I bought a Traditions .50 caliber Kentucky Long Rifle kit from MidwayUSA and decided to document and report as I get after it and start building this smokepole. I got it on sale for like $298, shipped. What the heck; it was cheap enough, and I've been wanting to do one of these so here goes.
Unboxed it and checked to make sure I got all the parts. So far, all seems to be present and accounted for. Found a funny little leaf spring thingee that isn't on the parts list, in the center of the 1st pic, and figured out it's the ram rod retaining spring. Now to figure out how to put it in and exactly where, as it's also not shown on the schematic and the installation instructions only say to use the lock pin towards the muzzle end to hold it in place. Gotta be somewhere near the tail end of the ram rod so it can't be too hard to figure out.
The inletting in the wood is pretty good, but I can see there is some work to be done. Going to be some fitting needed using an exacto knife, maybe some small chisels, maybe a Dremel, and a lot of sandpaper. This thing isn't going to be a matter of just slapping parts in place.
The brass accoutrements are all pretty rough; going to be a lot of polishing to be done there. One "useful" thing I learned from my USMC days was how to polish brass though, so I'm not worried. I am determined to take my time and do it right. So here goes:
Unboxed it and checked to make sure I got all the parts. So far, all seems to be present and accounted for. Found a funny little leaf spring thingee that isn't on the parts list, in the center of the 1st pic, and figured out it's the ram rod retaining spring. Now to figure out how to put it in and exactly where, as it's also not shown on the schematic and the installation instructions only say to use the lock pin towards the muzzle end to hold it in place. Gotta be somewhere near the tail end of the ram rod so it can't be too hard to figure out.
The inletting in the wood is pretty good, but I can see there is some work to be done. Going to be some fitting needed using an exacto knife, maybe some small chisels, maybe a Dremel, and a lot of sandpaper. This thing isn't going to be a matter of just slapping parts in place.
The brass accoutrements are all pretty rough; going to be a lot of polishing to be done there. One "useful" thing I learned from my USMC days was how to polish brass though, so I'm not worried. I am determined to take my time and do it right. So here goes:
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