ASSRA Forum - Ballard Pacific inlay

ASSRA Forum › General › Single Shot Rifles › Ballard Pacific inlay

(Moderator Group: Moderator)

‹ Previous Topic | Next Topic ›

Page Index Toggle

Pages: [1] 2

Hot Topic (More than 10 Replies)

Ballard Pacific inlay (Read 319 times)

westerner Frequent Elocutionist Offline deleted posts and threads record holder. Posts: 12007 Location: Why, out West of course Joined: May 29^th, 2006	Ballard Pacific inlay Nov 18^th, 2025 at 11:51pm	Print Post
	Is my Pacific the only one with an inlay in the forestock?

	A blind squirrel runs into a tree every once in a while.
	IP Logged

TomKlinger Full Member Offline Posts: 179 Location: Central Florida Joined: Feb 17^th, 2019	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #1 - yesterday at 7:16am	Print Post
	Westerner, Maybe someone damage the stock somehow at the ramrod hole and repaired it with an inlay. Tom Klinger


	IP Logged

marlinguy Frequent Elocutionist Offline Ballards may be weaker, but they sure are neater! Posts: 17335 Location: Oregon Joined: Feb 2^nd, 2009	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #2 - yesterday at 9:54am	Print Post
	Is it a JM Marlin marked Pacific, and a low serial number Joe?

	(You need to *Login* or *Register* to view media files and links)
	IP Logged

westerner Frequent Elocutionist Offline deleted posts and threads record holder. Posts: 12007 Location: Why, out West of course Joined: May 29^th, 2006	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #3 - yesterday at 10:34am	Print Post
	Yes, JM Marlin. 10 K serial number.

	A blind squirrel runs into a tree every once in a while.
	IP Logged

westerner Frequent Elocutionist Offline deleted posts and threads record holder. Posts: 12007 Location: Why, out West of course Joined: May 29^th, 2006	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #4 - yesterday at 10:38am	Print Post
	TomKlinger wrote yesterday at 7:16am: Westerner, Maybe someone damage the stock somehow at the ramrod hole and repaired it with an inlay. Tom Klinger Either that or Marlin used a hard piece of wood there to prevent damage. Hard to find pictures of that specific area on the internet.

	A blind squirrel runs into a tree every once in a while.
	IP Logged

marlinguy Frequent Elocutionist Offline Ballards may be weaker, but they sure are neater! Posts: 17335 Location: Oregon Joined: Feb 2^nd, 2009	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #5 - yesterday at 11:52am	Print Post
	It does look like wood in your picture, which I've never seen on a Marlin Ballard. But almost every early JM Marlin marked Ballard had ebony inserts in the forearms of the Sporting Rifle models. I wonder if your Pacific also had one and it fell out; then someone made a wood insert to fill the empty Vee?

	(You need to *Login* or *Register* to view media files and links)
	IP Logged

westerner Frequent Elocutionist Offline deleted posts and threads record holder. Posts: 12007 Location: Why, out West of course Joined: May 29^th, 2006	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #6 - yesterday at 12:53pm	Print Post
	I didn't know the Pacific model had any kind of inlay in the forestock. Who knows with old single shots. The inlay has been there a long time. And it is wood. Lighter in color than the rest of the stock. Lignum Vitae?

	A blind squirrel runs into a tree every once in a while.
	IP Logged

oneatatime Frequent Elocutionist Offline Posts: 4181 Location: Rocky Mountains Joined: Oct 30^th, 2011	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #7 - yesterday at 1:49pm	Print Post
	Somehow I don't think it would be Lignum Vitae. It is an extremely hard and dense (it won't float!) wood whose oily properties made it largely used for ships shaft bearings. For example, it was used in PT boats for that and you might imagine the beating those shafts took. There is a Lignumvitae Key (now a state park accessible only by boat) in the Florida keys which has stands of the trees. The first 2 experimental PT boats were build in a boatyard in Miami just before the war.


	IP Logged

westerner Frequent Elocutionist Offline deleted posts and threads record holder. Posts: 12007 Location: Why, out West of course Joined: May 29^th, 2006	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #8 - yesterday at 2:08pm	Print Post
	Lignum Vitae, old world hard facing. Lignum Vitae would be the perfect wood to protect a forestock from wiping rod entry hole damage. There are dams on the Columbia river that have rotors running in Lignum Vitae bearings. One dam was built in the 1930s and as of 2004 the bearings were still going strong. Out in the wood pile is a chunk of Lignum big enough to make at least a thousand inlays like the one in my Ballard. Unlikely? Imagine someone making a Ballard rifle with Bolivian Rosewood. There are some real kooks out there...

	A blind squirrel runs into a tree every once in a while.
	IP Logged

oneatatime Frequent Elocutionist Offline Posts: 4181 Location: Rocky Mountains Joined: Oct 30^th, 2011	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #9 - yesterday at 2:44pm	Print Post
	You've got a good point there, especially if it is turning at 1200 rpm as it goes in;-)
	« Last Edit: yesterday* at 3:14pm by oneatatime* »

	IP Logged

marlinguy Frequent Elocutionist Offline Ballards may be weaker, but they sure are neater! Posts: 17335 Location: Oregon Joined: Feb 2^nd, 2009	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #10 - yesterday at 3:34pm	Print Post
	westerner wrote yesterday at 2:08pm: Lignum Vitae, old world hard facing. Lignum Vitae would be the perfect wood to protect a forestock from wiping rod entry hole damage. There are dams on the Columbia river that have rotors running in Lignum Vitae bearings. One dam was built in the 1930s and as of 2004 the bearings were still going strong. Out in the wood pile is a chunk of Lignum big enough to make at least a thousand inlays like the one in my Ballard. Unlikely? Imagine someone making a Ballard rifle with Bolivian Rosewood. There are some real kooks out there... I've been told that rosewood was one option Marlin offered for their stocks, but not sure I've ever seen it? Not sure if the Pacifics made early on with JM Marlin had a ebony Vee insert or not, but other hunting models stamped JM Marlin did. All got dropped later after 1881, except for special orders.

	(You need to *Login* or *Register* to view media files and links)
	IP Logged

westerner Frequent Elocutionist Offline deleted posts and threads record holder. Posts: 12007 Location: Why, out West of course Joined: May 29^th, 2006	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #11 - yesterday at 3:52pm	Print Post
	Anyone that reads this thread and has a Pacific rifle, please look to see if it has an inlay, no matter the material. People who have nothing better to do want to know.

	A blind squirrel runs into a tree every once in a while.
	IP Logged

westerner Frequent Elocutionist Offline deleted posts and threads record holder. Posts: 12007 Location: Why, out West of course Joined: May 29^th, 2006	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #12 - yesterday at 3:57pm	Print Post
	I read somewhere that in a certain serial range, Ballard stocks resembled rosewood but are not rosewood. I have one, a special order #9 in the 16K range. The wood resembles rosewood. Back in them days if you had the money you could get anything.

	A blind squirrel runs into a tree every once in a while.
	IP Logged

oneatatime Frequent Elocutionist Offline Posts: 4181 Location: Rocky Mountains Joined: Oct 30^th, 2011	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #13 - yesterday at 4:01pm	Print Post
	Joe, if yours ever falls out you could replace it with a nice agate or even petrified wood.


	IP Logged

westerner Frequent Elocutionist Offline deleted posts and threads record holder. Posts: 12007 Location: Why, out West of course Joined: May 29^th, 2006	Re: Ballard Pacific inlay Reply #14 - yesterday at 4:12pm	Print Post
	It can't fall out because it encircles the wiping rod. Is about a half inch thick at the tip of the forestock. So if I never take the rod out.

	A blind squirrel runs into a tree every once in a while.
	IP Logged

Page Index Toggle

Pages: [1] 2

‹ Previous Topic | Next Topic ›

« Board Index ‹ Board Top

Top

ASSRA Forum » Powered by YaBB 2.6.12!
YaBB Forum Software © 2000-2025. All Rights Reserved.

Valid XHTML

Valid CSS

Powered by Perl

Source Forge

Page completed in 0.7426 seconds.