Interesting take you have on endurance Damascus. Which, if correct, would cast grave doubts over the quality of today's Purdeys and Holland and their opting for modern steels, (just like Perazzi's incidentally), CNC, EDM, and the whole spectrum of high tech manufacturing. You seem to be implying that the new ones will not last as long as those made of mild steel and empirically heat treated.
Condensing a lifetime of operation cycles in a short space of time is the way most manufacturers test their wares, especially high spec manufacturers, as in aerospace parts. Recently I read Ruger do similar exhaustion tests on their guns.
Closest test I recall for Purdey was the 500 000 bag of game by Lord Ripon, using several sets of Purdey guns, not one. And those guns were regularly sent to the maker for service and repair (read Beaumont, Purdey's The Guns and the Family).
My bet is on the modern certified steel and controlled heat treatment. I risk a prediction re 75 years from now, that a greater percentage of stainless steel Flodman/Caprinus shotguns will survive than any other.
Last edited by Shotgunlover; 06/06/15 11:22 AM.
