doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Do we need choke?

FWIW, the last time that I patterned some factory loads using plastic wads through two dif 'rifled spreader chokes' they both threw IC patterns.

One still sees Sporting Clays shooters on ocassion shooting 'threads'. Can't say that I see any advantage over a cyl or skeet type choke tube, but there are some who believe that wad retarders in chokes exist as well. Hahaha

Cyl chokes will often throw patterns w/hot centers, probably more so today than in times past, but that held true with card wads as well sometimes and even in black powder era, if one can believe what was written on the subject where trials were conducted for pattern effectiveness and penetration on 'standardized' card stock at the time.

The average flushed bird shot behind a good dog is probably well within the CYL or no choke range, at least for the first shot, some pheasant excepted.

Yeah, that is true, but you are really only inspecting whole clays. If you were looking for almost whole clays you'd probably find just as many that only show a hit or two on the broken edge. For skeet a cylinder bore works great but in the real world of hunting you are rarely presented those perfect shots at almost the same range time after time after time and in the clay sports, even though a guy isn't counting on chips whether he's a pro or a beginner, even chipped target counts as a hit and you get the same point as if it were smoked. In the game fields a shot that would chip clay and go down as a hit on the score card will more than likely just result in an unrecoverd crippled game bird. My point is that shooting clay is only one facet of shotgunning and for the most part an all around shotgun really does benefit a choked bore.

Lot's of choke, lot's of smoke, hit 'em hard and down they go.........from crows to doves and clays and everything else.........

Well, you might find an "almost whole clay" with no holes at all in it. Problem is, you don't know how many holes there were in the part(s) that broke off.

clampdaddy,

The whole clays that I find that have two or three holes in them represent a FAILURE of the load/choke combination used to break the bird at the distance it was shot, or the ability of the shooter to place more than two or three pellets on it. PERIOD. Think how many more, that were hit by a couple/three pellets, broke when they hit the ground! I am not interested in pieces of clays with or without shot holes in them.

If I find an "almost whole clay" it proves nothing. I don't know if was broken in the air or when it hit the ground.

I think we're both agreeing, tho', that choke is important. Whatever the "game".

Stan

Tom, I know something about those cyl choked "skeet" guns. I've had a few. One was a 4-barrel set I bought from a competitive shooter. Included with purchase were two Purbaugh tubes in.....guess which "gauge"..... Those .410 tubes were obtained b/c of the the original owner's dissatisfaction with his .410 breaks - unexplained misses wreak havoc on the psyche. Today you will not find one top competitive shooter using .000 in the .410. For that matter they do not use .000 in 28 or 20, either, but that's another story.

Tom, I have gone to the trouble of doing the pattern work with various 2.5" 1/2 oz target loads (shotcups). Have you? At least 2/10 21 yd patterns from these otherwise unalteered .000 barrels will have a target-sized hole at pattern center. Repeat the test if you wish, or believe that WW could never have made a mistake.

As it happens WW's transition to .000 choke sections is quite germane to this thread. It occurred as a result of an industrial leader buying the notion that shotcups make constriction unnecessary. For several years these guns, mostly Japanese 101s and Mirokus, were somewhat popular. In the end the skeet world came to disagree. I can't say for sure, but I doubt anyone at WW/New Haven had done their homework on the matter

As it happens, this was not the only screw-up made by New-Haven (I imagine Olin-Kodensha just did what they were told). Graded 101s of the period were often poorly stocked with way too much figure in the wrist. Again, Tom, I am speaking from personal experience - having had to replace a Diamond grade stock. The replacement factory stock was, likewise, poorly laid out.

Sam

Between 1867 and 1923 the second Marquess of Ripon[Earl de Gray] Shot 556,815 head of game. The vast majority of this game was shot with with cylinder bored Purdey hammer guns [used as pairs or as trios].In this era the standard shot charge was 1 1/8 ozs and shot shell muzzle velocity was 1200 ft; per second approx. To my knowledge the shooting skills demonstrated in the field by the Marquess have never been surpased; regardless of todays availability of high velocity shells,overweight shot loads and heavily choked guns.

556,815 head of game divided by 56 years = 9,943 head of game a year.

God must have been helping Lord Rippon with his addition.

Lord Ripon was indeed a fine shot, but though his total tally may not have been surpassed (his half million plus was not only birds but hares and rabbits as well), the tally for his last 24 full seasons have been surpassed. Sir Joseph Nickerson, from 1966 through 1988 accounted for 188,172 birds, an annual average of 7,841. Ripon's tally from 1899 through 1922 was 187,763 for an annual average of 7,823. For the last three seasons in that period Sir Joe used nothing but 28 bores and for the preceding fourteen seasons used only 20 bores.

Nickerson favored over and unders, matched trios, and on some favored a heavily choked first barrel in order to take the first bird approaching farther out, allowing the follow up shot to also be an incomer, not a crosser or going away shot. His second barrel was lightly choked. I would say this definitely surpasses Ripon, who, as you say used cylinder bore guns.

The better shot a man is, the better he can utilize choke, in an increasing proportion. Whatever Ripon did or did not do with his cylinder bore guns does not validate McIntosh's statement that choke is obsolete, due to today's highly advanced ammunition, IMO.

Stan

If true....They both must've had a heck of a game farm with lots of throwers.