doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Win 24 Frame size?

Was the 16 bore Model 24 built on a smaller frame tham the 12?

Pretty sure it was. A 16 (or a 20) certainly handles better than a 12.

I am sure, and it is a smaller frame. Larry is right about the handling qualities. Their good handling is overshadowed by their less that stellar looks.

I hunted with a 16 for a coupe of years and can't say it handled well but from just swinging a 12 last week at a store the 16 did seem better. But not by much.


I wonder if the M24 would lend itself to resculpting of the metal, the way people like to do with Foxes?

16 and 20 on the same frame; used to have a 16/20 "two-barrel set".

Mike, I'm guessing that was a "composed" set rather than something Winchester offered from the factory. That is, you just happened to have an extra set of barrels that worked. I had something similar many years back, except mine was 16/16. 26" IC/M and 28" M/F. On that gun, someone even checkered the wood.

One interesting fact about 24's is that the early ones with open chokes were factory C/M rather than IC/M. Or at least that's my deduction. I've seen a couple with low SN's marked C/M; later ones (higher SN) with open chokes all seem to be IC/M.

Mr. Brown, you're right. I bought a pair of new 20 guage 26" barrels from the old Numrich's when they were closing them out for about $50, and fitted them to the frame of a 16ga 28" that I had. This was not an experiment that worked--as I recall the short 20ga tubes made the rather well-handling 16 "feel funny". I didn't like them and shortly found someone who thought the combination or "set" was cooler than I did and got all my $$ back, and then some. Since then I have a friend in upstate NY who has a 26" 20ga M24 that he has been using very effectively on grouse/woodcock/cottontails/jumped ducks for years, but I think it wouldn't work for me.

I don't really recall the chokes on those 26" 20ga barrels. I always believed they were the conventional IC/M, but couldn't prove it now. The 28" 16ga tubes were a rather UNconventional IC/M; that I DO remember.

I had a composed 16ga "two barrel set" also. The original barrels were 28" M/F, I found another set that had been cut back from 28" to 26" and were pretty much C/IC. That second set came from a gun that was used in a murder, the receiver was destroyed but they were able to keep the barrels. I sold the whole deal to someone who wanted to do a restoration on the the entire gun. I never shot it well with either set of barrels.

Very true about being unconventional. They were special ordered that way. At this point in time that is the "hot" combo.
There were several special options offer for the Model 24, however, very few were ordered.

All the info I've read said they only offered extractors but I kept hearing about ejector models. I finally saw one of the elusive ejector models last month, a 12ga.