doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Hands on a real cutie

Couple of hours ago I got an invitation to lay hands on one that is "'bout as cute as a spekled pup." So, I just naturally had to give her a spin.

The cutie here is a Churchill SLE XXV Premier Quality Skeet model!!! Made for and shot by a lady, too. 5# 2 1/2 oz, 3 5/8" balance (teeter-totter to front trigger), unmounted swing effort of 0.86, mounted swing effort of 4.16, and a half weight radius of 8.80. Barrels are 2# 2 1/2 oz and 25" long, LOP is 13 5/8", and OAL is 40 1/2". Short, light, and fast!! Tied for second place in the MOI database with a Gibbs .410 BLE and behind a NEA Pardner Youth model .410. Greased lightning!!

"unmounted swing effort of 0.86, mounted swing effort of 4.16, and a half weight radius of 8.80"

OK...I am far too stupid to know what any of this means. But I suspect somebody somewhere got a gold star on his forehead for figuring out how to make something very simple very complicated!

Rocketman? Or Rocket Science?

GSY - unmounted swing effort tells you how much effort is required to make the gun point in a different direction (swing) while held between the hands. Mounted swing effort is th the effort required to make the gun point in a different direction when it is mounted to your shoulder. Half weight radius is a measure of compactness. The average for game guns in my database is 6 1/2# weight, 4 1/2" balance, 1.45 unmounted swing, 6.38 mounted, and 10.17 HWR. The Churchill above is 1# 5 1/2 oz lighter, balances 7/8" closer to the trigger hand, takes about 2/3 the effort to swing of a the average game gun, and is very compact.

The MOI machine is to swing what a yardstick is to stock fit, a scale is to weight, and a fulcrum is to balance.

I think you are way "too far from stupid" to not be able to learn these numbers. Too stuborn might be a different issue - we can discuss that if you want ---.

I have imagined the following conversation the first time a yardstick salesman sayshsheyed in to 'Ole Billy Moore's gun shop, "YARDSTICKS? We don't need no stinking yardsticks!!! Stocks are too long, too short, or jezrat! Why would I want to know how long it is??"

OK, Rocket, where do these figures fit when one shooter is 12" taller than another , and they hold the gun in different places ?

Daryl they don't. There is no formula to say how well a gun swings or doesn't. Each person has to pick it up and test it to their satisfaction.

Once you establish the numbers you either shoot well or enjoy shooting (these are not necessarily the same thing), you can "know from afar" if you will like a gun or not; just as you know if a stock can be made to fit you from hearing/reading the LOP. Also, you can nearly replicate a gun - think making a "pair" when the time and place of manufacture are widely separated. Not knowing these numbers for yourself is to handling like not having your stock dimensions is to fit.

A gun with swing effort of 1.0 takes half as much effort to swing as one with a swing effort of 2.0.

But what does the square root of the angle of the dangle work our to be? (Commonly referred to as counter-cast, or shooter compensation for shooting a gun with the opposite cast he or she requires?) Sounds like a "20 day vaction for 2 or a 40-day vacation for 1" type exercise. Forget all this nonsense and SHOOT the things!!! KBM

Rocket,
I would like to know more. How are the measurements made and what calculations are done. Can anyone determine a "swing effort?"
Jake

Jake - I have devised and built a simple little machine that "spins" the gun on a horizontal turntable for one timed revolution under constant torque (bob weight drive with the drive line on the turntable perimeter). Moment of inertia is easily calculated from known torque (bob weight's weight times turntable radius), known angular movement (one revolution) and known time (stopwatch). Calibration is done with an assortment of steel and aluminum bars of measured size and calculated MOI; my cal is pretty acurate (R squared of 0.9998 for those interested in such things).

I multiply the actual MOI times ten to get typically whole numbers and decimals for guns and call it swing effort. There are other ways. Actually, Tom Hammernick showed that you could get useful data with a shoestring and a stopwatch (torsional penduleum principle).

I have a database with 386 guns (as of this afternoon) that I share with anyone interested. Anyone wishing to do his own work can contact me for assistance. I have built 6 machines (2 loaners). See Sept-oct 2001 Shooting Sportsman for an article on this.

BTW - I have gotten a lot more knots on my head than gold stars over this subject. Fortunately, I have a very hard head and thick skin. Questions are always welcome.

That Churchill was one of those guns that just screams, "Buy me, buy me!! I'm so cute you must buy me!" But, i know better!! An unmounted swing of 1.2 is about my legal limit for either fun or good shooting. I don't need one more gun I can't shoot well, no matter how cute. After all, I keep reminding myself that I can't afford to run a gun museum. But, it sure was cute, tucked into a deminuitive toe-under case that just fit