I purchased a very nice Batavia Special shotgun by Baker yesterday at a local auction. It has most of the case color on the receiver and lock plates, the wood is uncracked and retains most of it's original finish and the barrels retain about all of the original blue. Really a very handsome shotgun overall. It has one somewhat serious problem though - there is a very slight bulge and an axial hairline crack about .37-.50" long at the bulge. This is about 20" from the breech. The barrels are not damascus so this gun would make a fine shooter except I worry about the crack getting longer if I shoot it. I could also cut the barrels down to 20" but the gun is so pretty it is hard to consider that honestly. I know jewelers and probably some others use a laser welder that can do extremely fine work and wonder if this is an issue that could solved using that technique. Does anybody have any experience with correcting a problem like this?
