doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Barrel pinhole repairable?

I am going to ask a rhetorical question here and hopefully get some realistic responses:
If you acquired a shotgun with a "pinhole" in the barrel would you assume it was an isolated problem or a sympton of a much deeper and hidden problem? In other words does the existence of one "pinhole" indicate that there are probably others developing just below the surface?
Jim

I would say yes that there is a good chance that it does. I examined a couple of Parkers and while one pinhole was visible to the naked eye when we shut off the lights and put a light into the barrels a couple more pinpricks of light showed through.The one was a DHE and it still brought 1800 dollars with barrels that were shot.I don't know if the auctioneer ever mentioned the bad barrels or not. Buyer beware.People tend not to be fastidious when cleaning a gun, even an expensive one, and it only takes one lazy owner to ruin a gun when a gun may have several owners over its servicable lifetime.

I agree with RHD45. The mere existance of one visible pinhole suggests that the barrels were abused and neglected somewhere along the way or perhaps the man who forge welded the Damascus used contaminated material or inadequate flux and introduced multiple flaws and inclusions. On the other hand, considering how much weld joint there is in a Damascus tube, it's amazing they all don't spring at least one leak. That's a testament to real craftsmanship. That, or the scrap pile was a lot bigger than the good pile after proofing.

Interesting comments:
I'm NOT trying to "rain on anyone's parade" here. I realize that many have a vested interest in assuring everyone that damascus got a bum rap and they are perfectly safe to shoot with low power loads as long as they meet some arbitrary minimun barrel thickness criteria is met.
My point is unless you have xray vision there's no way of telling just how safe any given set of these barrels may be.
I have studied Sherman Bell's data and there's just Not enough information regarding testing to draw any real scientific conclusions.
I know this post may be upsetting to some on this board but if it prevents one person from having a serious injury injury it's worth it.
Jim

How about a pinhole in the exterior that does not register on the inside of the barrel, about 12 inches in front of the breech? It was recently nitro proofed with the pinhole.

Please understand this is my personal opinion based upon my experience working for a metals company and this opinion is NOT shared by others on this forum:
A obvious problem like a pinhole is a symptom of perhaps far worse widespread problems and the closer these problems are to the breech area the more potentially dangerous they are to the shooter. Damascus barrel shotguns all have voids in the metal as this was an inherent result of the manufacturering process. The voids can only get worse due to internal rusting over the past 100 or so years.
I do not have any personal axe to grind here and it still a free Country and if anyone wants to take the chance and use these guns no one least of all I will stand in their way.
Jim

Jim, your view is an interesting one. Re internal rusting, would there not have to be some channel to allow in air for that to take place? That is to say, pits or holes either on the interior of the bores or the exterior of the barrels? Such channels might well be tiny and hard to detect, but it seems to me they'd have to be there.

Ky Jon's point, I think, is well taken. A good friend once rejected a British double (fluid steel) because it had some exterior pits, all in the last 3" or so back from the muzzle. As we discussed it later, we both concluded that those would not be of much concern in and of themselves. If they were, then ported barrels would surely be dangerous.

Point 1: All it would take would be a minute hole into a void for continued rusting to take place.

Point 2: Again IMO: If you could be positive that there was only pitting near the muzzles the problem would be diminished in two ways. Your off hand is well away from this area and the pressure is significiently lower at that point.

I should also add that I am a great admirer of the beauty in damascus steel and truly enjoy the craftmanship exhibited with classic doubles. However; I don't shoot them myself but would have no problem doing so with proper steel inserts.

Jim

I've done some shooting with Damascus guns that appear to be in sound condition, but not enough to make any blanket statements of safety or soundness. Every gun, fluid or Damascus is an entity unto itself and two guns by the same maker and only one serial number apart could have barrels from different sources or batches of steel of different quality or metallurgy. We've seen doubles pictured here that have two different makes of tubes on the same gun. I can state that in a couple decades of looking at every double barrel set at every shop or gun show I've attended, I have yet to see a blown Damascus barrel. On the other hand, I have seen quite a few blown tubes of fluid steel and own several myself.

I have three sets of Ithaca Flues barrels, two 20's and a 16 ga. that have one ruptured tube. Two of these were in the vicinity of the forearm and I wonder if the shooter was injured. I keep meaning to "mike" the wall thickness around these ruptures, but I will say that visually, they don't inspire confidence. Still, thousands of these guns have been shot with high pressure factory loads and a friends' brother used to routinely shoot his Dads' 20 ga. Flues with 3" magnum loads. Don't try this at home kids.

Of course, this could simply mean that most blown Damascus barrels get scrapped rather than taken to guns shows to be sold for parts. I would say far more barrels fail catastophically due to obstructions in the bores than from type of construction or presence of pits or pinholes. But all of this is just my opinion based upon my limited observations. As a legal disclaimer I would advise anyone concerned about safety to never shoot their guns: instead they should give their guns to me and then they can't hurt anyone. I'd be interested to hear more anecdotal evidence of what others here have seen regarding barrel failures of different types. All I know is that I was brought up to believe "Damascus bad-- Fluid good", and as a result I passed on buying some guns dirt cheap that would now be worth thousands.

I have read that when Damascus does fail, it tends to "unwind" along the path of the layers and welds and is more likely to open and vent rather than split and fragment. Even so, escaping powder gasses at several thousand psi levels can certainly do harm to eyes and skin. So shooting glasses and a leather shooting glove on the fore-hand probably aren't a bad idea with any gun.

I have several welded bbls, both twist & Damascus which I throughly enjoy using. I have one twist bbl gun I do "NOT" shoot. It is an H grade Lefever & has a crack in the left bbl a little ahead of the forend. It appeared to be the result of being hit on a sharp corner & dented in & subsequently fired. The crack is radial about ¼" long. One side was still turned inward toward the bore but the other side was flared outward so that one could simply look through into the bore. I had bought it very cheap as a parts gun. As the bbls were essentially worthless anyway, also badly pitted, I decided to "Test" it a little & fully expected to blow it further. I ran my expanding dent plug down the bore & raised the dented in portion & hammered down the outward portion till the crack was actually difficult to see at all. I then proceded to fire "REMOTELY" several factury 3¼-1 1/8 loads through it with no visible effect. I then ran a number of 3 3/4-1¼ factory High Velocity loads through it, again no visible results. I then put some 1 3/8 oz reloads through it, though these were lower vrlocity & may have had less pressure than the factory High Brass. After all this nothing, didn't even see any soot make it outside the bbls. "But" I know that crack is there & still wouldn't put my hand out there & shoot it.
I do fully believe that unless a bbl bursts in the chamber the odds are extremely high it had an obstruction in it. I also fully believe it is an old wives tale a damascus bbl will "UnWind".
Generally speaking I think the Yield point of a damascus bbl is lower in proportion to its ultimate strength than that of a steel bbl. This would result in more bulging & stretching of the metal prior to actual burst in the damascus, thus giving a different appearence. I think though that unwinding bit is mostly myth.