Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Savage Collectors OT, a different girl caught my eye

That's a great find.

Really looking forward to seeing this tomorrow Gary!

Gary, congratulations on finally finding a Pope barreled rifle, and in 32-40, which was said to be one of Harry Pope's favorite chamberings. I read that the old target men thought that the rifling could leave distortions on the rear of the bullet that reduced accuracy if loaded from the breech, with a false muzzle the rifling was put in gradually and left the rear of the bullet evenly formed. Pope's rifling also is supposed to be made so the amount of metal displaced by the lands is almost exactly what is need to fill the grooves to minimized distorting the bullets lengthwise.

Saw this on the single shot forum first, beautiful rifle. Definitely the gem in any collection. We need more pictures, well I do anyway.😁

Planning on a day trip to WV Tuesday. I heard the weather might go south on us though. I'm leaving my house about 730, getting my oil changed in Leesburg at 9, then heading up. Dump some stuff off, then heading back. Passenger seat has a butt warmer.

I already asked him that question, and he hasn't responded yet, hope it's just tears of joy?

Weather is showing sunshine in WV Tuesday.

Very cool, Gary! Enjoy it buddy. Hope you drag it along to The Rendezvous this year.

Gary, we both hit a home run yesterday.

Thanks, Gene. Avoidance of the tiny burrs pulled onto the base of the bullet by the lands was indeed one of the reasons for muzzle loading in this instance. One must strive for perfection on a bullet's base as it is the steering end of the bullet, but one can get overly anal about such things too.

Pope's theories were proven by and large by the extensive experimentation conducted by Dr. Franklin Mann which resulted in the 1909 publishing of "The Bullets Flight". How many times the wheel has been re-invented over the last 110 years by people who ignored that seminal work!

The other, and possibly more important, reason was to wipe the fouling from the previous shot from the bore by the act of pushing a tightly fitting bullet through from the muzzle. Remember black powder was the universal propellant back then, and accuracy suffered to one degree or another if said fouling wasn't kept clean from the bore, usually after each shot by the serious target men. Muzzle loading precluded having to do that.

Modern testing has long proved that with smokeless powder and good bullet lubes one may achieve nigh equal accuracy by breech seating instead of muzzle loading. Few contenders muzzle load these days, except for nostalgic reasons. But the edge still remains with the ML'ers - it's just not as pronounced as it was 120 years ago.

Pope offered a guarantee with his barrels: 3 1/2" for ten shots if using fixed ammunition, 3" if breech seating, and 2 1/2" if muzzle loading - at 200 yards. Mind you that was with soft plain base lead bullets and black powder. That guarantee was kind of scoffed at by owners of his barrels because waaaaay better accuracy than that was often achieved. While Pope was generally an egoist, he was smart enough to make guarantees that could easily be met.

Gary, I have something you really need if your going to muzzle load and use the same cartridge case over and over as they did !!!!!! Copy of a stevens-pope decapper,recapper for 32-40,38-55 !!!!!!!! One of my trinkets from the scrapyard a few weeks ago !!!!

Nice looking Gary, great rifle, they are tack drivers. The guy I bought my 99G 250 from was into rifles like yer new one. Hefted several of them and looked em over, nice shootin irons!!!

nice grab Gary

That is a sweet rifle, I'd like to shoot something like it sometime. Sounds like if I ever want to, I should hit the arm weights

Yep, I have that same tool. Works very slickly. Mine was made by the late Jerry Simmons. I could also use my 110 year old Frankford Arsenal tool for de-recapping in the process of creating gallery practice ammo by Army and National Guard troops.



Let me know if you stumble onto a bullet lube pump and a mechanical breech-seater! Last two tools I need to acquire, and would prefer to buy them than make them if I can help it.

Beautiful Rifle........Class pure class.......
Congratulations!

Away from the Fire for a few days and the best OT thread I've ever seen almost passed me by. Score of a life time. You must be pinching yourself hourly to make sure you're not dreaming. Can't wait for a range report on how she shoots. Congratulations my friend.

Brother Frank lives in Italy.

Piggy backing the OP, this rifle sold at auction over the weekend.
The maker's story is an interesting read. Different day and time...
John Meunier

Wow Gary, that's about the pinnacle of collecting isn't it? Congratulations. Be Well, RZ.