How old is too old to fire?

[sally-bee]

With older rifles is there a more or less accepted average as to how old is too old to fire?

[Noisydad]

How looked after is it is probably a more appropriate question. In the Seymour Black Powder Club we have a club member using an Enfield Snider .577 rifle built in 1867 at our monthly comps and another using a 10 bore muzzle loading shotgun (in the clay target event) built in 1847. So the there are a couple of guns lasting two lifetimes! There wouldn't be to many tools that are 168 years old that can still be used for their original purpose!

[Jack V]

As long as the rifle action or lock is in good serviceable condition and fired with the appropriate type of loading or ammunition that stays within safe pressures then it should not matter . The basic Mauser 98 action on my long range gun is over 100 years old now and it's working fine with full power 243 and 30-06 loads.
I guess it comes down to how old is old and what condition is it in . To fire very old antique stuff you need to have a lot of knowledge about the subject first .
Trying to use modern ammunition pressures in old guns that were never designed to take such pressure is very unsafe .

[Korkt]

Depends entirely on the treatment and condition of the particular firearm.

Plenty of 100+ year old guns gettting fired every day. Others that have corroded away to little more than messy paper weights that you wouldn't fire with a 30m piece of string.

[Mich]

Trying to use modern ammunition pressures in old guns that were never designed to take such pressure is very unsafe .

I've seen one or two mistakes here when people have swapped black powder for modern smokeless not fully comprehending the difference.

These rifles are no more.

[sally-bee]

Hi guys,

I thought before asking this might be a 'how long is a piece of string' type question but wondered if there might be a point where the steel has just aged past where you'd be comfortable using it or something like that.

Makes sense though condition is everything.

Just curious for now anyway, no super old rifle I'm deciding about pulling the trigger on or anything

[Jack V]

I've seen one or two mistakes here when people have swapped black powder for modern smokeless not fully comprehending the difference.

These rifles are no more.

I could well imagine .

[Oldbloke]

Agree with all of above. If in doubt get it checked out.

[sally-bee]

I definitely would.

I shoot a new rifle which I trust to be working and safe.

I wouldn't know where to start with evaluating and antique if I ever got one. But that's getting ahead of things.

[Kipper]

I've seen a 200 year old flint lock fired

[lowb]

Not at expert on this in any way but they can do various tests like the hardness of metals with an indenter. I suppose this kind of things could be applied to parts of the action or action end of the barrel to get some idea of the condition over all.

I don't know if that equipment is in the shop of an average gun smith though.