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I’ve enjoyed many of your posts, so I thought I’d join in on the fun and start contributing. As an introduction, I’ll share my first double rifle and the origin of my lust for Scottish firearms. It’s an Edward Paton & Son .450 3 ¼” BPE hammer rifle. Barrels are 28” steel tubes, Henry rifled, and built by A&T who supplied many makers with early steel tubes. Rib is marked “Edward Paton & Son, London and Perth”. Non-rebounding back action locks with stalking safeties are signed by Joseph Brazier. In the picture of the lock work below you can also see the incorporation of the fly on the tumblers. Stock is straight with a metal grip rail. Running stag engraved on the bottom of the trigger guard and is hidden by the Jones underlever when the action is closed.

The sights are a bit unique, yet typical of express rifles. It has a very wide and deep “v” rear sight. This is paired to a front caterpillar on a very tall post. I absolutely love this sight arrangement and have duplicated it on my other rifles used for similar purposes. It’s very flexible in its use in the field. It allows for precision use at distance (150-200 yards) by holding the top of the front bead even with the top of the rear sight. Conversely, you can bury the bead in the bottom of the rear “v” and you’re dead on for 50 yards and closer. You may recall this sighting arrangement from an often duplicated picture in Greener’s “Development of the Gun”. I believe the chapter is on Express rifles. It shows how the sights can be arranged as I described against a Red Stag silhouette at various distances. I can attest that it works quite well. MikeRowe has witnessed me successfully waging war on rocks and ring steel plates out to 200 yards quite regularly. The stars have simply not aligned for me to have seen deer when I had this rifle in hand while out stalking. That really needs to be remedied!

It’s regulated for a charge of 120 grains behind a 310 grain projectile and is so marked. I was really excited to try paper-patched hard lead flat points dropped from one of MikeRowe’s best quality brass molds, but the darn thing absolutely loves the 300 grain Hornady jacketed RN. I guess I lucked out, but I do plan to work up a load of black powder and some bullets from MikeRowe’s mold in the future.

Like most Scottish guns and rifles this one absolutely comes alive in your hands. It’s highly dynamic. I’ve shot several Alexander Henry .450 3 ¼” hammer double rifles with a similar feel, but my Paton is a bit lighter in the barrels – probably because it doesn’t have the weight of a Henry’s gorgeously swamped rib. I’ve shot a 28 bore Dickson hammergun that I swear was possessed by some woodcock and quail slaying demon. I think this rifle may be of similar possession!

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www.stephencokerandco.com
Uniquely superlative rifles in the Scottish tradition.

Edited by StephenCoker (27/09/12 01:32 AM)