doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com assisted openers

If one wanted to get absolutely technical, then a "Self Opener" would have to move the bolt lever for you as well as open the bbls. There is of course no gun built to intentionally do this. A few rotary bolt guns have on occasion become Self Openers, but this was undesirable. In general usage I believe the term self opener is applied to those guns which upon the locking bolt being withdrawn the bbls will open themselves with no effort from the shooter. An Assisted (easy) opener is one in which some effort is required to open the bbls, but not the full amount necessary for cocking the locks. Most self openers will I believe be found as those mechanisms which compress the main springs upon closing the gun & will require the greatest effort to close the gun. Assisted openers will fall between the self openers & regular mechanisms in this regard. If you lay the gun on its side as mentioned with hammers down on empty hulls, if upon withdrawing the locking bolts the bbls open, cock the locks & eject the empties with no assistance, I would call it a "Self opener". If it does not do all this then it is an assisted opener, assuming it does give some aid to the opening process, beyond that of bbl gravity.

Seems reasonable to me.

The Cogswell and Harrison Avant Tout and the Winchester Model 21 are assisted opening guns, easy to open because of the ejector design. They are among the most friendly of side by side guns for the shooter. That is because they are easy to open and easy to close, much different from many other well respected designs. Most high quality guns are respected for traits other than their ease of operation for the shooter. This is mainly because most shooters are not familiar with guns other than the one or two they shoot.

I thought Gough's faithful Henry Atkins was a Spring Opener?
Franc

Are there any designs in which the gun cocks on closing,
and could that "assist" in opening?

There are many things in the English language that are not as they would seem. However through common usage they become to mean certain things despite of this. Self Opener and assisted opener are such phrases. Those that have handled a Purdy and an assisted opening SXS such as an H&H with that option will understand why they were given these two separate names. The Purdy being much more immediate and vigirous.

When you shoot Purdeys like a gentleman, they open, load, and close on their own.

All you have to do is keep you eyes on the birds and an arm outstretched towards your loader.

Hahahaha

OWD