Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 92.djvu/50

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��Popular Science Monthly

���Attaching and detaching the adjustable gun-locks

��You Can Be Your Own Gunsmith

JUST about the time the merry gunner is afar from gunsmith and fac- tory, and the ducks are coming in, his old fowling piece decides to take a vacation, and a lock quits. Maybe it is rusty through long neglect, maybe a firing pin has become gummed up, maybe a mainspring breaks. A seance by marsh, particularly salty marsh, or seashore, is likely to start a coat of rust on the damaskeened surface of the locks of a fine gun; or a primer may leak and let in gas, which starts rust also.

A British maker has evolved easily-

��detachable locks for the hammerless gun. Take off the fore-end, press back a catch, •and the bottom plate in the frame of the gun drops down on a hinge, exposing the two fine locks of the hammerless gun, the main and sear springs, the sear, and the striker and tumbler of each lock. Only a moment is re- quired to wipe them off, oil them and slip them back into the gun. Or if new parts are required, the maker furnishes them in a neat leather case. If anything should break, merely take out the old part and slip in the new.

��Using Snow for Cement and Ice for Windows

��F

��IFTY degrees below zero is the average temper- ature in the south of Siberia during the winter months. In the section of the country where the house shown in the photograph was located, the weather is comparatively mild. In fact, although the logs of the house were cemented together with snow, there were times when repairs were neces- sary on account of the snow melting from the heat of the interior. The windows, too, which were of sheets of ice, had to be renewed at least once in every four months.

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��A fashionable residence in Siberia. The roof is of mud, the windows of ice, and the logs are cemented together with snow. If a sudden warm snap occurred the house would collapse

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