: Trying to make a gun making scene realistic So here is the situation. I got a character who is a trained modern gunsmith and he finds himself thrown into a setting where the most advance

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The biggest problem that I can see is making the bullets. These have to be very precisely made for them to work effectively. Also, I would imagine that making the primer would not be a trivial task.

If you have every tried reloading bullets, you would know that you have to be very precise and use accurate instruments, and that is when you are using already manufactured casings, projectiles, etc.

If I was in your gunsmith's position, I would first look at ways of speeding up loading by doing what was actually done -- pre-packaging the gunpowder so it could be loaded more quickly and accurately.

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Let's ignore the details and and focus on the methods of research and proofreading. You need three gun nuts, and two of them should be antique gun nuts. In the general case you need experts, and you need at least two or better three or four, specifically during the research phase you need someone who knows the subject well enough to answer all your questions, and even better if you have two experts with different backgrounds so you can get multiple views. you may find such folk at worldbuilding.se, the 1632 forum at baen's bar (or reading the grantville gazette), or the local shooting ranges and gun shops (maybe a texas antique store). Then for the second group you need some early readers (before you show it to your editor) who are knowledgeable enough in the field to be able to tell you when you put your foot in it.

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I would use the natural evolution of the firearm as the starting point. As a gunsmith he might be tempted to try to engineer a modern rifle. But in an army of flintlocks a springfield rifle would be devastating.

So his first area might be to find some brass type material, that could be used to construct a percussion cap. So that a modern esque breech loading system could be developed. Each of the steps in developing that could be a part of the story

The best way for the steps to ring true, is to use the steps that actually took place in bringing gun technology to where it is now.

Although it could be interesting to follow the path of him discovering that, so maybe initially he does attempt to construct something modern, but realises it is just impossible (after a few abortive attempts - that could result in a few dangerous explosions)

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