I recently picked up this very scarce Model 1892 (4 Mosquetao) Brazilian Engineers & Artillery Comblain Carbine at auction. In fact at this point in time; it’s the lowest serial number of all the known remaining carbines. Unfortunately the auction company was less than forthcoming with their description of the rifle and on arrival, I could see some work would be needed to restore it back to working condition.
While I was able to identify that the stock’s brass escutcheon nut was missing before purchasing, unfortunately there were also a couple of other things that would need to be replaced.
Below shows what the other side of the stock looks like opposite the escutcheon nut head but most of all, it also shows a missing retention screw at right. While the gun can operate quite ok without it, there is nothing to stop the existing screw from working lose and falling out. Not an ideal scenario considering it’s a key screw for holding action pieces together. It’ll need to be replaced.
Right: the missing retention screw.
But unfortunately and worst of all is what you can’t see in a photo. The main spring is also missing! This is quite disastrous for a Comblain carbine as unlike almost every other gun, this one spring runs the entire thing. It acts as the trigger spring but also the main cocking spring too. Without this single spring, the gun is a paperweight.
I have some 1075 Carbon Spring Steel on the way. I’ve never made a flat spring before but willing to give it a go. I’ll document the process. Yesterday I also had some brass bar arrive to work on building the replacement stock retention nut. I’ll be posting how I do each of these through updates on this site. I don’t pretend to be an expert but if I don’t at least try; I won’t learn.
