One of my friends on this board asked me what I was up tosaid he hadnt seen too much of my work lately, so heres an interesting project Ive been working on for a while
Harkom made some beautiful guns, and this one was no exception, definitely had the right provenance, but it sure had seen better days.
Since Im a sucker for this sort of thing, in no time I managed to see through all its warts and all the wear and tear. There was something about it , so getting involved seemed the right thing to do.. at least thats what I thought until the work began.
It had two things wrong with it, well three really. 1st , it had a mutilated left hammer due to an ugly repair, someone tried brazing the broken spur back on. 2nd, someone not too bright. probably the same guy, stamped his name (with a metal punch!!) across the address on the top rib. And 3rd , the gun did not belong to me, that last part didnt bother me much in the beginning but now that my end of the work is done I truly wish I owned it.
The picture below is the smoke print taken off the rib inscriptionnow tell me who in his right mind would do a thing like that? I guess Mr. Ferris was afraid someone would steal his gun
You can clearly see the name stamped over Edinburgh, almost sacrilegious....especially with the original lettering being so beautifully done
Engraving was completely struck off, new layout made from the smoke print
Took me a while to set up and execute that jobmatching graver cut was crucial for reproducing the lettering
I was quite happy with the way it turned out..once re-browned it looked original
I will usually finish Damascus in Black and white or dark brown, but I was asked to do these with a reddish brown tone.
This is an indoor shot, under artificial light
This one was taken outdoors
The Hammer spur was brazed on and the hammer burned and corroded.most of the engraving was gone
Needed extensive surgery to bring this guy back to life
