't have a flintlock, but it does appear to have a mount for a bipod and looks to maybe fire hexagonal bullets. It's missing a bunch of tacks and a number of decorative metal bands.

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Yes, I think that is a Jezail, nemesis of Dr. Watson who now and then mentioned to his good great companion that he still suffered from an old Jezail wound suffered in (as I remember) Afghanistan.

Notice the stamping on the lock. The gunmakers of these Khyber Pass type arms knew there were some markings here and there on British made locks, so they got a letter or number or two, and stamped away to create lines of nonsense lettering.

I've seen "ZZZZZZZZZZ" stamped on such arms - your lock looks like it has backwards "Z"s stamped, sort of italic font.

 

[Trooper "D"]

Just noticed this post.

There is a story that the 'brass' (actually bronze) breech blocks were made when Paris was besieged and were cast from church bells as they could not get the iron forgings. The truth is that, following Sedan in the 1870 War, the French National Government was desperate for arms and sought production from smaller manufacturers. Some were too small to have the forging ability to make forged iron breech blocks so they cast them in bronze. Looks pretty, and adequate if not abused, but not as strong as the iron ones and more likely to stretch if overpowered. The same reason was behind the Confederate bronze frames for copy Colt revolvers so beloved of modern Italian reproducers which have the same weakness of stretching with strong loads.

The brass framed colts are garbage. Fire under powered loads of you want to keep them working for long. Blanks I don't think it matters so much. The full frame copies in brass might not be so bad but they open top pistols are just junk made with brass.