Forums.NitroExpress.com

It's time for an update. I see Watson577 has neglected this thread. He hasn't neglected the rifle, though. I think I'll take the liberty to give an incomplete account of progress. Hopefully Watson577 will fill in details.

To shoot this rifle requires brass, bullets, and dies. None existed when the rifle came to Watson577. The cartridge seems to be a one-off; evidently a special order, unique in Holland & Holland production. Numerous entreaties to Holland & Holland for information on bullets and regulation produced nothing. These parts of H&H records went up in smoke under German bombs. So Watson577 essentially began with only this information:

* The cartridge has the head of a 16 bore;
* The rifle is proved as a 14 bore;and
* Load data engraved on side of action "Charge 9 drams, Brass Case 3-1/2 inches." (See all details in first post.)

For me, that would be the end of the road. An elegant wall hanger, thank you. But not for Watson577.

Among other skills, our dear Watson577 is an expert machinist. So he set out to make dies and brass cases. His effort produced an exquisite pair of loading dies, made out of 1-1/2" round stock.

Off to the heat-treater they went.

Then from brass bar stock he made cases; and beautiful ones!

They are properly annealed and ready to go!

The bullet remained a mystery. Holland had no record to identify its weight. Only trial-and-error will work now.

Watson577 made a push-through draw die and gathered up various large bullets from several sources. Here is his array of "try" bullets with information about their weights and origins (all to be paper-patched for trials).

So now it's time to load cartridges. Nine drams works out to 246 grains of black powder. That's a bunch of powder! Here are the first "try" cartridges, all loaded with 246 grains of GEOX Olde Eynford 1-1/2f.

And a couple of glamour shots.

These are rather large, to say the least.

November 26, 2016 was the day for firing the Bone Crusher. How many years had passed since this rifle was fired? We can only guess. Click the next link for a video of Watson577 firing these try-loads. The very first firing for him.

Video: First Shots from Bone Crusher 26 Nov 2016

We had another little shoot this past weekend. It was my turn to experience the Bone Crusher. Here are a few screen captures from my first shot (taken 06 Jan 2017).

That's the news on Jim's Bone Crusher. I've been an interested bystander through all this progress. Jim is a persistent wizard. He deserves an enormous amount of credit for making this fine old rifle again belch fire, smoke, and lead.

Curl