Has anyone any experience of "jug" choking or recess choking whereby a cylinder barrel has a slight recess formed in the bore approximately one inch behind the muzzle; recess then causes the shot to gather before leaving the muzzle resulting in a denser pattern - effectively "giving back" choke to a gun without it?

The only reason I ask is that most pre 1875 doubles seem to have no choke and whilst this is practically little issue for shots 35 yrds and below, it can be restrictive outside of that - especially on wildfowling/waterfowling bigger bore guns. I am NOT advocating crazy long range shooting here at all - but simply that on occasion, having some element of choke can be beneficial.

Interested to hear opinion, especially whether anyone has ever seen this done on Damascus barrels (assuming plenty of barrel thickness to work with)?

I had this done to a set of damascus barrels I once owned. Nick Makinson did the work and it seemed to pattern well and kill Roosters nicely. He was limited as to the amount of choke he could add with this method, if memory serves, on this set of barrels he was able to add .012" or light mod chocking.

Never had experience with other than fluid steel barrels, but I can vouch that jug choking works well.

My best skeet barrel is a cut off full choke barrel jugged about .006". Very even pattern.

CBL1 I just had this done and am very pleased, I shoot sporting clays and the best I could do on my home course before was 72 after haveing it done I shot 86 and 88. I had .015 jug put in both barrels that measure .735 bore size. The plan was to pattern it after I had it done to compare to the pattern sheets I did before but we have 14 inches of snow so it will have to wait. Mike Orlen did the work by the way. Hope this helps. Mike

The amount of jug choking can depend on the thickness of the barrels in that area. If you 35 thousandths in thickness you cannot remove 20 thousandths for a modified choke because your wall thickness at that point will be too thin.

I agree, but .020" of constriction is only .010" per wall

I shoot a 1870 Scott with both damascus barrels jug choked to .006. It is my favorite dove gun and commonly nails birds well over 30 yards--and they're small targets. Neatly done I see no reason not to do it as long as wall thickness is sufficient.

My one experience was with a Citori .410 skeet gun, one of the first to come to the LA area. It was Cyl/cyl and lousy. Would not keep all the shot on a 48" x48" paper @ 20 yards. Purbaugh jugged it to about the equivalent of .410 modified and it was a much improved skeet killer. My only anoyance was that plastic would build up in the recess and needed to be frequently cleaned. It definitely does work! It's my belief that it's a very effective thing to do to a muzzle loader because they still load like a cylinder barrel, but can then give a tighter pattern, for longer shots.

On my hammer Reilly, I doubt this will be an option as the barrels are no more than 28 thou at any point.

However, on another of my guns, thickness is > 50 thou, which would indicate I could have a chance. Forgive the UK terminology, but if the barrels on this gun are currently improved cyclinder (I think US skeet or 0.005), could I feasibly go up to modified/half choke (0.020) or is the improvement limited to a smaller degree? Bonehills post just above this would indicate it is possible.

Jug choking can work very well, assuming that the barrels in question have sufficient wall thickness to accomodate them. It is an old technique but a good one.

Three things might be considered, however:

First, recess chokes do not always perform their best with loads that use plasic wads. I suspect that at least some these wads do not always allow shot charges to "spread" inside the "jug" sufficiently to allow the constriction in the "choke" to do its job optimally. At least, that has been my experience.

Next, FWIW, "jugged" chokes do not usually lend themselves to optimal accuracy using solid projectiles. Accuracy can be pretty "cattywumpus" after barrels are jug choked.

Finally, even after barrels are "jugged" the shooter is still limited to just one choke per barrel. If this is a potential problem, the installation of a set of Briley "Thin Wall" choke tubes might be a desirable option.

Some great input here - thank you. I use fibre wads for virtually all of my shooting so less of a concern there.

As regards Teague or Briley choking, I may well be mistaken here, but have always been wary of these options as I thought they required some significant lapping out of barrel thickness to accommodate them and/or the incorporation of screw threads in the end of the barrel?? Not something I am keen on doing to a lovely set of old Damascus barrels, especially on a waterfowling gun?

Steve,
I stand corrected that it is 10 thou per wall. Not thinking this morning.

I have a Birmingham 12 bore, maybe 1880 with jug chokes that I measure as modified and it is very effective on long clays out to 50 yards. Those of you who have been to rock Mt Sporting clays in PA know the birds that come off the cliff and that is where this gun excels with 15/16 oz., PB, CB wads in Rem hulls. I use plastic wads with no ill effect.

With "Thin Wall" chokes may not always be a big problem. FWIW,the muzzles on my Skimin and Wood were pretty much "butchered" off-center, with one side of the muzzles being quite a bit thinner than the other. Briley expressed concern but, in the end, they "got 'er duuun"!

I jug choked a muzzleloading trap gun I built [ about 35 yrs. ago ] that worked just fine. And now have done a Remington 1894 F grade trap gun that only had IC in the right barrel when I bought it. It now has IM and breaks them just great. A friend had a Darne SxS that came with jug chokes. Paul

I would also be wary of threading Damascus barrels. Mike Orlen told me that it was not a good idea, IHO. The steel is too soft and the composition too variable to trust fine threading. That makes perfect sense to me. I would not hesitate to jug choke one, though, assuming wall thickness was adequate. Pressure is pretty low at the muzzle, anyway. Read what you can by V. M. Starr about it. I also have an article saved on making a simple jug choking tool for DIY'ers. I'd be happy to email a copy to anyone who sends me a direct e-mail. My address is in my profile. Don't waste time with PMs.

Unless Briley has changed the style of their choke threads, they aren't fine V threads like are used on many choke tubes. They are a coarse, but shallow square thread that should hold in either Damascus or steel.