Cody:
The SS foil is expensive because you have to buy a roll of it. If you write to me direct I can send you enough to do the job. BTW, for anybody who might handle this stuff, the cut edges are razor sharp. Nasty stuff. Think about the pretty coiled wire on top of the fences at the local Correctional Facility.
As for the straight rifling, I read about it being experimented with in modern shotguns as an attempt to tighten patterns. Apparently the thinking was that the polishing marks in the barrel tended to spin the shot charge, which would be a Bad Thing for patterns.
In this case I expect the idea was more about fouling management. There is a school of thought that rifling was developed in just such a manner. Someone came up with the idea of a grooved barrel to make loading easier, and then someone else made the leap to spiral grooves and we had the first rifle.
Glenn
gfewless@tds.net
