Incredibly Dangerous Bear Trap

I was checking out a you tube channel of a recent winner of the Alone show.
I came across a bear trap he showed while living with the Evanki.
I'm not advocating using anything like this but I find it interesting.

 

There is a much simpler set-up, for a set-gun.

Long long long ago I was working in an Alaska gun store, and a really old sourdough showed up just before we opened, he knocked politely at the door, we let him in the shop, we locked the door, he said he was leaving Alaska and had a few guns he wanted to sell or put on consignment. I had read stories back in the 50's and 60's about him, he built one of the early roadhouses long ago, he also guided and trapped.

Now remember he had a few guns to sell.......He was to old to be able to bring the guns in, so several of us young men went out to bring them in the shop, yep there were a few......I stopped counting at 120 and there were more. I kind'a recall someone said 135 or 136 total.

Well it was soon clear, "WE HAD A PROBLEM". We quickly locked the store doors, and put up a hand made sign, "Plumbing problem, closed till noon".

Sadly we did not photo the collection, which truly is very sad, for it was an unbelievable experience to view. We could not photo it as many many many were not legal, and sadly for history we destroyed many of them. But was an education for me about the very things we discuss about survival, and using what you have to survive. If you truly love classic firearms, can you imagine the experience of viewing classic original firearms that would bring $2,000.00 to $3,500.00 destroyed because they had been turned into Set-guns, for trapping back when trapping with set-gun was legal.

 

my granddad would rework set guns. He would make a new butt stock and sleeve the barrel to a rifle caliber then bush the firing pin. The old cut of barrel was used as a mono block.

I've often said that the cut off shotgun the rat river trapper had was really used as a set gun.