Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Single Shots Rebarreling an 1885 Highwall?

I have a very early (3 digit s/n) thinsided 1885 Highwall.
It was origianlly chambered for 32.02 but the barrel is shot and somewhere in it's past was removed with a pipe wrench.

It's a small shank and I'd like to have the receiver opened to accept a large shank so I can rebarrel for a larger cartridge.

Any recommendations?


Thanks, Rob

Recoil rob....highwall shanks came in two flavors....
.935x16v and.825x16v , let's assume that yours is the small one.What caliber are you considering? With that knowledge we can calc the wall thickness at chamber,for a modern rifle barrel steel. Boring your reciever ring ,re- tapping/thread milling is not a good plan,for a whole variety of good reasons

P.O. Ackley calced a .125" chamber wall adequate for most anything.I know of one Browning BPCR(Badger barrel,18twist) that was bored out in Bloehmfontaine SA to 460 Wby Mag.........a custom rimless extractor fitted.many tuskers later ,the owner is quite pleased.This is an an extreme example,not one that I'd recomend,but goes to show that with good barrel steels,chamber wall thickness can be marginal. Again,please advise what caliber is to be chosen.
Work safe GTC

I have the smaller shank, and I'd like to consider a .405 Win or 45-70, or one of the .50 cigar cartridges. Something that would be at least period to the gun

Here's what I don't understand. Winchester made one size receiver, they just made it to accept two sizes of barrel shanks.

So whether it was small or large shank, in the same caliber there was the same amount of steel surrounding the chamber.

Assuming todays barrel steel is light years ahead of the original stuff used back in 1886 so far as strength is concerned, I would think that removing the old steel from the receiver and replacing it with new steel in the form of a larger shank would only make the setup stronger. I see no reason not to go with as large a chambering as Winchester originally offered.

My pan was to go with a larger than the original barrel contour (2) at least a 3 or 4.

I fee I can go to a 38-55 with the small shank, but if I open up the receiver for the large shank I can go as large as I want.

What exactly are your reservations about opening up the receiver?

Rob

I would restrict a small shank action to cartridges based on the .30-30 case. If the vise marks on your barrel can be cleaned up, you could rebore the original barrel to .,38-55.

Forgot to say that I agree that rethreading the receiver for a large shank is probably not a good idea. Only gunsmith I have heard of who ever did this is Tom Burgess but as I recall he opened up a thickwall large shank coilspring action even more so that it would take a belted magnum. This is definitely postgraduate gunsmithery of the highest order.