I really like lightweight shotguns, my question is why has no one built a shotgun (either a sxs or o/u) with titanium barrels and/or frame. That way you could have a very lightweight gun without sacrificing things such as barrel length.
Steve

Tony Galazan has built titanium Model 21s. He showed them at the Las Vegas show. Just bring money!!

I just did a hasty look through the CSMC site and couldn't find the titanium Model 21s.

A & S will build you their Posiden or Aventis models with titanium frames. I have not ever heard of barrels in titanium. I am sure there is some stress or metalurgical reason why not. What is the reason for the longer barrels if it is not for the dynamics of the additional weight? I also think that a 12-ga. that is less than about 6.5# is has got to be a real ass kicker in the recoil department.

Bill G.

With modern steels and alloys, gun weight could easily be reduced without resorting to expensive materials like titanium. But most gun buyers prefer not to be hammered by guns too light for the loads they shoot.

I have a 5# 1 ounce 16 gauge sxs and it is a real ass kicker (I shot a few rounds of skeet with it this past weekend). Still it's a great game gun, I only wish it were a 5# 12 gauge because of amunition avaliability. As I've said in other posts, recoil isn't much of an issue with me, the only thing extra I do with my 16 gauge is to wear a cotton work glove with the thumb and forefinger cut off to protect my middle finger from trigger guard bruising.
I found the Model 21 Researcher wrote about, a 7# 1 ounce 12 gauge with a titanium frame and a (yick!) single trigger.
Steve

Here is the link to the titanium framed Model 21, but I seem to recall the ones at Las Vegas had titanium barrels as well.

http://www.csmcspecials.com/ProductDetails.asp?ProductCode=11007

Titanium alloyed with aluminum and vanadium in the form of 6Al4V, produces a heat treatable alloy that has strength properties similar to chromoly steels. There are some ductility limitations that are lower, but overall Ti could be a workable substitute for barrels.

Ti is not all that expensive for the raw metal in the scheme of custom gun costs, but the product cost could be affected by the additional machining costs. Ti is a bit tougher on tools and takes some additional time to machine. The problem with Ti is the expense in forging or any other "hot" processing since it will burn in an oxygen atmosphere at the extreme temps. So, billet made products are more economical with Ti if it is a low production product.

Aluminum is lighter than Ti and has been used successfully in a number of o/u guns (frames) including the K80, Citori, Caesar Guerini and probably others. But people seem to like expensive to produce material better. Myself included.

What materials were used in the ultra light Bretton O/U guns Roger Barlow used to write about? Probably mostly aluminum, given the time frame; I've never seen one, but recall they pushed the design envelope.

I talked to Ken Genneco about insert tubes for the infamous "Basket Case Optimus". I was considering Briley Ti, he showed me aluminum ones he makes that are similar to the Purbaughs from a few years ago. Seemed even lighter, but hard to tell when just tossing them in your hand. Genneco can make a single gauge reduction (12 to 16) while I believe the Briley require two reductions (12 to 20).

Super light barrels are tough to shoot, IMHO. Remember the fiberglas-barreled Winchesters of the 50's? Terrible dynamics.

We have steels and 'right now' technology to build ultra light shotgun barrels without the need for titanium.
As chuck notes, some of the processes we can work our steels aren't cross-functional to titanium alloys.

Replacing receiver material with aluminum or titanium never made so much sense to me -- in that especially with a double, the 'magic' in the handling comes from keeping the guns slender, slinky, and with the weight between the hands.
The receiver is metal between the hands.

I think the reason then to Steve's 'why...' is that we 'have it' already with high tech barrel steels, slender designs, and long boring bits to balance things from the stock end -- without the unnecessary cost of processing highly exotic materials.


--Tinker

Even Titanium handguns have steel barrel linners.Heat with pressure cause the problem.

I developed a liking for lightweight doubles hunting public lands in Iowa, beautiful country but alot of walking between shots. I didn't have a problem with my legs hunting from dawn to dusk but man, carrying my 7.5# Parker VH, would my shoulders and arms ache the next day. Then I found the 5# 16 gauge sxs Francobanger I use today, I can carry that gun all day and feel great the next, it's truly amazing the difference 2.5# can make. Based on the concept "If some is good, more is better" it got me thinking about a super lightweight gun, hence the questions about titanium.
Yes, my 16 gauge has all the magic wand atributes, thin wrist English stock, small frame, 27 inch barrels. It's also 90 years old with very basic French proofs, to keep it safe I only shoot 1 ounce loads through it (making ammo that much harder to find in the rural countryside). For me the ultimate game gun is 5# 12 gauge sxs (with double triggers) and 28" barrels that I can shoot any modern ammo through.
Steve

Steve,
I'm disappointed. I thought you were getting small? How about a Ti .410 at 4lbs or less? Recoil is not an issue with the .410 and it IS all about the hunt, right?

Chuck
When I was living in Illinois I did alot of preserve hunting, pen-raised poultry. Some of the venues were pretty good, for instance the state of Illinois ran a concession where they just released birds and they'd get fairly wild pretty quick, still it was easy hunting, sort of like opening day pheasant hunting (and it only cost about $10 a bird). To make it more interesting I began using .410s, in fact I still have my .410 hammer gun. When I was consistently making most of my shots with the .410 I bought a true 36 gauge ML sxs; consistently hitting birds with that gun was a challenge. I still have the 36 gauge, but now I'm living in Texas where preserve hunting is big business and pretty much out of my price range (as would be a titanium barreled 12 gauge sxs). Estheticlly speaking I still like the smaller gauges, but when you hunt wild birds and maybe get just a few shots all day (like I was used to in Iowa) you appreciated the utility of the larger gauges.
Steve
PS for all the "410's are crippler guns" comments I found that in their range (under 30 yards) 410's killed quite efficiently, for the birds that went down wounded, my dog rounded them up quite quickly, they didn't suffer for long.

I don't know what the rest of you think but that Winchester 21 posted above looks like it's sporting an unfinished receiver. I guess I'm too much of a traditionalist but space age material being used on a classic double doesn't do a thing for me.
Jim

I hear ya Steve. I pick up a 12g on occasion when the birds are big, wild, and scarce.

If all the "crippler" guys were really worried about it and were true to their tone, they'd never pick up a shotgun. 12g guns have and will continue to cripple more birds than any other gauges combined in the U.S. no matter the best intentions and skill of the operator. I saw an episode of a show on TV where it was clear than Tom Knapp wounded a bird with a 12g. They cut most of it out. How many of the "crippler" opponents to small gauges shoot as well as he?

I agree, it looks like it is in the white ready for the engraver!

T

Titanium is a finicky mistress. You can machine it fairly well, but touch it with a file, stone, or sandpaper and it laughs at you-quite loudly at that. For most folks’ production facilities, you better get the exact dimensions, profiles, and surface finish you want before you pull the part off of the machine. Forget about hand work.

Ti galls worse than stainless and is more sensitive to lube. Not good in an action that has lots of moving parts and breaks in half after every couple of shots.

Ti is a fragile mistress. If you doubt it, read the warnings that come with a Smith & Wesson Ti handgun. The Ti cylinder must be cleaned with care or you will damage the surface coating S&W puts on them. Do that, and you have big problems, namely a very expensive and very worn out cylinder.

Be able to use any commonly available 12 gauge shell out there? Have you actually touched off a 1 ¼ oz. load in a 5# gun!?! I have tied myself to bulls and would sooner do that again than shoot a gun that light with Wally World shells. And that is the lower end of the 12 ga. loads. I don’t even want to think about touching off a high velocity 1 1/2oz load commonly used by MN pheasant hunters.

I recall him writing about that gun & both the frame & bblas were made of what he referred to as Duraluminum. This is a "Trade Name" for some aluminum alloys but forgert exactly which ones. Chuck may know, I don't have any reference books on the alloys at home & no longer frequent the machine shop.
The reason the 12ga wounds the most is because it is "Shot AT" so many, many times more birds than other gauges. What would be interesting is to see some real figures, though would likely be difficult to obtain, as to percentage of wounds to kills of the different gauges, all used by shooters of similar abilities.

Ti is a fragile mistress

That's true. Never make airplanes and barrels from Ti.
TsKIB in Tula made nice barrel Ti inserts of diffrent gauges, but it was discontinued because of fragile problems.

Terry can i get some info on Ken Genneco? Are these insert tubes pernament or drop in? Can he do a 16ga. to 20ga.?

His tubes are drop in, like the old Purbaugh. Spelling below is correct.

K. Genecco Gun Works,
10512 Lower Sacramento Rd.,
Stockton, CA 95210

e-mail: double-special@comcast.net

Phone (209) 951-0706 He does not answer until after 12:30 (he is on his machines all morning)

I'm with Jim on the looks of the Model 21 titanium. I don't care for it that much, either. I am more of a blue type guy I guess.

Over 100 years ago the British gunmakers established (I don't know how ) that the ideal weight for a shotgun was 96 X the weight of the shotload it fired, e.g. a 12 bore firing a 1oz payload should weigh 96 ozs or 6lbs. This rule of thumb is still good today. Where would a shotgun with titanium barrels balance ??

So, the answer to the question is: Although Ti barrels can be made with the metal technology and manufacturing technology today, there doesn't seem to be an obvious business case for the rather expensive undertaking.

As Tinker and others have pointed out, there are challenges. Most of these challenges have been overcome but at additional cost as well. Putting a long smooth hole in a piece of Ti is no easy job and therefore no cheap job. I have a 5' long 3" dia piece of 6Al4V Ti with a gundrilled hole and honed to a 63 rms finish, .070 wall, that I found in a local scrap yard 20 yrs ago. This piece is from some aerospace project gone belly up. I'll bet it cost thousands to make that part. I had planned on making another extreme pressure/large water rocket with it, but lost enthusiasm after we successfully made a steel one. I may get back to it for the entertainment.

To your question, Mike, a gun could be balanced with Ti barrels in a number of ways. The most obvious application to me would be in the extremely long barrel o/u target gun market that seem bent on making the longest barrels. A set of barrels could be made to some very long lengths and still have dynamics of a shorter barreled gun. This could give the 'advantage' of a long sight radius with the quickness of a shorter barrel. We might see it yet on a PGUN 38" or 40" barrel set.

Chuck -

On long barrels and light materials.
I think you likely already have thought about this since you wrote the above post, but I'll make this note for all.

Quite a bit of the 'quickness' in the swing of a shotgun has to do with air resistance.
Might be possible to make longer barrels at the same weight, whilst using Ti as the building material, but what we'd have there is bigger sails, and that wouldn't do well for the 'quickness' factor.

Another issue with Ti as a barrel material for all to consider is dynamics. I think this has been touched on in this thread already, but as someone who has extensive experience in the development, fabrication, testing, and field use of titanium as a building material, I'll point out that it handles completely differently than steel. For instance, 'crisp' is not an adjective I'd associate with titanium tubing.
From my nearly 20 years of experience with Ti, I wouldn't bother with it as a shotgun barrel material, based solely on the way titanium tubing handles.


--Tinker

Jimmy-

If it were just to come down to surface finish and color, you could get a titanium gun frame, barrel, or any other part to 'appear' just as browned, blacked, or blued steel. You could even do 'fake damascus' pattern! Using the right electrochemical process, you can get almost any color on titanium you desire. It's pretty cool in that regard.
It's possible to get the same surface textures, including the engraving. It just takes process specific to the material.


--Tinker

The Bretton had French proofed, aluminum barrels. You didn't need screw in chokes, as the barrels were screw in.

Geno, both the MIG 29 and the SR-71 used titanium in construction. Can't speak for the MIG, but, the "Blackbird" was one of the safest airframe and flight programs ever put to use-none were lost operationally, although several countries tried.

The South China sea has a fair amount of titanium littering it, from SR-71s that crashed after repair while in testing.
Best,
Ted

Ted-

I got a call at the shop one afternoon in '92 or '93
A couple of friends had gotten a shipment of sample Ti tubing from Eastern Europe.
A materials broker was offering a seductive offer on 'milsurp' tubing and stock.
They'd been joking around with the notion that 'that stuff could have been recycled from *some reactor or something*' when they got the idea to drag out the Rad Meter.

That material was Hot!

Since then I've steered clear of any cheap Chinese (or whatever) titanium products. Frankly, I have little personal use for titanium, and don't tend much to fancy exotic material for the sake of exotic anyway.



--Tinker

The "Rule of 96" is a rule of thumb - a very big, wide thumb, at that. Weight whould be what makes the shooter happiest or shoot best. Balance is the factor that determines how much weight goes into each hand. Moment of Inertia is the factor that sorts swing effort for given weight and balance. Since MOI is the summation of weight times radius (from CG) squared, long barrels and long stock have a disproportinate effect, especially if they have dense wood and thich barrel walls.

Cosmi made/makes Ti barreled guns.

Well then, there we go.

There is no why.



--Tinker

Tinker,
Earlier than that, I believe reading about a shipment of Mexican produced concrete reinforcement rod that set detectors off as it passed on truck near the White Sands military installation.

It was really, really hot.

Maybe should mention at this point that I'm OK with good old steel barrels. Hell, my Darne 12 weighs six ozs less (6lbs even, to be exact) than my 16, and isn't what I would use for 100 targets any day of the week. Either gun, come to think of it.
Best,
Ted

As I understand it the 96:1 ratio was primarily based upon considerations of recoil. This was I think based upon giving the gun using a standard powder charge for normal velocites a recoil velocity of approximately 15 FPS. Burrard in his most excellent book does not mention the shot wt to gun wt ratio at all but confines most of his data to the gun's recoil velocity. The 12ga 2½ "Low Velocity" load giving 1¼ oz shot a MV of about 1050 FPS has less recoil than does the Standard "Game Load" consisting of 1 1/16oz shot @ an MV of about 1270 FPS. The 96:1 ratio takes no account of MV's at all so is somewhat limited in scope.
Burrard stated experience had shown most shooters found a Recoil Velocity of about 15 FPS comfortable, while one of around 16 FPS was about the limit most would be willing to endure except for very limited shooting.

Tinker,
On the 'hot' Ti, I recall some yrs ago we here at, then MDC, had a QC problem with Ti Huck bolts containing inclusions of tunsten. It turned out that some of the Ti was recycled Soviet subs and the tungsten was from the careless/poorly trained welders 'dipping' the TIG electrode in the puddle and letting it solidfy then breaking off the tungsten tip. During the electro-remelt, the mfr stated the bits of tungsten didn't get melted into solution. We never thought to see if any of them were 'hot' from being in a nuc boat.

On the aerodynamic drag of a swinging shotgun, I'm gonna disagree that it's a detectable aspect by a shooter. The average shot swing velocity at the muzzle is very low IMO. If it were high velocity, you could hear the howl of aerodynamic drag and a sxs would be noticably easier to swing than a o/u. I don't ever recall feeling any difference in the swing resistance from one or the other of equivalent static weight distribution. Also, the resistance would highest at the fastest part of the swing, usually the latter part. I just don't ever recall feeling that either.

I just think the velocity of a muzzle is just too slow on any conceivable shot that it would produce any noticable drag. I do believe that it may play a factor when the wind gets up over say 20-25 mph crossing.

Chuck-

It just occurred to me that we're getting dangerously close to one of those "muzzle flip" conversations.

Think of how that one could go considering the behavioral differences between alloy steel and Ti tubing!

It's good we have such nice weather lately, isn't it Chuck?


--Tinker

maybe the muzzle would flip right over the shoulder.

I dunno about you, Tinker, but I prefer the fall for more reasons than I like hunting. This 90-100F stuff can slow my projects down. Waaa waaaa waaaa. I suppose I'd complain if it were 65F and windy too. Some others have it way worse I suppose.

65F
Partly Cloudy
6mph breeze from the east...



--Tinker

Even Beretta has an OU that's about 6 lbs...that's as light as I'd ever care to go.