Tom de Grey, the 6th Lord Walsingham
On August 30 (1888), when I killed 1,070 grouse to my own gun in the day, I shot with four breechloaders. No.1, a gun made in 1866 by Purdey, subsequently converted from pin-fire to central principle, to which new barrels were made last year. Nos. 2 and 3, a pair of central fire breechloaders, made also by Purdey, about 1870, for which I have likewise had new barrels. No. 4, a new gun made by Purdey this year to match the two mentioned above, but with Whitworth steel instead of Damascus barrels. The guns are all 12 bore, with cylinder 30 in. barrels, not choked. My cartridges were loaded by Johnson, of Swaffham; those used in the down-wind drives containing 3 1/8 Drams Hall’s Field B powder to 1 1/8ozs. No. 5 Derby shot; those used in the up-wind drives (where the birds, of course, came slower) had 3 Drams only of the same powder, with the same shot.
I learned that Whitworth steel barrels are not desirable for a heavy day’s shooting.
The explosion in them makes quite a different sound from that given off by Damascus barrels: there is more ring about it, and I can imagine that this might prove a serious annoyance to anyone who minds the noise of shooting.
I think the seller may be correct, but no clue why, other than differences in the acoustic vibration.
Pattern welded barrels (a laminate of very low carbon steel and wrought iron) had a significantly lower % elongation than did fluid steel in my study
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cvqRzkg0wEjhAAcFWr8gFi7aPFRsSIJ_hahfDxmrNAU/edit The ring tone is generated by vibration, and it seems reasonable that the vibration would be different, but the vibration characteristics of metals, steels and steel alloys is WAY beyond me.
I did find that cast iron has superior vibration dampening characteristics over steel.