Old Rem No. 1 Rolling Block Gets New Colors

Old No7

New member
Since I will only load this one with Blackpowder -- it fits in this category...

I've been doing some work on an old Remington No. 1 Rolling Block that had been converted to a Schuetzen model -- with a heavy steel 2-pronged Swiss butt plate. With a 32" long .45-70 barrel installed, it weighs in at 12.4 pounds without the palm rest plate, rest hardware & wooden ball that I've since added.

The gun shot really well on my first attempts, and while the wood stocks were nicely figured and finished, and the barrel and action parts were professionally blackened (not blued), the action itself needed some work to make it look better.

This is what "The Beast", as I called it, looked like when I first acquired it:

Rem_RB_10_Small_.JPG


Here's what the action itself looked like "before" :

Rem_RB_04_Small_.JPG


You can see where the owner/gunsmith had bent the upper and lower straight tangs to form to the Schuetzen-style stock, and added a brass spacer under the main spring. And here's the beautifully figured buttstock:

Rem_RB_01_Small_.JPG


I polished all the parts that I wanted case-colored from the No. 1 rifle, as well as a smaller No. 4 boy's rifle rolling block (22) to 300 grit to prep them for the shop:

Rem_RB_C-Color_prep_Medium_.jpg


And finally -- here's a close-up of how the action came out!

Rem_RB_15_Small_.jpg


And here's the case-color on the Swiss butt:

Rem_RB_14_Small_.jpg


Lee Shaver Gunsmithing of Lamar MO (publisher of "The Single Shot Exchange") did the case-color job, as well as I had him add one of his economy Soule Sights with a Hadley Eye Cup (an option I prefer) and he made it fit the tang perfectly.

I do need to replace the fugly (as in effin ugly!) hex head screws on the action and the Philips head screws on the Swiss Butt -- but overall...

Lee helped me convert this "Beast" into a "Beauty"!!!

Tight groups.

Old No7
 
Drop dead gorgeous; but dump the Philips head screw. Get a regular screw and nitre blue it. The contrast against the color case hardened receiver will be aesthetically appealing.
 

AKexpat

New member
OMG that is such beautiful wood! 20 years ago I converted a #5 RB from 7mm Mauser to .45-100 and it took a great deal of time and money. It shot very well

Thanks for the pics!, but it was never worth the amount of money that I sunk into it. Great learning experience and sold it long ago. Sorry, no pics.

Your rifle is a gem, hands down!
 

Oliver Sudden

New member
That's a dandy shooting iron! The a Rolling block should always have color case and that's a fine job they did. Part of my hobby gunsmithing is color case hardening. This is one I did.
 
What type of bone?
What type of wood charcoal?
What type of of leather scraps?

I've seen it done once at the Oregon Gun Makers' Fair and we had to do it ourselves in Benchmetal at Trinidad State.
 

Oliver Sudden

New member
Brownell's wood and bone with nothing else. Clean tap water in the quench barrel. Varying the charcoal mix and temperature of the heat gives different colors. Another one.
 
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