Creedmore Spoons

tabs · 06:45 AM

If you were going to the Creedmore 1000 yd Matches in 1877 you might be taking one of these Spoons with you. While the weight and trigger configuration of several of these spoons would have prohibited one from competing they are of the type used successfully in that era.

1. C Sharps model 1875 LR There wee only a few of these built as proto- types by the original Sharps Co in 1875-76.

2. Gibbs Style LR Percussion 451 Caliber, This was the type of spoon that the Irish, English, South African and Austalian teams used from the 1860's to the 1880's.

3. Shiloh Sharps LR Express, The Sharps model 1874 was used by the American team in 1876 to beat the spoon teams from the British empire. The 1874 Sharps is the rifle associated with the winning of the West

ODDJOB UNO · ODDJOB UNO's Garage

beautiful.

Talewinds · Talewinds's Garage

Incredible. Just perfect positioning of the wood grain, and the iridescence of the grain, man those are awesome.

John Rogers · 09-02-2010, 05:01 PM

I just bought a custom made 45-70 based on a Remington action and a 34 inch Badger barrel that was build by Doug Knoell of Santee CA who at one time held the world record for BPCR grouping at 200 yds. As soon as my right hand recovers from the surgery tomorrow for "trigger finger" and Dupuytrens disease on the thumb I plan to give it a good try. I made up some 350gr and 500gr lead cast boolits so they should work well.

Jeff Higgins · 07:26 PM

Tabby showed you guys the rifles, so I'll show you what we load them with.

Left to right we have the .45-2.1, or more commonly known as the .45-70, loaded with three different bullets. The first is the old Lyman 410 grain flat nose, a wonderful hunting bullet in these old guns. It's loaded over 53 grains of Goex FFg and 7.0 grains of Alliant Reloder 7 for a muzzle velocity of just over 1400 fps from my original Ballard Pacific, manufactured in about 1884. I've taken my biggest mulie to date with that rifle and load.

The next two are target loads, the first being the RCBS .45-500 BPS, a 500 grain spitzer, loaded over 65 grains of Swiss 1 1/2 Fg. I won the Oregon Territorial Long Range Championship some years ago shooting this load in my C. Sharps Arms '75 Sharps. The next is the same load, but substituting the 540 grain Jones Creedmoor Bullet. This load, in either my '75 Sharps or my old Ballard, has won countless mid range (out to 600 yard) matches for me. Both loads just break 1100 fps.

Next are two .45-2.6 loads, aka .45-100. This was the rarest of the original Sharps chamberings, only being chambered in match rifles (no hunting rifles) for a year or two before being superseded by the .45-2.4, or .45-90. The two bullets shown are the same Jones Creedmoor and a Hoch 550 grain bullet from a custom nose pour mold made by Dave Farmer. 95 grains of Swiss 1 1/2 Fg pushes either into the mid 1300 fps range. Both loads are proven match winners in my '74 Sharps (again from C. Sharps Arms), having garnered medals and trophies from 600 to a full 1,000 yards.

Jeff Higgins · 09-03-2010, 07:10 PM

Next are the bullets that make these old guns speak:

Left to right, we have the old Lyman 410 grain flat nose hunting bullet, a 480 grain Saeco short range match bullet, the RCBS .45-500 BPS 500 grain spitzer, the old Lyman 500 grain Government round nose (as originally loaded for the Trapdoor), the 535 grain NEI tapered bullet, the 540 grain Jones Creedmoor, and finally the 550 grain Hoch. All are cast 20:1 lead/tin, lubed with either SPG or my own homemade lube, and fired as cast (unsized). A loaded .45 ACP 230 grain round nose is shown for comparison.

Hugh R · 09-03-2010, 07:18 PM

Don't know anything about them, but stunning.

stogie25 · stogie25's Garage

Wow!!! The combination of art and functionality is amazing.

Joeaksa · 09-04-2010, 04:59 AM

Very nice!

Tobra · Tobra's Garage

too purty to shoot, almost

john70t · 09-05-2010, 03:46 PM

Those are some purty spoons. Thank you.

Jeff Higgins · 09-05-2010, 08:38 PM

I have a real love/hate relationship with Hugo's Sharps. Compare it to the '75 action in tabby's first post - the '75 is the one they should have built, but bringing Mr. Borchardt on board spelled its demise, in favor of his own iteration of it. As a result, the Borchardt spelled the demise of the Sharps rifle company.

The Borchardt was superior to the '75 in every way but one - the world was not ready for it. The lack of an external hammer, being replaced by an internal striker, caught everyone off guard. They didn't trust it. They were used to cocking hammers to make guns fire. Not being able to see a hammer, to feel a hammer, to control a hammer, just didn't sit well with riflemen of the day. The new fangled safety - the second trigger behind the one that makes it fire - did not provide the feeling of comfort and familiarity that cocking a hammer provided. So, in the end, the Borchardt spelled the demise of one of my favorite rifle companies.

I've owned a couple of Borchardts over the years. They are not legal for NRA competition, lacking the required external hammer, so I've never owned a match version of one. My last "sporter", marked "J.P. Lower" (the famous Denver distributor back in the day) was a sporterized military carbine in .45-70. It went to a famous (now infamous) Montana gunsmith about 15 years ago to replace some broken parts. He was actually advertising Borchardt replicas at the time, and his now equally infamous brother in Wyoming was advertising Ballard replicas. I never got the rifle back, and I never heard from him again.

tabs · 09-06-2010, 01:40 PM

JP Lower himself decried the 1878..saying it would never catch on because of the very thing you said, "No external hammer." However in the end Lower discovered their worth and competed with 3 or 4 of the infamous 78's in TGT Matchs.

he 78 was excellent where it counted and that is in accuracy....

Jeff Higgins · 09-06-2010, 05:05 PM

A friend of mine that runs a shooting supply company in Idaho has won the NRA long range championship with a Borchardt. So, let me clarify - it's legal for long range, just not silhouette.

Borchardts have weird triggers, a function of the early striker fired action. There is nothing you can do to remove all of the slop, creep, and over travel. It's worth getting used to that, though, as the other advantages outweigh that shortcoming. The lack of all that swinging hammer mass, and the offset blow when it lands, can be seen when dry firing one. A '74 really jumps around when the hammer falls, where a Borchardt doesn't even move.

BPCR · 06-28-2015, 07:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tabs

If you were going to the Creedmore 1000 yd Matches in 1877 you might be taking one of these Spoons with you. While the weight and trigger configuration of several of these spoons would have prohibited one from competing they are of the type used successfully in that era.

1. C Sharps model 1875 LR There wee only a few of these built as proto- types by the original Sharps Co in 1875-76.

2. Gibbs Style LR Percussion 451 Caliber, This was the type of spoon that the Irish, English, South African and Austalian teams used from the 1860's to the 1880's.

3. Shiloh Sharps LR Express, The Sharps model 1874 was used by the American team in 1876 to beat the spoon teams from the British empire. The 1874 Sharps is the rifle associated with the winning of the West

Old thread I know but I wanted to further discuss your #1. I think Sharps also rebuilt rifles updating them to be used as market guns. I have one such gun. It was an original Sharps 1859 that began life as a percussion carbine using paper cartridge bullets and pellets for ignition. At some point it was converted to centerfire. It was then again converted to .45-100 and a double set trigger added. I suspect that was accomplished between 1876 and 1878. I shot a few rounds keeping pressures around 18K cpu using 24 gr of H4918 behind a 545 gr round nosed bullet. It shot 3/4 MOA at 100 yds. I shot a few more rounds at 200 yds to see if it held a decent MOA. I also chrony'd it at 1129 fps avg. Slow, big, freight train. It shoots almost dead center on a 7 inch steel plate. Testing done I plan to now load it with BP to shoot Mid and Long Range. BTW, the bullet busted the welds on plate even though it was moving slow. I guess it's hard to stop a freight train once it gets moving.

Bob

Joeaksa · 07-02-2015, 02:18 PM

Bob,

Sure looks like a nice guy. Any chance for more photos?

Joe A

Jeff Higgins · 07-02-2015, 02:34 PM

Any pictures of the action, Bob? This should be a "slant breach" action if it started out shooting paper cartridges. Pretty darn cool.

Our ".45-100", originally referred to as the ".45-2.6" was one of the rarest of Sharps chamberings. They soon shortened the case to 2.4" (known today as the ".45-90"), while maintaining the same overall length. Both case lengths were loaded with 90 to 100 grains of powder.

When I was actively shooting long range matches, I settled on the .45-2.6 for use with grease groove bullets. The extra .2" of case would serve to cover all of the grease grooves when seating a 540-550 grain bullet over 90 grains of powder. The .45-2.4 would leave at least the forward, if not two of the grease grooves exposed. Some folks are comfortable with that, but I never did like it.

The shorter case is better with paper patched bullets. More bullet is exposed and, since they were patched to bore diameter, supported by and centered in the bore itself. Almost no one shoots paper patch these days, though. It's a real PIA...

BPCR · 07-02-2015, 02:56 PM

Hi Jeff! It's not a slant breech. I think it was the first of the straight falling blocks. I think it has 5 patent marks on it.

BPCR · 07-02-2015, 02:59 PM

Here's a few more, folks. Hope you enjoy looking at them. Bob

Jeff, thanks for your help. I'll be emailing you back tonight. Bob

BPCR · 07-02-2015, 03:17 PM

Jeff, I almost forgot. My bullet sticks out almost 2 grease groves to touch the lands. I'm not sure just how much BP I'm going to end up with if I go with a jump. I suspect the long leade is due to it being an old rifle? In the lands using the 24 gr of h4198 it shot 3/4 inch at 100 yds.

One a side note I got my Dave Crossno .22lr barrel yesterday. I pushed it into my 1885 Browning High Wall went to the range and shot 60 rounds to see how it would shoot.
The first five through the barrel was spent adjusting the scope at 100 yds. The next 10 shot inside 1 inch in a stiff wind. The winds were alternating from my left rear quarter all the way around to my my right front at 10-15 mph. I was shooting SK plus and some 10X as Dave told me his barrels seem to like subsonic bullets. Since I already shoot those bullets with my Anschutz I had some lying around to shoot. Another bud was at the range and he was shooting some RWS Match Target in his CZ and it was shooting a 7 inch group ar 50 yds. I asked him I could try a few rounds of that ammo and I tried them. That ammo shot around 3/4 inch at 100 yds.

I then dialed 7 MOA down to 45 yds and shoot some chickens. Dead center with everything I had. I redialed right back up to 100 yds and was dead on again. I'm really learning to love that Malcolm 6X Scope.

I did not shoot the Sharp today as I ordered a new Long Range Soule Sight from Lee Shaver and it hasn't arrived yet. If I shows tomorrow I'm going to go dial it in.

Bob