doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Why the popularity skips with some sub-gauges?

Brent I have wondered the same thing. I think it is because of the gunpowder - black or nitro. As you know you can now load 12 gauge from 3/4oz loads up through 2 oz I suppose, all at less than 1250 fps, but certainly you would have to change powder as you changed the shot weight. I think that 120 years ago when it was desired to shoot a 3/4 oz. shot load (2-1/2" 20 gauge) the available powders would not burn in such a way that is could be done in 12 gauge.

That is speculation on my part but I did read that when the early English 2" shells came out they had considerable trouble making the shells work consistenly because the powder wasn't compatible with the inertia of such a short shot column.

Best,

Mike

Mike, I believe the main issue with the early 2" shell was trying to load too heavy a shot charge at the expense of gas sealing wads. Hence, they had issues of blow-by coupled with insufficient cushioning causing fused shot balls.

You may be right!

Best,

Mike

Mike;
Your formula is of course correct, & only a .001" diference was the result, which is of no consequence. It simply results from rounding in establishing the .729" dia. Many years ago one evening instead of watching the idiot box I sat down with a programmable calculator & a copy of a British Proof house table of gauge sizes with all whole numbers from 1-50 & those odd ball sizes from .450 down to .300 in .010 increments with the gauge carried to two decimal places. It was soon determined to "Fit" the entire chart the dia of a 1 ga (1 lb lead) ball had to be carried to 6 decimal places. Then using the exact formula you used I settled upon an approximately middle of the road figure for a 1ga ball dia of 1.669285" & recorded it.
A couple of things are worthy of note I think. 1st taking thr volume of 1lb of lead in Cubic Inches of any chart I can come up with does not produce a ball having this dia. It will be "Very Slightly" larger. "If" one adopted the theory they used impure lead in determining their standard, this would have required a "Denser" mat'l which is opposite of what would have been expected. It was once suggested by someone on the board here that perhaps they used some form of rolling to get their sample to pefect roundness & it gave a light compression to the metal. This certainly sounds plausible, think may have been Rocketman who suggested this, but just not positive now.
At any rate, once a base is established, & especially consideringat that point all calculations would have been done sans assistant of computers or calculators, their matamatics are astonishing. Cube roots aren't easily handled longhand. I can recall doing sq roots from my school days & they are time consuming.
Incidently using my baseline 12ga figures to .729127+. Using this figure your formula will give a result which rounds up to .506" rather than down to .505". Your calculations certainly showed that 36gauge is not a correct figure for a bore of .410" & was not intending to disparage your figures, was just stating what the British tables listed.
As I recall if one used 1.669 (1 ga from table) as baseline no gauge when rounded to 3 places would miss by more than .001". With this base 12ga is virtually an exact .729" (.729003) & 36 is .505462" (.505" to 3 places) as you correctly calculated.
Obviously when these tables were run some precision calculating was done, even if they did slightly miss the wt of lead. As I recall using current listings for the wt of lead a number of the gauges would "Grow" by .001" with some of the larger gauges perhaps going up by as much as .002", "Terrible Error", but has been some time since I actually ran the figures & didn't save them all.
I enjoy mathamatics to the extent I know them & have just always found this gauge buisness fascinating.

Miller I certainly didn't take offense at your post and found it interesting. What I did is set up an equation that said the volume of twelve 12 gauge balls times the density of lead is the same as the volume of thirty-six 36 gauge balls times the density of lead. The density of lead cancels out and thus the formula I posted. I am verified ADD and most of what I do is "in the ballpark". Your detailed analysis of the gauging system is right and corrct.

I was just explaining how I came up with my numbers.

I grew up working in the family business - a sheet metal shop and plumbing shop. Guess how sheetmetal gauges came about - take a 1 lb piece of steel and shape it into a 12" by 12" flat piece. Then slice it into 24 12 x 12 equal thickness pieces and you have 24 gauge!

I am interested in the gauge system too.

Best,

Mike

Mike,

All we can do is speculate. I think some other contributing factors were makers looking for a market niche. It also seems to have to do with rivarly between various national interests.

Part of the growth of the .410 has to due with the slow movement to lengthen the case, allowing a greater payload.

Pete

Pete that certainly seems a plausible explanation to me.

Thanks,

Mike

What surprises me more than the missing guages is that some manufacturer of firearms and ammo hasn't figured out he is missing marketing opportunity by not producing shotguns to shoot several more gauges than we currently have. They seem to have no problem reinventing rifle cartridges eg .308 Win, .30-06, .300 Win Mag, .300 WSM, .300 Ultramag, .300Weatherby. There has never been a year, I don't think, when some new "super" cartridge hasn't appeared to fill in an imaginary gap in the rifle or pistol ammo spectrum. But we have been stuck on standard 12ga, 16ga, 20ga, 28ga .410 for half a century if you overlook the 3 1/2' 12ga which is a very poor substitute for an 8ga or 10ga. I think a 32ga would be lovely for dove and quail. Of course I also know I can load a 20ga to duplicate whatever standard loading the 32ga would handle just as I currently load it for 28ga duplication at times. American style skeet with slow targets and premounted gun would probably benefit by restricting the guns to nothing but the 2 1/2" .410. There is no significant scoring difference in the other guns to differentiate who is best shooter of the day anyway.

It’s just fascinating what humans have done with their rationalization at the time to design a very complicated system in firearms nomenclature. Lower animal carnivores have it down to the basics: “It’s meat, let’s eat it”.

But just why are we so basic in the shotgun area with only 10, 12, 16, 20, 28, 67.5 (.410) gauges currently built and commercially loaded for?

If you look at the current commercially loaded American centerfire rifle cartridges, there are 96 different calibers in the latest edition of Cartridges of the World. I can also immediately think of at least 3 more since that edition came out. And each of these are unique, they can’t safely be fired in another caliber rifle.

The reason can’t be to keep a performance difference between the gauges, as many of the various different rifle caliber cartridges have minuscule or even non-existent ballistic differences. And you can’t say it’s because of the widely available different load weights, shot sizes or powder charge choices for each shotgun gauge providing enough overlap, as for each of the rifle calibers there are different bullet weights, shapes, internal construction methods and now even different powder loads.

Compared to the rifle guys we have made it somewhat boring, to have so very few gauge choices to play with.

You are I think a century or so behind here. Most of these gauges were in existence prior to the introduction of breech loaders, with the possible exception of the .410. As I recall on the Lewis & Clarke expedition they carried one gun to be used with either ball or shot, which was essentially a 28ga, perhaps a little heavier in the bbl than a true shotgun.
In the late 1800's & early 1900's a myriad assortment of loads were available for shotgunners. Hull lengths were available for most of the gauges from 2½ up to 3¼" in 1/8" steps with a few having a 1/16" increment thrown in. For an order of as few as about 100 shells a buyer could specify virtualy whatever they desired in way of hull length, powder brand, type & amount, shot size & hardness type of wadding etc, etc. Far more shot sizes were then available. Around about the time of WWI, not sure of exact dates, the companies began streamlining & standardizing. It was all economics. Unless you are wuite willing to pay a considerably higher price than even the current prices, you should be thankful for the lack of variety. Mass loadings of a lesser variety gives us better prices "Comparitively speaking" than shooters of 100 yrs ago enjoyed.