New Native Texas Member
Posted: Thu May 10, 2018 8:09 pm
Glad to find this community. I’ve already learned quite a bit from the site itself.
I am from south Texas but currently live in the north - Up in North Dallas.
I don’t get to work with my hands much at work, so my hobby is restoring old guns. Only been at it since the end of last year but love the labor.
So far I’ve refinished some and restored others. Just finished restoring a German Walther Gewehr 43 rifle from WWII and while it began rusted and then went under flood water last year for a week, I was able to turn it into a great looking rifle once again. I documented the restore on the k98kforum for others to learn from.
Now I am onto another family heirloom, my great grandfather’s old model 8. He was a blacksmith in south Texas and took two model 8s as payment for some work. One being a .30rem and the other a .35rem. Being in the 20s and the guns were new, he kept the .30rem and sold the .35rem. - I am assuming he could get more for the .35rem at that time.
He was an avid hunter and fisher - heck he took up blacksmithing so he could stop working anytime he wanted to go hunting. He ended up shooting one of the biggest white tails in the Texas game history with his model 8. Was real proud of that deer head.
He passed on the gun to my grandfather, who never shot it, and onto me when he passed. The deer head went to the other side of the family so we both got something to remember him by.
Here I am today with a earlier 20s model 8 in .30rem. Given that my grandfather and his own father never really did a deep cleaning on their guns, this one is in need of good cleaning/restoration.
I don’t think it will be a huge job but it will still be fun to do and document for others. As with my other rifles, I find the journey of doing a full dissembly and cleaning of each part quite enjoyable.
I am from south Texas but currently live in the north - Up in North Dallas.
I don’t get to work with my hands much at work, so my hobby is restoring old guns. Only been at it since the end of last year but love the labor.
So far I’ve refinished some and restored others. Just finished restoring a German Walther Gewehr 43 rifle from WWII and while it began rusted and then went under flood water last year for a week, I was able to turn it into a great looking rifle once again. I documented the restore on the k98kforum for others to learn from.
Now I am onto another family heirloom, my great grandfather’s old model 8. He was a blacksmith in south Texas and took two model 8s as payment for some work. One being a .30rem and the other a .35rem. Being in the 20s and the guns were new, he kept the .30rem and sold the .35rem. - I am assuming he could get more for the .35rem at that time.
He was an avid hunter and fisher - heck he took up blacksmithing so he could stop working anytime he wanted to go hunting. He ended up shooting one of the biggest white tails in the Texas game history with his model 8. Was real proud of that deer head.
He passed on the gun to my grandfather, who never shot it, and onto me when he passed. The deer head went to the other side of the family so we both got something to remember him by.
Here I am today with a earlier 20s model 8 in .30rem. Given that my grandfather and his own father never really did a deep cleaning on their guns, this one is in need of good cleaning/restoration.
I don’t think it will be a huge job but it will still be fun to do and document for others. As with my other rifles, I find the journey of doing a full dissembly and cleaning of each part quite enjoyable.