doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Blow Up EUREKA

that is the gun Researcher posted the link to the Parkerguns forum about

Why is it that all the blown up guns I have seen have involved reloads but we keep looking at the gun for the problem?

+1 Exactly my thoughts. Until they quit reaming, honing, re-choking, and loading shells with C-4, this will be a never ending phantom chase.

In Weak Rivets, a Possible Key To Titanic's Doom Speaking of slag.

Progress report

Was back down at TEAM this am. They had a bunch of images of fluoroscopy of the first barrel wall to confirm the defects were indeed pits and not within the wall. No image yet but I'll post the best when received.
Still working on the second (Chain) barrel and bulge.

I'll have 3 more barrels to x-ray so we should generate a meaningful data base of what normal pattern welded barrel x-rays look like, and hopefully will identify a definite abnormality that can then be sectioned and photomicrographed. AND a fella on the PGCA site has had radiography done on a set of barrels with a fracture and will try to get digital images from the folks that did the testing for me.

No word yet from METL regarding the Failure Analysis.

I'd have thought pattern welding would show manufacturing defects here and there, but the xrays seem to show the appearance of a mono steel and they seem to fail like a mono steel. Maybe, the forging process to make damascus barrels was intended to minimize the effects of any individual material defect like inclusions or process defect like slag.

"the x-rays seem to show the appearance of a mono steel and they seem to fail like a mono steel"

By Jove, I thinks he's got it And I hope we'll prove it with the photomicrographs of the blow out barrel, Whodathunkit?!?


BTW: in a remarkable event of (Providential?) timing a fella named Chris Helms sent a bunch of pics from a rib relay which demonstrate just what we are seeing on the x-ray
http://www.picturetrail.com/sfx/album/view/24519472

if you have ever forge welded iron- when it is hot enough to work, it flows together

Maybe the old timers really knew what they were doing... :-)

Very much appreciate the donation of a 16g Syracuse Arms Co. Twist barrel which sadly was likely the victim of an attempt to lengthen the forcing cones, and 16g short magnums



Both chambers still 2 9/16" but the MWT at the end of the right chamber is only .087; left was .110.
Note the No. 0 16g Smith had a MWT at 3" of .114 right and .120 left.
At 3 1/8" there are four 1/4"-3/8" bulges; at 2:00, 5:00, 8:00, and 10:00. The WT at 3" was .098 and I was able to get the pin in the 5:00 bulge and the WT was .093. On the surface, that bulge appears to have a crack



At 5 9/16" there also appears to be a surface crack. WT there was .050



So the barrels are unusable, except with sub-gauge tubes BUT will be perfect candidates for radiography to confirm the depth of the cracks and possibly section and photomicrograph the cracks and the bulges. Knowledge advances

Still waiting to hear from TEAM about the Smith No. 4 barrels. METL should have the failure analysis done this week.