doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Barrel dents

My J Braddell and Sons 10ga has a couple minor dents in the left barrel. It is a Damascus barrel gun. I intend to shoot it with mild loads using brass shells. Should I be worried about the dents? I have a hydraulic dent raiser from Brownells for 12ga I am tempted to try but if they aren't a problem I won't mess with it. Again they are minor dents. Thoughts advise?


JHolland

Have a competent gunsmith raise the dents. Refinished the barrels if you like after.

Depending on the severity of the dents, you may or may not need to re-finish. I can usually get away without a re-finish if the dent is not very sharp and has not gouged the metal.

I'm not taking in repair work, maybe LeFusil, Dustin can help.

If you are in the Midwest, Jon Hosford can fix them quickly and inexpensively. He is near Ann Arbor and attends a lot of the SxS shoots. Just for safety sake I would probably wait to shoot it.

If the dents are at all visible in the bore, I would want to raise them before shooting, especially in Damascus barrels.

In any event, I'd prefer to raise them just for appearance sake. And raising common dents in the thinner portion of barrels is one of the easiest DIY gun repair jobs there is. It does become harder when a dent is closer to the breech where the walls are thicker, but those areas are much more resistant to getting dents in the first place. And of course, a sharp dent or one where metal is displaced is more critical. If it is deemed repairable, it will often involve striking the surface and refinishing. Polishing on the inside may be done too. This can leave a thin spot in the barrel wall that could rupture if too much metal is removed.

I believe you said you are a machinist Jholland. If so, you may have access to a set of plug gauges. You slide in the largest one that will fit snugly, centered under the dent, and begin lightly tapping all around the dent with a small hammer. I use either a hard plastic faced hammer or a small brass hammer to avoid marring the barrel. Very thin tape or plastic film can be used to avoid leaving marks, especially from a brass hammer.

Tap all around the dent until the plug gauge becomes loose, and then insert the next larger size that fits snugly under the dent. Lather, rinse, and repeat until the dent is fully raised and a bore size plug gauge slides through to the choke. Done carefully, refinishing or touch up bluing is seldom needed. And it rarely takes me more than 15 minutes to raise the average dent. Hardly worth risking loss or shipping damage sending most barrels out to a specialist.

Lacking plug guages, you could also turn several on a lathe. Of course, the leading edge should be chamfered. Or even take the time to make a tapered wedge type dent raising tool, if you contemplated removing a number of dents over time.

I don't know if the anvil of your 12 ga. Brownell's hydraulic dent raising tool has enough stroke to be used in a 10 ga. or if it would work well. But the process of using a small hammer to actually do the dent raising is the same. They are not used like a hydraulic jack to push out the dent from inside. You could also do a Search here to read old threads on the process.

What are the minimum barrel wall thicknesses?

Removing minor barrel dents is not hard, just tedious. You might be able to do it yourself with a very minimum of investment in tools.

Very minor dents are not a big deal and hurt nothing, excepting maybe your sensibilities. But, I hate the looks of them and always remove them.

The dents are about 12 inches from the muzzle where the barrels are thinnest. I will have to measure them. As stated I have a Brownells hydraulic dent raiser for 12 ga. I think it would extend out enough for the 10ga barrel diameter. It won't take much because they aren't very deep.

JHolland

The only other thing needed would be a tiny brass hammer, about a 2 oz. And, it doesn't absolutely have to be brass. Besides that, A steel hammer with a brass drift, ground to a concave shape on one end, works well. I like to use a layer of heavy clear tape to cover the area around the dent. It just serves to protect the surface finish from the little hammer blows.

Be very careful with that hydraulic raiser,dents can easily become bulges with them !!!