Perhaps off-topic here somewhat, but so unique I thought you'd enjoy seeing it.

My collection of single shot rifles grows ... and what an amazing & unique rifle this is! This is an original breech-loading flintlock, by John Hall of Maine, of patent date 1811. 

Mr. Hall was a famed machinist and inventor and patented the micrometer that we use today with the 40 tip thread that give us the units to 0.001". He also developed the standardized threads sizes and forms we use today, so a screw from his 1811 model fits into an 1841 model and vice versa.

John Hall should actually should get the credit for achieving truly interchangeable parts - not Eli Whitney - as besides inventing the rifle, he invented or created the tooling to make it. Once the 1st 100 rifles came off the assembly line at Harper's Ferry, VA, and passed their acceptance tests, they were disassembled, scattered into parts piles and then all 100 were rebuilt using different parts. All 100 also passed the acceptance tests.

This fires a 52-caliber (0.525") roundball, over a 90 or 100-grain 1Fg service load, with sometimes a buck & ball loads. The many '1sts' of this arm are amazing - but I'll add that info later.

Look at the bore collage - looks NEW! Best pictures I could take using the schmart phone. It should be in a museum ... 'mine' that is - but I shoot the toys in my museum collection! 

This is the last arm in the evolution of the flintlock arm.

Lefty38-55,

This is the second or maybe third time this has happened on the forum. It's weird but last night I started re-reading my stack of old Rifle and Handloader magazines and in the issue #14, March and April of 1971 there is an article by Ken Waters titled "Mr. Hall of Harpers Ferry". If you are interested PM me and perhaps I can send you this highly valuable  magazine.

JS

Nice rifle, and thanks for the history lesson. Always enjoyable to hear more about the person.

I have a good friend who collects mostly military ML rifles, and owns a couple nice Hall rifles. I was intrigued when he showed them to me and showed me how they worked. Always thought that it was the missing link between ML and breech loading cartridge guns, and that rather than discontinue it, they should have just improved on it.

Lefty38-55 wrote on Sep 27^th, 2017 at 9:22am:


The problem that doomed Colt's revolving rifle.

A phenomenal read of John Hall as a machinist and inventor, IMHO it is 'must' reading for anyone mechanically inclined.

Part 1 = (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)

Part 2 = (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)

Part 3 = (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links)

Wrote one Dr. William Roberts: “Hall’s greatest achievement came when he machined parts to a tolerance of .001 inch, a feat never before accomplished. For this, he is widely credited for completing the foundation for the American Industrial Revolution.”

And a hearty, BIG thank you goes out to all you ASSRA members here that allow me to inform you with this info on an albeit 'early' black powdah single-shot rifle!

Thanks for those links. I thoroughly enjoyed reading them.

Metal to metal seals for  containing high pressure gases are difficult. 
Hall may have been the first but certainly not the last to try this. 
I spent some time trying to modify a Starr so it didn't leak so much. 
Modern 'O' rings helped but didn't cure the problems. Perfectly executed
metal to metal seals work for amazingly high pressures but it takes really
good machining and metallurgy to make it work.