Told ya I was back. The original H&R and the newer Italian repo's have a lot of issues as  far as I am concerned. The primary one being the auto-eject feaure some, not all, but many have. An original breech block (trapdoor) can be made to fit,cuz I've done it and put the pix here a while ago. I am totally in agreement with an original. Unless the bore is totaly erroded, most will shoot very well. I'll help anybody I can. 

Dick

I agree with Dick, the H & R are not all that well made. Several years ago several folks did a study ont trapdoor strengths and were really suprised. They rebarrled one in severalk calibers, including the 30-40. the 30-06, 270, 243, 38-55 all the way up to the mag calibers. The barrel finaly flew off with a 300 H & H if I remember correctly. The door stayed closed on all others. It is a simple design but strong. When the barrel left I think it took the threads off the barrel not the reciever.
Mike

Mikes comment on the barel tests is 100% correct. I have the test details.  In some other tests. it took twice the load that grenaded a RB and injured the shooter.  to seperate the breech block from the receiver on a TD. Only shooter damage was a pants change. Guys, there's a lot of myths out there about TD's strength, but just for a reminder, the army actually made some in 30-40 Krag, when they were short on Krag's. Never was a problem and these were smokeless loads. 

Oh, on the 1884 action. Yes I've got a few, but these are kinda reserved for custom projects, maybe another Scheutzen. Give Red Dougherty a call at 260-833-2315. I get a LOT of parts from him and he is first rate and VERY fair with pricing. Telll him I sent you. Might even help a little.

Dick

Hi, to understand why a barrel would loose it threads before the reciever is a metalurgy probelm. Which steel might you suppose is a  higher tensile strength, the barrel steel or a heat treated reciever? I would say the reciever every time. Now I'll show my age, I actualy talked to a person involved in the test I mentioned. It really suprised me until he explained about the metal hardness differance between the 2 types of steel, 1 heat treated and one plain. If you think along those lines I hope you can see why this is so. And yes Dick is Dead on. A roller will eat you alive if overloaded. I have seen the postmortem pictures of a dude that lost his brain in overloading a RB and it is not pretty.  I have seen others severly injured from there own stupity or a mechanical failure which most but not all can be traced to bad hand loads, or improper heat treating. But to this day I have never ever witnessed a failure that involved a Real Springfiled Armory Trapdoor. Even the old 50-70 models are safe. The last batch of the model 1888 trapdoors were some of the finest rifles ever produced and of real nice fit and finish with all of the refinements that were ever incorperated into the Trapdoor rifle.
The first trapdoors that were the Allen conversions are not even close to the later quality that was achived. If you ever get a chance read just how the armory tested these things, things such as load a primed casing, dump in 300 grain of FFFG or more and load several slugs ontop of this mess and pull the trigger with a lanyard from a distance. In some trails for different designs they actual loaded them up to the point of failure if they could get them to fail. Several models refused to fail including the Peabody sidehammer- My favorite and the trapdoor Springtfield.  Sorry if I rattled on here a bit much
Mike

SSS,
John Baird's book on the Hawken Rifle has a detailed explanation. As Sam Hawken was retiring in the 1860's, after several hoops, Gemmer acquired the shop and rights to the Hawken name. Muzzle loaders were going out, Breech loaders coming in. Gemmer combined the Hawken name and style with the new breech loaders to stay in business. He was successful and an excellent gunsmith, stayed in business until about 1915. Dick probably has more information.
Chuck

Don't think I'll be worrying too much about the barrel flying out or the receiver cracking (hopefully). Will be building mine as a 38-56 and shooting 365gr or lighter bullets at ~1500fps.

OK guys. A lot of good and correct info here. You've been doing your homework. First comment.....Who in their right mind, or maybe not, suggested a load of 40grs of Unique behind a 500 grain bullet. That's not a load, thats a bomb. I have a Unique load I use for a 300gr bullet that is very accurate, and has a medium impact on your shoulder. 
13 GRAINS. More than that gets uncomfortable. For a 405, 12 gets the same results. Unique is WAY too fast burning to put behind a 500, in any thing. 

John Phillip Gemmer. Info on history shared here is basically correct . Gemmer made rifles on about any military arms he could get. Sharps, RB's Spencer's, TD,s Snyders and a version of lifting breech of his own design. All that I have seen use the barrels they came with ie: stock military or commercial. I'm sure he made some customs, but it was not practical to rebarrel every one. There are only two known TD's out there. One is in the Missouri Historical Society in St. Loius. The museum rifle, contrary to Mr. Bairds drawing and description in his second book, was built on an 1876 Cadet action. It has a conventional Hawken lock, vice Springfield, the stock barrel, vice octagon, furniture blue, not brown. I have examined and photographed this rifle. The museum curator says this is the only TD Gemmer they have ever had. After building a couple basrd on Mr. Bairds information, you can imagine what I felt when I first saw this rifle. I have been told that the one in private collection mimics this one, but I have not personally seen it to confirm. I'm running out of space for my ratchet jawing here, but a Gemmer is, as far as I'm concerned, for the sake of description is a "Gemmer/whatever action is used." The multiple barrel test description is accurate, I do have a copy of the original write-up, and the Shooting Times article too. Will share these later if you want.

Dick

rustyrelx - exactly what I'm thinking of building with a 30" barrel, Soule rear and Lyman front. Should be a fun project.

Next question is............... have been offered a complete 1884 TD action, including the 2-piece trigger guard in very good condition (no rust or pitting and strong stampings - no barrel, sights or wood) for $415. Is that a reasonable price for such an animal?