Look what I found!

[ptdunk]

I recently discovered something quite interesting whilst conducting a renovation to an extremely lightweight bellows gun (more on that later).

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The bellows was not holding air and was obviously leaking somewhere.
As it was made up of three different pieces of parchment I decided to take the plunge and try to replace them with a single piece of parchment which should reduce the chances of leaks in the future.

When I started to remove the parchment I noticed it had writing on the inside face, and seemed to be an old handwritten Parchment document.

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With some advice from John G about how to de glue it (water disolves old animal glue) I got the two pieces off and was very pleased to discover they were cut from the same document and they fitted together.

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Thanks to Jeorg, a fellow collector for translating what he could, he worked out the following bits of text:

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And he said:

'This is a Part of a certificate of employment written by Johann Kasbar In... for a Person that some time before had served in the Bataillon of the guard unter a commanding officer von Neitsschütz . There was a Rudolph von Neitschütz (* 1627; † 1703) who was a lieutenant-general of the Electorate of Saxony. He was head of the Life Guards on Foot and had been Lord of Gaussig since 1696. That is pure speculation but that would fit.'


I told him I'd been informed that the Bellows gun was probably made around 1780, he said:

'That may as well been made in 1740 but that is naturally more a feeling than evidence. The trigger guard is a bit too elaborate for 1780.
Saxony is possible.
The neighbourhood Thuringia with the towns Zella-Mehlis and Suhl is a good guess, too.
For a southern german provenience it is a bit too plain, I think.'

So an early example of recycling and a fascinating window into the world and a time that this airgun was built in.

I made a paper template, then a parchment one, then glued it on to the repaired woodwork and the animal glue has now cured and when I get a chance I'll be refitting it and testing.

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I thought that may be of interest, I'll report back in when it's tested. There will be a nice video in the future.

For anyone unfamiliar with bellows guns here’s another one I worked on:

https://youtu.be/hwZ_O8j62Vg

Cheers,
Matt

[Garvin]

Fascinating stuff Matt!

[micky2]

Very interesting stuff Matt, it just shows that gun makers used what ever things that they had at hand to keep the cost down.

[PaulK62]

Well, I guess I now need to tear into my vast collection of antique bellows rifles and pistols. (I wish.)

But seriously, what a mind-blowing discovery.

[45flint]

That is awesome

[Rair rifles]

Unbelievable i can't wait thank you

[rapidresponse1]

wow very nice

[ccdjg]

Absolutely fascinating Matt. It tells us something that we didn't know before - old airgun bellows parchment was the same material as document parchment, and not some special version of pig skin or goat skin as might have been the case.

It would be great to see a blow-by-blow account of how you restored your bellows, as I don't think this has been documented before. Can't wait for the video!

Cheers, John

[Powderfinger]

Fascinating piece of history and impressive restoration skills.

[ptdunk]

Very interesting stuff Matt, it just shows that gun makers used what ever things that they had at hand to keep the cost down.

Yes, this one is pretty plain and seems to have been made to a price so makes sense to recycle some parchment. I think it was made for a lady shooter as it seems to have been made to be as light as possible. Not to say all women need a lighter gun.
My missus has agreed to do a loading and shooting comparison with this one and the heavy Kuchenreuter and see if she finds this lighter one nicer to use. That’ll be a good ending for the eventual video.
We know women took part in after dinner competitions in Germany from the diary of Mozarts sister, who used to shoot with him regularly using a bellows gun:

https://forum.vintageairgunsgallery....the-airgunner/

Don’t see why they wouldn’t have had bellows guns made to order.

It would be great to see a blow-by-blow account of how you restored your bellows, as I don't think this has been documented before. Can't wait for the video!

Cheers, John

I filmed the process John, I’ll get some stills and post a pictorial account here when it’s done.
I worry that once imgur starts charging all my previous posts will be pictureless, heartfelt thanks to Danny for replicating topics of interest on the gallery.

Cheers,
Matt