"Buck Hamlin as I recall, took an L C Smith Damascus hammer gun in 12ga & lengthened its chambers to 3". This gun had badly pitted "Unusable" sewer pipe bbls. He started with the heaviest loads of Blue Dot listed in the manuals & went up from there. Finally quit when the gun simply refused to stay shut with the shot, but didn't succeed in blowing her up".
Buck actually used an early set of Lefever barrels in his experimental attempts to burst a Damascus tube; I don't remember the Grade gun these barrels came from, but it was a lower grade with a serial number in the teens as I recall. It was actually his strength testing of Damascus barrels that lead him to the point whereby he now refuses, and has for years and years, all mono-blocking requests (I own a Lefever he mono-blocked back in the mid-80's; one of the last mono-block jobs he did). And although I'd never do such a thing now (given the knowledge now available and not available then), in the past I've had Buck lengthen the chambers of 2 or 3 of my 12-bore Damascus SAC guns to 3"; then "proof" each modified barrel with 2 oz. 3" mags (SAC 12-bores came standard with 2 3/4" chambers). All bores were measured before and after testing; and fortunately, all survived two such loads thru each barrel with no failure or bore measurement changes. So it seems these old (high-quality) Damascus barrels are indeed tough, but having now made it to age 66; and having witnessed a significant portion of a man's left hand vaporized by a burst barrel, I've come to terms with my own mortality and am no longer the risk taker I was in my youth. It is entirely possible that the subject 10-bore Smith gun here could absorb load after load of heavy charged 10-bore 3 1/2" mags; but it is also entirely possible that it wouldn't. And were it my body parts in question, given that I can't know the future, I'd not take the chance. So let us hope the seller was ignorant about the manufacture date and load type engineered for this gun; otherwise let us hope that he never gets a complaint from the buyer, or that he has great liability insurance in a worse case senario.
