Show us your ball butt.... pistol

[qusko]

Originally Posted by Kubur

Very good catch congratulations!
Please do not use a bad Moroccan band!
Just a simple metal wire, iron, lead or copper will do the job
Look at the photo above and let us see the result

Thanks Kubur ! Apart of barrel, there are some mother of pearl inlays I need to focus on (someone has tried to fix it but without required precision : ) )

Of course Moroccan band does not fit and the wire is a way to go. Just wondered how other barrels without a wire are attached to the stock ...

Originally Posted by Kubur

And here my ball butt, I let the pistol as it is.

Very nice example. I saw him in your other post:
http://www.vikingsword.com/vb/showth...ht=ball+pistol

Can you share what have you used as a red cover of some inlays you have there (it was not a coral per what I see)? I am quite interested as I see that red decorations in ottoman pistols/muskets from Africa, Balkans, ..

Do you have a barrel fixed with a pin?

[rickystl]

Merry Christmas to ALL that celebrate the Holiday.

Hi Kubur. Hope all has been well for you.

I've never been able to locate one of these interesting ball-butt Balkan pistols for my collection. At least not at a reasonable price.
I think the ball-butt is somewhat a carry over feature from the wheellock era.
It would facilitate the hand grip draw from the holster on the horse saddle, and double as a club. And they all seemed built with no trigger guard.

Very seldom have I seen any Balkan style pistol that did not include a barrel band(s). The ones that were pin fastened also appeared to European made pistols for export to the Eastern markets.

Many of these pistols show up with barrel bands from different areas of the region. And many of the bands are later, period replacements - or just newer made 20th Century replacements. Although I have seen them done with very thin wire, usually brass or silver.
It's not too difficult to make a plain barrel band from a sheet of steel, brass, or silver. But most "sheet" material is too thick and difficult to bend and work with. Search for "shim" material. About 0.2032mm is good.

Material for missing inlays: Pearl is easiest to obtain. Supply house for musical instruments (guitars) have many shapes and sizes that can be files to fit. Or just blank sheets.
Bone, even genuine camel bone can be had from suppliers for custom knife making. The bone can be cut to shape and submerged in tea where it will begin to take an aged appearance.
Colored stone type inlays would be more difficult to locate material. While colored glass or even solid colored plastic is available, neither would look right. Of course, genuine semi-precious stones shaped and polished would work, the cost would be too great. I would be looking to find the approximate size red colored beads (not see-through glass) and cut/shape to size.

Net looking pistols !!

Rick

[Kubur]

Originally Posted by rickystl

Merry Christmas to ALL that celebrate the Holiday.

Hi Kubur. Hope all has been well for you.

I think the ball-butt is somewhat a carry over feature from the wheellock era.

Rick

Hi Rick,
Still alive. I hope that you are fine too and happy new year!

Yes you are right these pistols are from the wheellock era, like the Caucasians ones.

Originally Posted by rickystl

Very seldom have I seen any Balkan style pistol that did not include a barrel band(s). The ones that were pin fastened also appeared to European made pistols for export to the Eastern markets.

Rick

well for the ball butts it's normal as they are Turkish and not from the Balkans...

[corrado26]

....and here I add some fotos of another one with ballbutt and a fantasy gunmaker's signature on the lockplate

[Kubur]

Originally Posted by corrado26

....and here I add some fotos of another one with ballbutt and a fantasy gunmaker's signature on the lockplate

It's the first time that I see a ballbutt with a trigger guard...

I have another ballbutt with glass inlays and barrel band...

[qusko]

Rick, Kubur,

Thanks for your replies! Adding for others some new pictures I've found.

[qusko]

Plus some more ..

[Jim McDougall]

These are amazing pistols, and I just wanted to add an example of mine which is of course Caucasian, but most probably a Liege product, mid 19th c.
Pretty simple.

[Kubur]

Originally Posted by qusko

Can you share what have you used as a red cover of some inlays you have there (it was not a coral per what I see)? I am quite interested as I see that red decorations in ottoman pistols/muskets from Africa, Balkans, ..

Do you have a barrel fixed with a pin?

Hi Kusko

Well I replaced some red by white bone.
Many red stones are not coral, in fact a lot of them are red glass.
Some red stones? have a hole, I think they were beads like in some jambiya.

What I did is very bad, Rick and others will curse me, I used glue.