stan, recently, an avid shooter i know of had a scary experience...seems like he occasionally shot skeet with a 12 gauge parker hammer gun with damascus barrels, using light smokeless loads...been doing so for quite awhile...well this summer, he was shooting as usual, when one of the barrels erupted, with a few inches of barrel being blown out...fortunately, no one was hurt...one never knows when one of these old guns is going to let go...if one must shoot guns with twist steel barrels, then do so only occasionally...and then only use shells loaded with powder the gun was designed for...ie: black powder...
and as for shooting .017 or similar thin barrel walls...a barrel blockage of any kind or a severe barrel dent will cause pressures to increase rapidly...in that situation, the thinner the barrel walls, the more likely there will be a bulge or eruption...i would think...
minimum barrel wall thickness of .030 is my standard for safety...others say .025 is ok...shooting anything below .025 is to risky for me...
Last edited by ed good; 09/24/21 09:46 PM.
