How difficult is it to fit a new barrel to a sxs shotgun?
I have a sxs that had a damaged barrel. I was lucky to find a replacement barrel for it. I haven't got the barrel yet but I was wondering how difficult it would be to fit it.
How would you go about it?
Thanks for any help Pete

I would imagine allot would depend on the design of the shotgun.

I have fitted extra or replacement barrel to a few LC Smith doubles, and on them the job ranges from no problem at all to a lot of work. I bought a set of barrels off an auction site for a FW 12 ga that were not close to fitting any gun I had, but they snapped right on a gun I had bought for a friend. I fitted an extra set to a 16 ga FW that only took a few minutes with an India stone to fit to the frame, but took a lot of time to get the fore end to fit properly. On an older gun, I would say it is a matter of luck, but would expect that on a newer gun that is machined more closely to eliminate hand fitting in production interchangeability would be better.

Depending on the value of the gun I would say this is a job for a good smith.

Pete, sometimes finding a barrel within a few years of the gun you have should/might be easier than a later one.

As Tom Martiln has stated with L.C. Smiths, sometilmes you get lucky.
I was looking for an extra set for a hammer gun I bought that the barrels were cut from 30" to 25 3/16". They were now bore/bore. It shoots skeet very nice, but wanted longer barrels. I found a set of Grade 1 L. C. Smith barrels, 30" that had choke but not as described by seller. The hammer gun I had was a 1908, and these Grade 1 Damascus barrels were from 1899 and fit on gun with no work at all. I also had a pair of 26" barrels (verified by our records keeper to be just that)circa 1900 that also fit with no work, and fit another 1899 hammer gun. However, like Tom also stated, it took me hours to fit the for-end on the Grade 1.

I fit another set of barrels on a Zabala (American Arms-Derby) side lock 12 ga. double that had 26" barrels .004 and .012 choke with .718 and .722 bores. I bought an extra set from Numrich, and these barrels were not close to fitting. I spent many hours slowly filing, lamping, filing, taking measurements, etc. I got it very close but had to have the rim deepened. Had a local gunsmith do it for $25.00. I asked him what he would have done, he said either what I did or work on the hinge pin area of the barrel and the breech. I did do some on the barrel hinge pin, and the measurement came to the same as the fnished barrel, so I worked on the breech doing lamp black.
The gun closes up tight and the lever is more to the right. The barrels fit higher on the fences than the other by maybe a 1/64". These barrels are 27 1/2" and have mod/full choke. No proof marks.

Thanks for the responses, The barrels are for a .410 Iver Johnson Skeeter. The seller describes them as Hercules barrels but I think they'll fit the Skeeter. The barrels are ejector barrels and My Skeeter is extractor but I think they'll exchange OK.
Pete