Picked up my C Sharps Arms 1874 today and must say I am very impressed. It is my first from them and the first Sharps with checkering I have owned. I wasn’t sure if I would like it but it does feel good in the hands and looks good too. Pretty light for a Sharps and should make an excellent hunting gun. Can’t wait til the weekend to see how she shoots!

Congratulations!

Details, man, details! Even better, pictures!

Those of us addicted to all things BPCR wanna know!

Model, caliber, barrel length, sights, stock shape, etc...

You going to shoot greasers or PP?

Ed

28 inch 1/2 round barrel in .45-70. I will try both PPB and greasers to see which performs the best for hunting. I prefer PPB but am not opposed to the good old Lyman Gov’t bullet greaser load. All with BP of course

Is that a saddle rifle? Looks a lot like the one I have. Mine has the Montana rear with a front sight that flips between two different beads. They are definite beauties. KIlled an Alaskan moose with mine. Know you will get years of enjoyment out of yours.

Thanks, that's a beauty!

I still haven't made the leap to PPB, yet. Still in love with the Parker Hale bullet and the good old 500gr Gov't. RN. Powered by holy black, of course.

Ed

It is a C Sharps Arms 1874 Bridgeport rifle with some options. I bought it from Bill Goodman and called CSA and asked about it. It was one of John Schoffstall‘s personal guns he has built. It has fancy wood, checkering, cheek piece with shadow line, silver nose cap, 28 inch half round barrel in .45-70, CSA midrange vernier sight and serial number 74-1500. I will take off the vernier sight off and use the barrel sight for hunting. It is almost too pretty to hunt with but I will do it anyway. The first scratch always hurts the worst

NICE, Congrats pacecars.

Nice plinker you gut there, enjoy!

Wouldn't be too quick to remove the vernier, they can be useful in the field, and you still have the option of using either sight.

You don't have to scratch it. Have several guns that have been used a LOT that have yet to suffer such indignity.

I blame Bill Bagwell for the barrel sight thing. I have not met him personally but have read his posts and he was kind enough to call me and gave me a lot of pointers on both the .45-110 and .45-70. He save me a lot of time and aggravation and put me in the right path. His tips for the barrel sights helped tremendously

A little bit of ammo to try and see how she shoots

Very nice. Congrats.

pacecars,
How is this one shooting for you.
If ever you decide to part with it, please let me know.

I actually sold it already. I am not sure what it was but it just did not “feel” right compared to my Shilohs. It was a beautiful gun and I can’t really put my finger on why but I just didn’t like it. I guess I am a die hard Shiloh Sharps man

I have a question for the experts here .
I bought my first 1874 Shilo Sharps saddle ring carbine last year and the tiny rear sight is so low the rifle hits 5 feet low at 100 yards. I know I could file the front blade down BUT - with the ladder sight extended it is dead on at 200 and 300 yard !

Besides the 100 yard target, What am I missing ?

Phil what load are you shooting? Need to know that first and how high is the top of the silver blade over the barrel flat? Or does that have a slotted square post that the blade is pinned into? MB

I am using 30 gr 5744 behind of 400 gr Kodiak bullets and the top of the front blade is .30" above the barrel and the blade and base appear to be one piece.

Would you have a problem with holding the blade above the notch in the rear sight? Or is your notch so small that would not work. ?+The gun sounds like the military carbine model with what they call the low notch short staff Lawrence military sight. Barrel is 22 or 24"? Have you tried flipping the staff up with the slider at its lowest position? My line of thought on the first question was to establish how high above the top of the rear to hit at 100 yds. When the rear sight is folded down measure from the the top of it to the barrel. Maybe just switching out the low notch Lawrence mil sight with a semi buckhorn would bring up your impact quite a bit. Shiloh owners have a saying when all else fails call Shiloh. So if you get online to the Shiloh website and click on the contact us and explain what is going on to kirk Bryan one of the owners he can probably fix you up. MB

The top of the rear sight is .265" above the barrel , which means the entire front post must be above it in order to even be close at 100 yards ! Yet the ladder sight is pretty close at 200 and 300 yards .

Yeah well it's obvious you need to raise the rear sight up on the lay down position without messing with your ability to retain the 200 and 300 yd settings when you stand the staff. At .265" it must be damn hard to pick up over the top of the receiver anyway. What I think I would do is simple, find a piece of wire about .1" to .125" in diameter cut it down to the width of your rear sight, rough it up a little on one side and epoxy it to the top of your rear sight. Try to keep the back side of the sight clear of anything to maintain the existing staff height when folded up. After its setup take a 3 corner needle file and notch it in the ctr just a tad, enough to see the top of the frt sight. Now to the range see where it is for elevation. It's glued so it's not as durable as solid metal, work the height down with a dremel or a file notching the top as you go. When you get down to the height you need to put your shots where you want them at 100 measure the height and write it down. Once you know this you could use it as is or simply atleast know how high it needs to be extended with a silver soldered or braised piece of metal that would be more durable. Usually Shiloh sights are pretty close but they are targeted to bp loads. At 65 my eyes don't make the best use of really fine black iron sights sometimes a little dab of chartreuse or hot pink finger nail polish works wonders on iron sight visibility . On my 45 -110 business rifle I replaced the German silver blade in the dovetail base with a pre 1982 penny, oh so much better low light visibility. Good luck MB

I built up the sight with Devcon liquid steel and filed in a nice wide notch, which worked great for a week until it broke off. The second one didn't last that long. I considered soldering on a face plate but as is, the face of the little sight rests tight against the barrel with the ladder flipped up.

Get in touch with Shiloh and order the full buckhorn rear sight. The rear notch will be too narrow, but you can open it up with a file. THIS will solve the problem. Do NOT get the semi buckhorn. On the semi buckhorn the 200 yard setting is screwed up, and you will have to file it to bring it in. BTDT and have the T shirt several times over.

Well I guess we were thinking the same idea.... got another idea neither of my Shiloh fullbuckhorn or semlbuckhorn has a rear sight notch in the bottom of the staff but on my original business rifle the low notch Lawrence military sight does. So what about filing a notch in the bottom of the staff window to use for 100 yard setting, just slide the slider up out of the way. If you would move the slider to the top and flip up the staff for the notch in the bottom of the window. Did you get a height on the first devcon extension? You could check the height of the staff window bottom to see if it's high enough first to do that and get what you need for a 100 yd setting. Failing that do you might measure the height of the slider at it's lowest point with it flipped up recheck the measured height of the devcon extension that worked subtract the devcon ext height from the height of the slider at it's lowest point, now remove the slider stop screw on top the staff and slide off the slider, grind or file off the bottom of the slider to get the height you need at it's lowest point with the staff flipped up. Bill (SHARPSGUY) probably has the best idea but I sure don't know how long it would take to get it to your place out in bush Alaska. MB

Don't file anything off the bottom of the slider. If you take anything off the bottom, it will make it thin enough that it will become all but invisible to your eye when you are developing a sight picture and render it useless. I have that T shirt, too.