doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Why are SXS's more expensive than O/U's?

Larry, I agree about the market being there for a target grade SxS. A sporting clays ready 12ga 30"bbl at 7lb, 12oz would sell well even at $5K.

I think the gentlemans name is Hal M. Hare who has put up a pretty good showing in competition with a CSMC Model 21.

I believe Ugartechea would make you one for less than that, but I don't think they've been overwhelmed with orders.

SXS cost more, like other things that cost more, because they are worth it. They are worth it to those who buy them. And nothing sets the real value like the market. Try to sell a used gun and you will find out right fast what it is really worth.

Larry is right that volume make many O/U cost less per unit but no maker would build a gun at a loss for very long. Prices are because that is the max. that sellers are willing to pay.

Maybe SXS are slightly more labor intensive, maybe not.

After reading your post I wonder why we are hear on a SxS forum.

Makes total sense on the lower price scale that O/U's will cost less than SxS's due to supply/demand and the cost of production scale. When one gets to the hand made bespoke firearms are SxS's any different in cost to make than O/U's? Are the man hours the same? Are the material costs the same? I think there's no significant difference.

The production cost of a double-barreled shotgun doesn't depend on the plane in which the barrels are joined - that's what I've heard from engineers employed at a gun company.

The dominance of O/Us on the clay ranges is the product of evolution and survival of the fittest. Even in the '60s, at Trap and Skeet World Championships, about 30% of participants used SbS's, 10% - repeaters, and the rest 60%, with O/Us, mostly took top places. The O/U won the clay world because more people were winning events with them. (yet it all was probably just because you don't burn your hand as so can shoot more rounds, I think ;))

The large brace counts were shot with the Sle sxs, period!
Year in, and year out with the same set of guns.
Not just one trip to South America for high volumn dove shooting with a Browning o/u.
Oh ya, "aesthetics," are for the boring months ahead.
...and target games, are just that!

Jack, an old gent like you should be sitting by the fire, dreaming up more reasons why ST's are better than DT's--rather than out there in the cold, where you might frostbite your fingers or have a coronary. And I understand that as one ages, circulation problems increase, causing one to feel the cold more--especially in one's extremities. Yet another reason to wait for warmer weather--and shoot the more reliable and more sensible DT.

If you take a company like Merkel--which seems to make more sxs than OU's (or at least exports more sxs to this country, by a healthy margin)--then the price thing does a flipflop. Merkel sxs are a good bit less expensive than the OU's.

Back when the Cynergy came out, I had a chance to ask the Browning people how come they didn't have Miroku making sxs for them any more. The response was that all the employees who had worked on sxs had retired. The Ruger experience with the GL shows that while it might not be any more difficult from a technological viewpoint to produce sxs when you're already producing OU's, the process is very different. And even with guns that are largely machine-made, you still have to set up the machining and have the people that know the process. When you start from scratch (as Ruger did) and are looking at a much smaller volume than on OU production, then you have to factor in startup costs--which have to be recouped in the price of a relatively small number (in comparison to OU volume) of units produced.

SxSs, 16gauges, DTs all sing the same songs. I imagine that girls who aren't invited to the prom have lots of explanations for why they weren't chosen, too! But I have to admit that a DT SxS is fine for you fair weather hunters.