Over the years I've often admired the various Trapdoor Springfields, and considered buying one, but they continued to go up in price for nice guns, so nothing purchased yet. Then this morning a friend brought in this 1873 Springfield project that was a MGM movie gun a local gunsmith was restoring prior to his retirement about a decade ago. He passed away this week, and my friend was selling some guns for the family, and I picked up this project rifle to finish up.
Being a movie gun the exterior was pretty well beat up, but internally the mechanicals were pristine, and the bore looks unfired! The exterior has all been polished out, and he color cased the breech block, and fitted new stock to it. But he never did the final stock sanding and finish, nor did he do the bluing.
This should be a much easier rebuild than most old single shots I've purchased to finish, so I'm actually looking forward to doing it! It came with a box of Trapdoor spare parts, including another receiver, breech block, and a lot of internal parts and pieces. So I'll see if any pieces might be better than what's on the gun now.

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That looks great, wonderful bones for a new project.

I’m not sure why, but I would love to convert a Trapdoor to .38-55, just because the few similar rifles I’ve read about seem very intriguing

Otony wrote on Feb 26^th, 2023 at 7:21pm:


I saw one done similar to an Officer's Model years ago, and chambered in .38-55. I also thought that was very nifty!

That will be fun to finish up and be even more fun playing with  out on the range.

Fantastic she is complete including sights.

I was same as you looking for a good one to refurbish but unfortunately I can no longer go out to the range.

I trust you will have a lot of fun seeing what she can do for you.

Dang, that's pretty!

That is a great looking trapdoor. Should make into a beautiful piece. I have a few of them. I do have one in 38-55 and another in 40-65 that I built/converted. They are fun to shoot.

Easiest project I've ever finished up! After getting about 5 coats of WOP on the wood, I decided to stop before it got shiny. It will come up slightly more after it cures for a week, and I wax and buff it. But I like the satin look for a Trapdoor.
Used Mark Lee Express rust bluing, and worked all day getting it blued. I fought the rear sight, and then remembered it's likely too hard, and wont take rust bluing. Came up a little darker, but not dark enough. It will need to be nitre blued, or hot blued, so I'll get that done later. Lock plate was a little better, but also not quite as dark. I can live with it as it is. I didn't blue the barrel bands, or sling swivels as they were pretty darn good as is.
 
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Well, that is a real beauty!