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Posted By: Bill Graham Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/29/19 02:32 PM
What other makers were known to use this style of side-plate boxlock action, other than Hellis?

Are they prone to any particular type of problem?

https://images.gunsinternational.com/lis...1F81C98A921.JPG
Posted By: pipeliner Re: Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/29/19 02:42 PM
Higham
Posted By: lagopus Re: Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/29/19 03:44 PM
Cogswell & Harrison made quite a number that way too. Lagopus…..
Posted By: eddiel4 Re: Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/29/19 03:50 PM
You don't mention if you're just after English makers however Francotte made many side-plated boxlock's and they had no issues that I ever heard of.
Originally Posted By: eddiel4
You don't mention if you're just after English makers

Just after English makers, and the Hellis style specifically.
Posted By: L. Brown Re: Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/30/19 11:02 AM
Originally Posted By: eddiel4
You don't mention if you're just after English makers however Francotte made many side-plated boxlock's and they had no issues that I ever heard of.


Except Francotte's were the more conventional one piece sideplates. C&H made a bunch of sideplated boxlocks. Oh, excuse me: Their term for those was "ornamental strengthening plates".
Boswell
Posted By: KDGJ Re: Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/30/19 11:55 PM
This is an interesting plate put on an H&H boxlock H&H . It even has drop points.

Ken
Posted By: Dan S. W. Re: Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/31/19 12:47 AM
Armstrong - don't know if they made it though:

https://www.guntrader.uk/guns/shotguns/a...170723152958001
Bentley & Playfair.

In Douglas Tate's book 'Birmingham Gunmakers' he states that Bentley & Playfair may have produced sideplated boxlocks for Charles Hellis. Pg. 28, "Bentley and Playfair soon opened a shop at 60 Queen Victoria Street, London, and advertised that it had outlets in Paris, Capetown, and Melbourne. Their stock in trade appears to have been good quality boxlocks, often with sideplates identical to those seen on Windsor grade Charles Hellis guns. That fact has led at least one enthusiast to conclude that the Hellis guns - or at least the ones made in this particular grade - were built by Bentley & Playfair."

However, it's possible that these side plated boxlocks were made by S. Wright & Sons Ltd., Birmingham. Samuel Wright had originally started out working for Bentley & Playfair before starting his own company immediately after WW I circa 1918.

In Don Masters' book 'The House of Churchill', he states on pg. 281 that, "Wright's [S. Wright & Sons Ltd.] also made guns for Charles Hellis & Sons Ltd. After Charles William Hellis broke away and bought Geo. Hinton & Sons Ltd. of Tauton at the end of 1946, Wright's continued to make guns for both the companies of Charles Hellis and Sons Ltd. and Geo. Hinton & Sons Ltd. There was correspondence between Charles W. Hellis and Howard Wright concerning minor differences to the guns in order to distinguish Hinton guns from Hellis guns, although before World War II, the firm of Geo. Hinton & Sons was already a customer of S. Wright & Sons."

S. Wright & Sons Ltd.
Posted By: cadet Re: Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/31/19 01:12 AM
Once saw an Atkin BLE not quite the same, but similar to, the Hellis in the OP.
Posted By: SKB Re: Hellis style Side-plate Boxlock action - 07/31/19 10:24 AM
I had a Bentley and playfair box lock with sideplates. It was a very nicely made gun.
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