doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com John Dickson Round Action 12 ga

I just acquired this John Dickson round action 12 ga. It has a set of American made barrels. They are a little on the heavy side for me, making the gun weigh 6 lb 12 oz. Of course it has a 1" recoil pad for 15-1/4" pull that weighs probably 8 oz. A thinner, lighter pad will help, but I'm thinking of a new set of barrels. Is there anyone in the US who could make a set? I've asked what a set costs from Dickson. I'd like to get the gun down to 6 pounds. I believe this gun is an antique, based on the patent use number of 228. Will that make it easier to ship back and forth to Scotland?

Link to photos: https://imgur.com/gallery/LQo9oHy

I give up

I asked Dickson’s about this gun when it came up for auction. It is an unusual action with a side locking bolt (see the screw on the left side). The side lever bolt has been removed. It also had cocking indicators on the top strap but they have been removed. The barrels aren’t fitted well. The gun needs some work. New barrels are probably close to £18k without being marked by the original maker. You can call Dan Morgan in VT and maybe have him look at it.

Ken

Diggory Haddoke (in the UK, obviously) claims to be able to rebarrel and restock a classic action for as little as 15K. Basically, a new gun.

https://www.vintageguns.co.uk/gun-services/service-repair

Probably does everything shy of that as well. It would be worth having a proofed new set of barrels for that kind of money from my perspective.

Thanks.

I spoke to Dewey Vicknair about a new set of barrels about 4 years ago. He gave me a ballpark figure of $12K. Doubt it’s gone down.

I would get a professional evaluation on what could be done with the existing barrels I have no idea what the value of this gun is but putting 12000 into it seems excessive but it may be with it.

Why not have the barrels re-struck? Take some meat off the set you have.

Where was this auction, just curious?

I would suggest finding a way to get the gun back to the UK and have Bill Blacker make you a set of barrels. I'm sure that would be the least expensive way. Bill Blacker, barrel maker to London Best Makers.

It would be nice to find a set of barrels from a 2-barrel set that someone would be ok with parting with. However, I’ve heard they just won’t fit any old Dickson and fitting them can be a big task, at least that’s what Dan Morgan told me. He also told me good Dickson RB guns with lots of case color are only worth about $15,000 in todays market….that statement shocked me. If that’s true, I wouldn’t go overboard with a new set of barrels unless you want to keep her forever cuz it sounds like you’d never be able to recoup your money???

so the gun was sold in Aug of 1888. In Shooting Sportsman awhile back Del Whitman describes relaying ribs. I am guessing having the barrels struck thinner and ribs relayed would be cheaper than anew set of barrels. You also might ask John Hosford if he would make a you a set of barrels. All of this is costly to remove 8 oz of weight.

The gun is nice, but I would agree with others here and advise to start over. You could find a really nice original example for the cost of the new barrels + sale price of this one. Someone else has already done what you plan to do and rebarrelled a thin barrelled RA. Profit from their mistake and find that gun. Patience is key.

It is true.

I do not know why anyone would buy a clunker today and expect to turn in to a silk purse by having new barrels built. Just look at this Dickson round action jewel at the current Holt's sale (27Nov2023) that has replacement chopper lump barrels with bores of .727"/ .728" and wall thickness of .032"/.031. Plus look at the stock--it could have a 3/4" leather covered recoil pad on it and make it more than 15 inches LOP. Dan Morgan is straight on about the price range of complete round bodies--even though guns by Scot makers are in high vogue today. Look at the estimated auction hammer price of this gun. Even if the gun brought £2,000.00 more and you added buyers premium and $1,500.00 to get it here the price for a complete gun with like new chopper lump barrels would only be $13,600.00 (£8,000.00 x 1.25 premium x 1.21 exchange rate + $1.500.00 = $13,600.00 ) One of my grouse shooting friends has purchased 4 spectacular guns( Hollands, A.A. Brown and others) from the UK in the last 2 years with Dan Morgan bringing them in for him and the cost was less than $1.500.00 per gun. Novices think it cost an arm and leg to import guns but they are wrong.

I decided today to ask my colleague friend gunmaker in the UK what a new set of chopper lump barrels cost to be made (he has 40 years in the trade as a gunmaker starting at Holland & Holland and later working for others such as Purdey, and Westley Richards, even building for Peter Nelson). What I learned is that Pudey's currently charge £29,000.00 for a set of barrels. Therefore he believes that a set of barrels from a UK barrel maker will cost $20,000.00 made and fitted. However there are only 2-3 barrel makers and you can count on the wait being years.

https://www.holtsauctioneers.com/as...++1400+&refno=++206599&saletype=

The only piece of advice my gunsmith ever gives on prospective purchases is, "buy the barrels, everything else can be fixed."

I'd like to see a good example with lots of case color for $15,000 and good barrels.

Me too!! But, that’s what Dan Morgan said…

I bet they’d let it go for 13k
https://www.gunsinternational.com/g...ncluded-make-offer-.cfm?gun_id=102482866

That one has surely been redone.

Yes re-done. I had it inspected by a former H&H barrel man before it went to auction, he suggested that I run not walk away from that one. On the bright side, you buy it you keep it, no inspections with CMSC.

Well sure it has. It looks to my eyes that it’s been done right. The gun being redone surely doesn’t detract from the value at all to me. The finishes on this Dickson are very well done.
100% original finishes on a 100+ year old Brit gun…..pretty rare thing.

I wouldn’t kick a properly refreshed British gun out of my gun cabinet.

Just be careful buying a gun by the pictures. It appears to be nicely redone, but the barrels are a little thin


[/url]Dickson

Ken

Your gunsmith is wise. He uses the exact same words that the late Jack Rowe, Birmingham gunmaker used in all his lectures on British guns. Look at this example that your gunsmith would tell you to buy as what needs to be done is the buttstock which you could have the famous gunstock painting artist here in America fix for you (for less than $1,000.00) or you could have a new buttstock made for 4-5 thousand dollars by the renown Birmingham stocker Malcolm Cruxton before it is sent to you.

Graham Mackinlay who sells more Dickson round actions than any gun firm in the UK and always has round action bargains listed. My guess is this gun can be purchased for £6.000.00 ($7.260.00)

Here you have a gun that has much desired 29 inch barrels with exceptional bore condition and acceptable .022" wall thickness that with careful use will last for when your grandson is shooting birds. The engraving looks like it was done yesterday and the guns internals are perfect.

https://www.gmackinlay.com/product/12g-round-action-by-john-dickson-son-29-x-2-1-2-barrels/

What did your H&H barrel man find wrong with it, Steve?
I notice the CSMC ad doesn’t give very specific measurements, etc ( obviously if I was seriously interested in buying the gun I’d have all of the details confirmed before going into negotiations)

Out of curiosity I’d just like to know what’s hidden beneath the pretty finishes.

The barrels had numerous issues, when he told me to run I stopped asking questions.

I think doing business with company that won't let it be looked over by a gunsmith or return a gun that had problems should be discouraged .I understand how auctions work but you can hire local gunsmith to look at your prospective buy, the gun the op has seems to need a gunsmith fix the barrels I would love a Dixon even one that needed sorting.

I looked at that gun. It has a non standard ejector system and just seemed a little off. I may be wrong but my sense is CSMC doesn't budge much on $

I have gotten Galazan's to come down $500 on a $6500 gun. I think that may be built in.

Back to my Dickson. It was made in 1888 and weighed 6 lb 6 oz. They generously offered to make a new set of barrels for a mere 17,000 pounds. I think I'll pass.

The gun is off next week to a smith to see about the fit of the barrels. Once that is sorted, I'll address the bores, as those barrels are very thick. .138 at chamber end, and nothing thinner than .060 anywhere. It's probably cheaper to thin from the inside than from the outside as long as the dimensions aren't too drastic.

Have you calculated the amount weight loss for whatever you would consider a maximum bore diameter? I can't imagine that it would be much.

If you reduce the chamber end to .100 and the minimum thickness to .035 I would think it would make quite a difference also you can't make the barrels concentric by striking the outside with the ribes on

I'm hoping that between the gunsmith and a barrel man that the gun will be optimized. I have a nice light 12. This can be my heavy 12

I hope your gunsmith knows something about Dicksons - sadly that one is a bodgered up mess. There's all kinds of stuff in/on the action bar that shouldn't be there.
I have no idea what the screw stuck in the back left side of the action does.
I have fixed some messed up Dicksons in my time, but this one will take some saving.
The advice Steve was given to run from it was sound.

Mike,

I talked to J-P at Dickson’s. He looked at the records and said it’s an unusual action with a side locking bolt (see the screw on the left side). The side lever bolt has been removed. The side lever was there to manually move the locking bolt to prevent the hammers from falling. It also had cocking indicators on the top strap but they have been removed. The barrels aren’t fitted well. The original owner ordered 2 of these type RA guns in 1888.

Ken

The sidelever guns I've worked on have the lever mounted in the trigger plate, why a conversion like this would be attempted is beyond me. If done at Dicksons, one would think it would have been easier to just make another gun. I don't know what the side locking bolt is, you can see the underbolt in the first picture.
The junk in and around the knuckle is the biggest problem I see. I'm pretty sure that got done by someone else, when they stuck the barrels on. They were probably adapted from another gun, hence the dog which needed to be fitted to work the extractors, rather than the toggle that Dickson non-ejectors use. It may have been a non-ejector first, then converted to the early pattern ejectors, then those have been removed and plugged. It's a mess.

It's all really hard to tell from pictures - having it your hands (or better still, taking it to pieces) would tell the story.

If anyone can sort out the gun, these two can, The gun functions perfectly as is. I have fired it extensively. I just dont like the fit of the barrels. It patterns high which helps with rising birds. I'm not into collector guns but I like small frames. I don't have much in the gun so I can't go off the rails very far. Any weight reduction from reaming will be insignificant, less than half an ounce. A lot more weight will be removed by taking off that thick pad and putting on a thinner, lighter one. My goal is to remove excess metal in the barrels, but leave enough metal to withstand even magnum loads, not that I'd ever use them. I want the forcing cones lenghtened so that transition to the bore from the chamber is less traumatic to the shot. If a larger bore is what they accomplish, that will ease pressure and therefore stress on the gun. I will probably need to have a set of choke tubes installed, since the left barrel already has a colonial tube. The gun having been restocked lessens the chance of old wood failing from stress at the head of the stock. I do appreciate all of the comments and interest. I always learn something here. I did order a copy of
Bob's book. I would appreciate suggestions on other books addressing shotgun performance and the effects of bore and choke dimensions. I have all of Gough Thomas and Michael McIntosh's books.

That side lever was just a redundant safety. I was confused by the use of the term "bolt" until I remembered that stalking rifles with stalking safeties were marked "bolted". I have seen a photo of a Dickson with the side bolting safety lever. The top end of the lever rides in a track on the side of the action and sits in dimples on each end of its travel. The absence of the dimples or the track leads me to speculate that this action never had a lever. It was most likely viewed as more of an annoyance than a safety feature and left off this gun when it was built I feel the same way about Greener side safeties.