Thanks Raimey- I know that WRA went from their nickel steel ordnance barrel steels (US Steel in Pittsburgh) to a stainless in the 1920's, a friend has a M12 20 gauge with a stainless barrel, and Dave Riffle details that- but the "backblast" lead WRA to develop their form of 4140 for their Winchester Proof Steel- My guess is that as Remington and Winchester were forming their own barrels out of nickel steel even before 1900, they didn't need to import, as did Parker, etc (who didn't made rifles along with shotguns, regardless of whether doubles or pump/autoloaders) just a guess of course--
I have a Super Grade M54 from 1935 in .220 Swift with a 26" stainless barrel- now modified to the early M70 (1936-1941) bolt and safety, and with a Timney trigger, OW- pretty much original- fortunately it was ordered with scope blocks and the receiver was alreadt drilled and tapped, as doing that operation in stainless is an entire different "ball game" than in nickel alloy steel sans chromium etc--
I can somewhat compare the "rough tubes" tarrif of 1908 with a more recent Habitat 4 Humanity set of experiences- about 12 years ago, we "stick built" the spec houses for that program, and we used 2x4 "pre-cuts" imported from Canada-as they were cut from length at the sawmill to aprox. 92 & 5/8" they were considered a manufactured product- they also were jig drilled with a 3/4" wing bit off one end- at 16" up from the floor plate for the Romex to be run in later, and that also made the 2x4's a "manufactured product" and at a way lower tarrif rate- that has all changed--
We always had some rookies on the job- wannabe carpenters, but you gotta learn from somewhere- we had one crew stud in three partition walls and set them in, plumbed and lined perfectly- except they had the Romex holes up at the top plate, and not at the base or floor plate level- Ooops--
