Paul;
Yes whether a barrel can be jug choked is dependent entirely on how much wall one has to work with & how much you desire to enlarge it. I was not speaking of this.
What I was speaking of was the operation of the reamer itself. Perhaps I did not understand exactly what you were saying. Just as a standard drill bit cuts on the end & not on the sides like an End Mill a reamer is sharpened to cut on the taper. The straight portion of the reamer body is ground cylindrical so as to Not Further Enlarge the hole in reaming.
What I understood you to say was that you placed the reamer in the bore & expanded it out tight against the walls which would mean it had to cut on the portion which was designed NOT to cut. To use an expansion reamer efficiently in this manner the lands on the flutes along its body length would need to be backed off to give relief for it to cut properly. Failure to do this would put extreme pressure on the inside of the bore & due to the thinness in this area could indeed result in the bore being bulged rather than metal being removed by cutting.
I put in over 35 years in machine shops, as a machinist, & have never seen a reamer designed to cut in this manner without modification. I have a set of Brownell's Choke Reamers & this includes them.
I fully agree with your statement "They would have to cut on the front edge where it's sharp". The way I was understanding your original ;ost on this though it sounded as if you were not using the Front Edge, but rather the portion behind that edge where it is not sharp. That was what I wanted clarification on.
