Damascus chambers and steel tubes

[Rick Riddell]

How often do you encounter this? Would this be something done by Parker, seems like it wouldn't be very cost effective to have this done privately.

[Eric Eis]

I think what you are talking about is called sleeved barrels, old barrels (damaged or too thin) are cut off and then new steel tubes are mated to the old barrels (chamber area) and welded together. That's a very rough explaination of what sleeved barrels are.

[Rick Riddell]

Now I got it! Makes sense now, thank you!

[Bill Murphy]

This is a very common procedure, one that is getting more expensive every year and adds little value to a good original gun.

[Eric Johanen]

This subject comes up occasionally. Bill is correct that it adds little or no value to a solid original gun. However, with a nice gun that has damaged tubes from either neglect or accident, a nice shooter can be brought back to life. I have several very nice doubles that have been sleeved and with their new tubes are excellent shooters. If they carried their original barrels hey would have been out of my affordability range. Being a shooter first and collector second I do not find sleeved guns much of a bother. If it is a very nice gun, having it sleeved or buying a sleeved gun can be a good way to restore the usefulness and with a quality job one can enjoy it on the course or in the field.

[Ted Hicks]

This picture shows Parker Damascus barrels that have ben sleeved. I know it isn't a great depiction, but hopefully you can see what is shown. I believe the photo can be enlarged by clicking on it. This one was done by Del Grego, I believe.

[edgarspencer]

The process of "sleeving" has been done in England for many years, and well before it was commonplace over here. The English also stamped guns as such, by either the gunsmith, or the proof house.
The term is commonly used, but a bit of a misnomer, as there is another process, where the entire bore of the original barrel is bored out, the whole length, and a 'liner' is partially pressed, partially "shrunk" into place than final bored, honed, and choked. The process is done by Teague, and others.What is refered to as 'sleeving' is also commonly called 'monoblocking'.
Parker Hale, in England, and a company now out of business in Kansas,( Actually, they're not out of business, just not doing the sleeving anymore) known as the 90-06 Armory, commonly bored out guns that were shot out; lacking any rifling, and ran a sleeve down it's entire length. Again, by law, in the UK, this was revealed. '90-06', who got their name, by working almost exclusively on the model 1890, and 1906 Winchester pump .22, would bore from the breach end, to within about an 1/8" of the muzzle, so that the sleeve wasn't apparent. Guns given such a treatment, that had little cash value prior, would be made to be good shooters.

[Todd Poer]

Edgar, thanks for adding that background. Very informative. The first gun I ever shot is a 22 short Winchester pump, I think it's a so called gallery gun that was chambered for 22 shorts. It passed down thru the family but rifling on it was and still is shot out. Part of my self appointed duties as a kid was to shoot all the mice around the corn crib with that old gun using rat shot.

My dad used to make me carry that gun with no bullets when first started going with him on quail hunts to learn how to carry a gun in the field. Have a Love/Hate relationship that gun. That was a heavy piece of artillery for a spindly 8 year old kid to drag around for a couple of mile walk and constantly getting reminded how I was carrying it wrong. Still remember thinking at the time quail hunting sucks, but it was a valuable lesson about gun safety.

[Dean Romig]

Todd, that's how I trained my grandson when he first started tagging along on my grouse hunts at age 7. I made him a 'gun' from a shortened .22 rifle stock with a length of 1/2" copper tubing painted black and attached to the stock. I was pretty hard on him about the way he carried it and he learned pretty well, acing the hunter safety course when he was 11. He'll be 13 in May and loves to go hunting with "Grampy" every chance he gets.






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[Dean Romig]

Back to 'sleeving'...

Probably a better word would be 'jointing' as "sleeving" almost seems misleading and "monoblocking" is a misnomer in the case of Parkers and other old doubles where the two barrels, the lug, and the rib extension are four separate pieces. Monoblocking is the process of machining and boring a solid one-piece (mono) block of steel alloy to the shape and configuration to become the breech section of the two barrel tubes, which are then jointed to it.





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[Ted Hicks]

I am not a metal worker or welder so bear with me please. In what we are referring to as sleeving, the old barrels are cut off and the new barrels are welded to the old chambers. In the example I showed in the photo in my earlier post, there is only a very fine line showing that this was done.

The location of that joint, I assume, will be subjected to the full pressure of the load upon firing. It seems to me that the weld is applied to the surface of the joint, but then ground away to achieve aesthetic expectations. How is this joint strong enough to be safe? I trust that it is, I am just hoping to learn why.

[Dean Romig]

Ted,

The front of the breech section, after the barrels are cut off, is bored to accept the machine-stepped barrel tubes (probably as much as 1/2" in length) and shrink fit and welded or bonded in some manner.

I had a Ruger Red Label (which are monoblocked as are most modern doubles) that would weep oil from both joints with the first couple of shots I took after cleaning and oiling it. I called Ruger about this and they told me in effect, "Don't worry about that, a lot of them do that..." So, it ain't perfect on every gun.





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[Ted Hicks]

Ahh, I can see how that adds strength. Maybe that's how/why the term "sleeved" came to be used because that stepped barrel "lug" is inserted into the bored-out chamber "sleeve" section. Thanks!

[Robin Lewis]

I had Bred sleeve a 16ga for me. According to Brad, what he did was remove the ribs and saw off the original barrels in front of the breach chambers. He then bored out the remaining breach material to accept the tubes and turned 16ga barrel tubes to zero tolerance of the size bored "through" what was the original chambers. He put the tubes into liquid nitrogen and slipped the tubes into the breach and when the tubes warmed up they were there to stay. Then laser welded the joint to make it about invisible when blued. He re-chambered the barrels and did whatever magic it took to prove point of aim, obtain proper balance, relay the ribs and fit forend & action back to proper working order.

The only thing he didn't do that I expected was to laser weld the joint in the breach end, I could see the hair thin line under the ejectors on the barrels breach ends. But, needless to say, I was happy with the results. The gun went from a non-shooter to a very nice, serviceable gun.

[edgarspencer]

Robin, the method Brad used is the same as what is done in England. The bored out chamber is usually to the cartridge rim diameter. Rather than a square shoulder, the barrel tube has a very slight champher from the smaller diameter to the large diameter. This then gives a V groove weld prep.

[John Walters]

Out of the dark at last I have a JP Sour SXS and it is stamped sleeved and I have been looking at the breach end for years to find the sleeve inside the chamber and could not find it. I assumed that the job was so good I just could not see it. Shoot it so well single trigger with ejectors 600.00 dollars I didn't care but was curious not any more.

[Drew Hause]

Images of the process are here
http://www.picturetrail.com/sfx/album/view/20580224

[Bill Murphy]

Drew, thanks for clarifying the truth about sleeving among the many expert opinions of what some of us "think" sleeving is. I believe Dewey Vicknair has some demonstration of sleeving on his website or blog.

[Harry Collins]

I purchased a 16 gauge Parker hammer gun that had been sleeved to 20 gauge. I loved the little gun and won the 20 gauge hammer gun event at the Southern with it one year. At the Fall Southern a few years later I found an original 16 gauge Parker with the same type frame that had been lightened. It was so much lighter and well balanced it made me disappointed in my gun.

[Dean Romig]

Right Bill - ‘sleeving’ and ‘lining’ are two completely different methods of addressing unsafe barrels/bores.





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