My 3rd Model Winchester model 1873 was turned out of New Haven in 1882. It is not 1 of 1000, not 1 of 100. It is an old shooter, lots of dings and bumps and much of the rifling was rusted out. It will hit into a liberty silver dollar at 50 yds and around 4-5” at 100. I have put thousands of rounds down range through this piece, most for cowboy action shooting. I e broken 3 springs in doing so and bought replacements from some guy down in Texas who has them parted out. Though the main spring is now from a 92 (same mainspring). It shoots my own smokeless .44WCF loads which are very mild. I use .430” bullets as opposed to the stock .427” ones due to the worn out bore.
God I love shooting this thing. This 134 year old relic might have been held by Earp, Masterson....who knows? Probably though by some farmer up in NH where I picked it up.
I inherited an 1884 Springfield (Trapdoor) rifle that had been decommissioned by the factory by a gouge taken out in the chamber. The rifle was decommissioned due to a large bore defect, and although it’s in mint condition, didn’t sell online at $1200. It would make an expensive lamp, so, is it feasible to have a gunsmith convert the chamber to the much-milder .44WCF caliber?
I had two of the 1873s many years ago. One was a rifle in 38-40. Nice, but it blew the cartridge shoulder forward about 3/16 of an inch and split all the casings. That was in 1969 and you can imagine what those shells cost!
Then I read that the 38-40 was bored deep on purpose to split the case so you could not reload.
The second was a rusted 44-40 carbine found chinked inside the walls of an old log cabin being torn down. I always wondered why that gun was hidden in such a manner!
I wish I still had both of them as the 1873 is still the most snazzy rifle I have ever seen!
Why Winchester went from the steel curved buttplate to the ugly shotgun style in later 1894s is something I will never understand.