This is the story of the Winchester Rifle Model 1873, “The gun that won the West.” To cowman, outlaw, peace officer or soldier, the Winchester ’73 was a treasured possession. An Indian would sell his soul to own one…
Boy, oh boy, a Winchester ’73!
What I’d give to have that gun.
One of 1000? First one I ever seen.
But mister, that’s a real gun.
Heard it took over a year to make it.
It did indeed took me over a year. My story begins a long time ago when I came across a very old beaten up Winchester 1873 receiver and just could not resist the urge to buy it and restore it to its old glory. The receiver was pitted and rusty, I cleaned it up the best I could, then I started buying parts and tried to put that poor gun back together. Of course, things didn’t go well and I sort of abandoned the project. Until one day recently, while organizing my storage, I stumbled upon the parts box, and there it was, a pile of old and new Winchester 73 parts, begging me to do something about it.
I started by sanding and polishing wood and metal, first with files, then with various grits of emery paper.
Once everything was sanded, I finished the wood with tung oil.
I then sent the metal parts to the Wyoming Armory company in Cody, WY for color-case hardening. The barrel and the magazine tube were blued in hot salts.
I made a few custom screws for the rifle and fire blued them to a nice dark blue color.
Finally I put everything back together and checked the function with some 44 WCF snap caps. And here it is, my new 150-year old rifle!
