doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Barrel Sleeving - Case Study

This thread will b e a case study for barrel sleeving. To start lets look at a gun that could possibly be a candidate. Take a look at the gun below and tell us what you see. The point here is that if you are considering sleeving a gun you need to know what you are looking at. Describe the gun in words and in BV-OQ-CC if you have the charts.


http://auctions.holtsauctioneers.com/asp/fullcatalogue.asp?salelot=A0314+++1704+&refno=+++74893

DDA

The gun is a Woodward BLE with full coverage engraving. The barrels are cut and wall thickness below 20 thou. The stock has seen some use because the drop points do not look crisp. Not a lot in the description concerning action tightness. Woodward is a Brand Value of 1. The Original Quality is 5. Current Condition is probably 8 (marginal, but shootable depending on the low MWT location). BV1-OQ5-CC8 = ~$1167.

If you assume the cost to do a quality sleeving is over $3500, not sure it is worth it.

Ken

Please excuse my ignorance, but where are you getting these BV-OQ-CC values from?
Dave

As a boxlock, sold by Woodward, it was very probably made in Birmingham by W & C Scotts, Midland, or another. If so it will be a good sound gun, but probably not 'made' by Woodward.
How that works in 'brand value' and 'original quality', I have no idea. I don't know how those charts are meant to apply to guns with a big name, but probably more humble origins (as most big name boxlocks are).
In my view, it's value is what it makes at auction, and so Holt's estimate is the guide as it stands now.
IF it was sleeved, (again in my opinion) any increase in value would not cover the cost of the work.
The only reason I can see to sleeve would be if the gun had sentimental, or family heritage appeal.

Or if the buyer had the means to do the sleeving himself, or through a barter.

Excellent thread, Don. I don't have your charts, not being a dedicated English gun aficionado, but I am very interested in following the case study.

Thanks, SRH

So, it's a $1000 gun according to Holtz and Ken says a resleeving would run $3500. But the finished gun would not be worthy of the investment?

I think it would be well north of that mark from what I see around the web. Maybe export costs and shipping to the US would eat up some of that profit, but done in the UK, it would seem quite reasonable to fix up that gun.

That would be another good reason. I have nothing against sleeving, and own 2 sleeved guns. However, it is an expensive process, and generally to be financially viable, needs to be on a gun in the higher value brackets (i.e. a better grade sidelock).

It is also done on scarce early guns (such as better grade hammer guns), but the majority of boxlocks were made as inexpensive guns when new, and current values reflect that. Shame as many boxlocks are very nice guns, and handle as well as their sidelock cousins and are probably more reliable as well!

I think that sleeving (in real terms) has increased in cost faster than used gun values, particularly mid and lower range English guns. Whereas a few years ago it might have been worth sleeving a good quality boxlock, especially one with fine wood as a few have, now, it is unlikely to make sense.

I keep meaning to get a nice English boxlock, but have never got round to it.

Why bother? That�s the real question to me. If that gun was in high condition with 30� barrels what would it be worth? $3500, 4,000? If you bought that gun for $1100.00, then sent it out for sleeving for 1500-2000 and then pay to have it shipped to you for 400-450 you are going to have 3,000-3550 in it. Add in a freshening up of the stock for another 100-200 and you just paid full price for a sleeved gun. Worse as other pointed out that gun was retailed by them but most likely brought in in the white if not even more finished.

You can get sleeving done for different prices and my 1,500-2000 might be on the low end for what you want. A invisible sleeve job may be more. I�m sure if you lived in GB and had friends in the trade you could shop around. We don�t. And I can�t count the number of auction guns which I liked, that seem to go for 150-250% of estimate. Either keep it as is or don�t buy it.

Really? $4k for that gun in high condition? Where? No where I've been looking.

As a person who has built a number of high quality custom rifles for hunting and competition, the first rule is that one will never get back what one invests in the venture. I hear it is the same with rehabbing old cars and trucks, tractors, and just about anything else. Why would shotguns be different?

"Sleeving" is when a shotgun has its old barrels cut away and new barrels placed into the monobloc that remains after the old barrels were cut away

"Resleeving" is when a set of shotgun barrels that were previously sleeved (as above) are sleeved for the second time (or third time and so forth) in the method described.