Argo44 kindly translated a couple of pages of Mournetas's book that dealt with the partial rifling of one barrel of the Ideal and a rare example of both barrels being partially rifled. Thanks, Gene:
Nevertheless, it is very rare to find an IDEAL so equipped because on one part the fabrication was complicated and thus onerous and, on the other part, the fouling by black powder posed a problem. This led them rapidly to abandon the concept. To my knowledge no long gun of this type has been made by the Manufacturer since the beginning of the century. But, before closing this paragraph, it’s worth noting that certain barrels, meant for firing ball, were rifled from the exit of the chamber, along the entire length of the barrel. What happiness for a collecter to come upon such a rarity.
The choke initially seen on the barrel of the IDEAL corresponded to a constriction equivalent to that of one caliber. As it is evident that shooting during a hunt doesn’t take place at a constant distance, it was necessary to adapt the chokes according to the ground and thus also was born the half-choke (constriction by a half caliber)
Before the great war, the IDEAL generally carried an open smoothbore barrel on the right and a choke-bored one on the left for barrels 74 cm in length. Bores with half choke on right and full choke on the left on barrels from 65-70 cm. Except for special orders of course. For pigeon shooting models, full choke on both sides was the norm.
Thereafter, that excelent compromise, half-choke on the right and full-choke on the left were kept on all the classic series IDEALs. (see the tables on page 34).
There is another particularity which we are going to find on the barrels of the IDEAL. The (shallow) rifling. For the dispersion of shot when firing at a short distance and for the shooting of ball, a number of IDEAL came, on special order, with the right barrel (unchoked) rifled “SUPRA” beginning in the 1920’s. Previously, on certain models such as the COLONIAL IDEAL, only one length of some 8 cm was striated (rifled) at the beginning of the barrel. This assured the rotation of the ball without perturbing in the slightest the smaller shot. The compromise was a good one and it made its mark abroad to the point that certain of the classic series can be seen with the right barrel provided with such rifling. Such a rarity."
on the right tube, i was rather surprised. the dent described in the auction catalog is at 3:00 o'clock just above the tip of the forearm. it is about 9.85" to 10.6" from breech (in line with the bore), and easily visible inside the tube, but not as "sharp" as description might lead one to expect.
the surprise is the fact this tube is shallowly rifled from chamber to muzzle - not the partial rifling near the muzzle that i was expecting. it conforms with argo's translation of the mourneta's book.
my bore gauge shows .727-8 in the grooves from one end to the other...no choke. its not so easy to stay on top of the lands, but a quick stab seems to indicate about .716. proofed at 18.2 on flats...
so the difference of .11-12 thou, divided by two, would yield 5 or 6 thou depth in the rifling. this is quite evidently an example of the gun in the photo provided above. and it is obviously intended for use with properly sized solid projectile.
best regards,
tom
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