Not a lever gun guy....but I'm trying to figure this bad boy out....

Cannot find anything about it

thanks

Tagged for info.  I just went through my "History of Winchester Firearms 1866-1980" by Duncan Barnes and there's no mention of a 'Henry' style Winchester .22



Winchester did make a Henry rifle from 1860 to 1866 but the caliber of those were all 44 rimfire.

What is stamped on the tang besides just Winchester?  

Looks like a cool rifle.

It's an odd duck for sure....

marks on upper tang are shown in pic,   lower one has a serial #

All I can make out is Winchester.

Pictures don't load for me.  None of them.

Rob

hmm,  they're good for me.

tinypic hosted....

Interesting. I've never seen anything like it. It's an 1860 Henry in .22 rimfire basically.

Email these guys with those pictures and see if they can ID it. They're dealers, but legit and knowledgeable.

Joe Salter

Any chance it's a conversion? Someone got tired of trying to find the correct rimfire ammo, and had enough money to have a .22 front end built?

Whatever it is, it's a cool rifle.

Well....did WInchester make a .32 rimfire like this?

the receiver is pretty small...don't see it being  for anything bigger...but I'm no expert

The bolt isn't even remotely right for a Henry.  

To tell the truth, the bolt looks suspiciously like a Model 1890/1906/62's one.
For what it's worth, I remember seeing a thread on Rimfire Central a few months ago about Winchester having made a few toolroom samples of .22 leverguns using that arrangement and people putting a fair amount of effort into replicating them.  Rossi or Taurus did a short-lived lever action .22 that worked the same way (makes sense, considering the gazillions of Model 62 clones they've made over the years).

The goofy thing is that Winchester wouldn't have been making 'em to look like a Henry back when messing with that project.  It was back in the days when making a new product look like a goofy old gun would've been considered a negative, not a positive.  My money's on someone with machining skills and access to a good metal shop deciding to make something up from scratch and had it stamped or engraved with fake Winchester markings to mess with peoples' heads (and they succeeded!).

that would be an amazing hoax for sure

link to that thread please?

My search is not turning up anything I'm afraid,   thanks

Oh boy.  My Google Fu is seriously weak, but I'll give finding it back a try.

Well, I found the thread I was looking for.  Looks like I was mistaken in remembering that it was Winchester toolroom work; looks more like a project someone did and then sold blueprints of.  Eventually Taurus dabbled with making such a thing, but dropped it in short order for whatever reason.  Considering how long ago the thread was posted and that I didn't have a whole lot of interest, I'm still kind of surprised I remembered anything about it at all, mistakenly or not.  

However.  The final result as shown in that thread is clearly a Model 1890/1906/62 action converted from pump to lever and doesn't look much like a Henry.

Linky

I'm sticking with what I said regarding the bolt looking like it's from one of Winchester's hammer pump models, instead of a Henry's.  I've handled real Model 1860 Henry rifles and repros alike, as well as having owned one of the Uberti Model 1866 repros in .22 for awhile.  Those bolts look nothing at all like what's shown in the second picture of the set in the OP.  It DOES look like the view when I look down at the top of the action of the Model 1906 that lives in my safe.

Far as I'm concerned, the only question is whether that bolt design was copied and made from scratch, parts were used for that portion of a build or if it's still got part of the guts of a converted pump gun inside a chassis made to look like a Henry.

Edited to add: looked at the OP pictures yet again.  Scratch that chassis idea; not enough meat there for the receiver walls of a donor action to be inside of that.

thank you

Wow-that's a neat rifle.
As mentioned earlier, the bolt arrangement looks to be nearly identical to that found on 1890/1906/62s. (I have a 1906 myself, and that appears nearly identical).
I wonder if that's a prototype?

Try posting at leverguns.com  Quite a few folks there with some smarts.

Might be worth an email to Winchester to see if they have any record of anything similar tested and not produced. A friend's ex brother in law inherited what he said is a Marlin revolver(pre-1898IIRC) with a detachable stock and emailed the company. He said they gave him a bit of info on it, and offered him anything currently in their catalog as trade to get it back from him-it was a prototype that shouldn't have been released. No idea if "We'll give you whatever you want to get it back" is true or if he's blowing smoke but if any information can be found Winchester would be the place to start.

Another option would be asking someone at the Cody Firearms Museum. I'm not sure anyone at the current FN owned "Winchester" will know much about them.

Here's a shortcut that might work: at the bottom of the tang, there should be a serial number. Run it here: Winchester serial number lookup Use the Model 1890, 1906 and Model 62.
If it shows up there, that might serve as confirmation that it was shipped as a pump, and then reconfigured. If the serial number isn't in those ranges, or there is no serial number on the lower tang...it may be even more interesting.

I'm almost certain that this is a model 1906 or Mdl 62 tang assembly  (the rear of the action, including the hammer/trigger/rest of the action parts) married to a newly made front receiver and barrel/magazine assembly.
Winchester 1890 tangs showed the model number and included the old 19th century Winchester patent dates, IIRC. My Model 1906 shows the same Winchester trademark logo that your receiver shows.
Oddly though, the stock is configured more closely to an 1890 Winchester stock with crescent buttplate, to more closely resemble an original Henry.

That's neat but I agree that it looks like a one off made by someone using a Winchester bolt and maybe other parts. Regardless it's still neat. Is the receiver brass or just coated to look brass colored?

Its brass

Cody museum says the serial number is correct and 'exists'  they just don't know what for....

it's been on a rack in a warehouse full of guns for well over 20 years....I've waled past it w/o a 2nd glance for well over 15.  Just having fun trying to figure it out is all.

Man, this is like a safe thread, but real! Keep us posted, OP. That rifle is pretty damned cool and worth the trouble.

If it's a legit Winchester, it's gotta be a prototype. The first lever with the Winchester markings is the 1866 and the first lever .22's were 1873's. Both cool and bizarre!

Tagged for outcome!


That is a seriously cool little rifle!

Your best source for info is in the forum at Wnchester Collectors Association website. They have the CORRECT serial number tables there as well

http://winchestercollector.org/forum/