doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Sawed off shotguns?

Gentlemen,

Any ideas on why so many older doubleguns have the chokes sawed off? I am talking guns that have had little more than two inches removed just eliminating the chokes. I'm thinking perhaps the owners were missing what they were shooting at?

Thanks

Kurt

I would bet most were sawed shorter to remove all or most of the choke. Done by "gunsmiths" who didn't have the tools to open up chokes and/or maybe the owner wanted both shorter barrels AND more open chokes. My dad's lifetime model 11 Remington had the barrel shortened for both reasons, for quail hunting over dogs.

Jim,

Thanks for the reply! I assume that new guns with open chokes were somewhat rare then? At least not readily available?

Kurt

Blame Robert Churchill for the cutting down of a number of British guns - owners thought their long barrels very unfashionable when churchill was pushing his XXV in the 1930s and the legacy of this lasted well into the 70s.

People simply had long barrels cut down for reasons of fashion!

The Brits always refer to them as "sawn" off, but we in North America seem to use "sawed" off. I wonder why?


Bob

As Winston Churchill, I believe, once said, "We are a common people separated by mere language."

Sometimes we speak sawed off English; but not always.

Actually it was George Bernard Shaw:

"England and America are two countries separated by a common language"

one of my favorites of his;

"Democracy is a device that ensures we shall be governed no better than we deserve."

or more to the point;

"A government that robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul"

If the owner wanted to hunt Quail, and not shred the bird (if he hit it) the barrels often recieved a "Hacksaw Choke", or so I was told.

I've had a couple of guns with only a portion of the chokes trimmed back. My brother owns one a 12 ga. CE Fox with 27 5/8" barrels.

I have a couple of Parker 16's with cut barrels. One is 27-3/4" (from 28") and the other is 27-7/8" (also from 28"). Cut just enough to ruin their collector value, but not enough to spoil them as shooters. I think they were were cut to correct damage to the muzzles, probably from a fall or banging against a rock.

I have my Dad's Lefever Nitro Special 16 ga. which he sawed off two inches to hunt quail with. This was done somewhere between 1948-1950.

I also still have the two inch piece since my Dad never threw anything away.

The XXVs had very little impact on the shooters of any day.
One the American side of it all, I looked at a Winchester M21 with 26" barrels - it looked and felt like a clubbish brute!

Lowell,
Rumor has it that Tony G has a technology fix for the club. The rumor is that a titanium 21 is or will be offered. That combined with barrels struck to order and his scaled recievers, should make a decent gun.

Is there any reason the precision trimming of a doubleguns chokes would not be a practical alternative to reboring? The taper would be shortened ,but the end restriction could be opened slightly and accurately by substituting a milling machine or percision grinder for the hacksaw. Perhaps this is done?

Saw, sawed , sawn - in British English 'saw' is an irregular verb.

Saw, sawed, sawed - in American English it is a regular verb.

Lowell - 'The XXV had little influence on shooters of any day' - are you having a laugh or just ignoring the UK in your comment?

Or as I like to say, If the colonials had lost the Revolutionary War, we would still be speaking English.

My "house gun" is a Lefever Nitro 12ga. that someone (not me) cut to a mere 18.5 inches. Think there are any chokes left there? :-)

I sawed off an Ithaca 12 ga to 21 1/2" because of a split on one of the barrels due to an obstruction. Drove aluminum foil into the void and filled with solder. Great car gun now to have in the front seat for skunks and the occasional "out of the window" crow.

Small bore, now maybe you Brits just didn't think your 25" would sell very well here in the states, and you kept 'em all - but the ratio of 30" to 25" barreled guns is what.... 20:1 - most likely even higher than that. I'd bet 30:1 in favor of 30" barrels over 25"s
So, someone in merry ol' England didn't shoot XXVs hmmmm?

Could it not be that bulged muzzles from dirt/snow is the main reason for chopping off a couple inches?
after all its one of the most common accidents to have.

Incidently us Kiwis refer to short guns as SAWN OFF.
Most commonly used for robbing petrol stations and dairys.

Most commonly used for robbing petrol stations and dairys.

You rob dairys? Milk must be high downunder.

Dairy's = small grocery/convenience store, perhaps what you would call a 7/11?

I had this done to a Model 100 SKB. Wrote to the Ithaca factory and got the engineers to calculate how much I would have to cut to get the desired choking. It was less than 2 inches to give me just a little constriction in the right barrel and tight improved cyl in the left. The gun is long gone now as it started doubling on me and I traded it.

I like em both ways (long and short). Does that make me perverted?

I have an old Parker that has been cut back to about 18". I'm thinking about having screw in chokes put in it.

Of course in New Yawk it's pronounced "sore", as in I sawr it.

Are we sure that simply shortening the choke will cause it to produce a more open choke?

Not arguing here you understand, but I was considering opening up a 410 I have with a straight reamer, but then I got to thinking that the angle of constriction of the shot column would not be changed, just the diameter of the muzzle.

So my question is, are all chokes reamed with a reamer that has the same angle ground onto it? Meaning that one just reams deeper for a more open choke?

#1 Yes, assuming you cut it back beyond any parallel section it might have.

#2 The angle of the cone leading into the choke has much less to do with the amount of choke produced than does the muzzle ID. Muzzle ID, compared to bore ID, is the most important factor. Yes, you certainly will open up the choke with a straight reamer.

#3 Not necessarily. I understand Winchester has done just that, usind a reamer with something like a 20' radius and coming through the muzzle farther for a more open choke and less far for a tighter one. In these cases the actual muzzle ID varies, as with all chokes but there is no parallel section.

Friends:

Ill bet that the bulk of the guns I have seen with 2 inches or so lopped off, were done that way to get the open chokes without damaging, too badly, the balance of the gun.

I have seen several that were identified to me as "grandaddy's bird gun" or something similar.

Back when money was dear, it was likely easier to do, even for the professional gunsmith, than getting a set of choke reamers and doing all the skillful adjustments that the late Ralph Walker was so famous for. 6 minutes with a hacksaw, 5 minutes pounding a bit of lead into the gap to replace the keel, and then oil and hot lamp blue the muzzle ends, and Voila - duck gun is transformed into a quail gun.

My guess , of course.

Regards

GKT