New life for old guns

Hi Mike: Just wondered if you have any pictures or any info on how you made it. I read some on another web site where the guys were experimenting with single shot shotguns and various actions like the martini etc. but wondered how you did it. Chris S

Chris, 
I have seen the ads for a book about turning double shotguns into double rifles. It might work, but it would take more effort than the way I did my rolling block. I did it all before digital anything, so I don't have pictures or video. Here's the story:
I bought a 7mm Remington Rolling block at Bing and Bob's Sporting Goods in Havre, Montana probably in Fall 1969. I didn't shoot it, I just liked single shots. At the time, I was a regular competitor in muzzle loading shoots at Rogers Pass with the Bear Tooth Mountain Men. They had two-day weekend shoots every month in decent weather where we camped out and had a generally good time. There were a couple of matches for black powder cartridge rifles, but I didn't have one. 
Then, I saw in a magazine that Numrich Arms sold a kit to turn a #1 Rolling Block into a 444 Marlin. I thought that would do the trick. I got the kit, which consisted of a new stock with crescent buttplate, a heavy octagon barrel in 444Marlin, and an extractor for rimmed cartridges. I squoze it all together, got some shells, and tried it out. Bad Medicine on rockchucks in the Bear Paw mountains, but the top bullet weight that would stabilize was about 370 grains. I swaged half-jacket slugs with a Herter die.
One time, at a regular Bear Tooth shoot, I was showing it off and saying I wish it had a faster twist so it would stabilize 400-500 grain slugs, a friend, Danny Neal, a Burlington Northern Railroad machinist, spoke up and said he had made himself a rifling machine to make his own barrels. My ears pricked up, and we discussed possibilities. Of course, the barrel would need to be bored to a lager caliber to change the rifling. I toyed with Sharps 50-120 and other things, but another friend, a stockmaker, said he had read that George Grinnell, who had explored Glacier Park when it was formed, had made a 577 Nitro Express on a Rolling Block action because he found that the 50 Sharps did not kill them fast enough for his liking. John Buhmiller had already demonstrated a 600 Nitro that he had made. I still remember him shooting a huge pine stump, about 500 pounds worth, and making it roll about 20 yards.
So, I unscrewed the barrel and gave it and the action to Danny. He was done very quickly, and everything fit up tight. In the meantime, I had bought supplies: 20 brass from Bell, a 750 grain bullet mold from NEI, and two kegs of SR4759 from Great Falls Sports (I lived there by now). But I needed dies. In the time, there were no dies for such as that, so I made my own. I was a user of Lee Loaders, and figured that was the way to go. I had a bonanza Co-ax press by then, but it wasn't big enough for regular 7/8" dies that long. 
So, I went to Grizzly Gun Works, run by a gut we called Jungle Jim, and asked to use his lathe for the project. He agreed because he though it would be interesting, AND he was a fan of large calibers. First, I turned the octagon barrel into a half octagon to save a bunch of weight and give it some style. Then, I recut the front sight dovetail and fitted a nice big ivory bead. For a rear sight, I got a three leaf express sight from Brownells. The chamber was no problem because I was too green to think it would be hard. Since the 577 is a 'straight case', I just looked up the base and neck diameters in Cartridges of the World. I calculated the angle, set it on the lathe, set up a boring bar and went to work. Then I cut the inlet for the rim and adjusted the extractor. To polish the chamber, I used a brake cylinder hone. I figured that would also give me the leade. After that, I grabbed a foot long piece  of barrel blank in 1 and a quarter diameter, cut it in half and proceeded to make the dies. I cut a slightly tighter chamber in the sizer and a rebate for the rim. For the seater, I cut a slightly looser chamber and made a seater bar that would drive the bullet in to the right depth for the crimp groove. On the back of the seater, I cut a truncated cone to bell the case mouth.
Sizing the brass was a chore, so I went out to Swain's Spring Service at the edge of town and used their hydraulic press to apply the necessary pressure. Worked great after I made a half inch tool steel rod to push out the case. I highly recommend Imperial Sizing Die Wax for this operation. Then the powder. I made a wag of 85 grains of SR4759 as a proof load. Loaded a few up and went to the range. I tied the rifle to a large tractor tire at the bottom of the hill, hooked a 50 foot wire to the trigger, got behind the old Wagoneer, and let fly. Sure did make the tire jump, and threw a lot of dirt on the hillside. I did that three times and figured it was safe for regular loads. I drove up to the shooting bench area, and my friend, Tom Stevens, the stockmaker was trying out a rifle. He saw the rolling block and asked how it was coming. I showed him the remaining proof load and the rifle. "Have you shot it?" "Sure, I just did." "Well, can I try it, then?" How could I refuse? He stood up, loaded the round, Drew down on a large gong at 100 yards, and let fly. He didn't ask if it was a proof load, but he was used to hard kickers. I knew it was an impressive gun when a woman four benches down wearing ear muffs, jumped up, threw the earmuffs off, and yelled, "What, in the Hell was that?"
And it stayed that way for over twenty years. In the meantime, I had a machine shop thread the seater to 7/8" for a Rockchucker I picked up. It still took way too much wrangling to size brass, so it went on the way back burner. Then, a guy named Jack Reynolds called me from Michigan one day to say he had read about me making the rifle and had questions about my technique. We got to talking and he said some hard chrome plating inside the seater might help a lot. Also, he said Midway USA had a shellholder for that cartridge at a good price. I jumped on the shellholder, sent him the sizer and waited. The die came back, so I cast 20 rounds of bullets for it and loaded a half dozen with 61 grains of 4759 covered with a wad of polyester fiber. Sizing was really smooth with the bore of the die coated.

More tomorrow, and I'll post pictures.

Mike

You did quite a good job since it shoots so well. In my younger days I too was a machinist/ gunsmith and decided to make my own single shot 45-70. I started with a modified Sharps-Borchardt that I designed myself with a roller bearing as the cocking mechanism instead of the original version. I fiddled around and eventually machined the action out of a block of solid steel on my mill and then made all the guts by hand or with my lathe and mill as needed. eventually I sent it off to be heat treated since I had no furnace and then bought a barrel from Douglas. The stock I carved out of some fine California Claro and fitted it with a skeleton butt plate and grip cap. It took quite a while but I finally finished it and proofed it just like you did yours, on a big old truck tire and some double loaded shells. It all held together and it seems to be quite accurate to boot. Chris S
you can see pics of it at the link below.
http://sixgun-forums.com/ElmerKeith/node/62

Chris;

That is one fabulous gun. All the classic stuff, and the finish is absolutely top notch. I like the Sharps-Borchardt action. I found an original in Helena one time at a hardware store. Must have had a lot of custom work. The stock is Turkish walnut, and the forearm tip is buffalo horn. It's a 45-70. The action us so tough and the lock time is so fast on those things that I don't think we have surpassed it yet 150 years later. I will put a photo of it in with the elephant rifle dies and cartridges.
I think the old ones are usually more interesting than new ones. 
Mike