Damascus anomaly

[Breck Gorman]

Here is a LeFever 10g that was sent to me for refinishing. The barrel flats have an unusual addition. The barrel is twist, but for some reason, pieces of crolle were soldered in to lengthen the barrel flats. Never seen this before.
I suppose that when the barrel was fitted to the action, the barrel flats and action flats did not match up, so extra material was added. Just a guess, and would be interested to hear other theories.

[Dean Romig]

I’ve never seen such a thing either Breck.





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[Bill Murphy]

New to me and I've seen a few Lefevers.

[Drew Hause]

Breck: that is a Bernard variant; possibly similar to this which I think is "Bernard Ribbon"

https://photos.smugmug.com/LC-Smith/Damascus/i-dpVHLBK/0/1659cbe8/S/Smith%206-S.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/LC-Smith/Damascus/i-dpVHLBK/A)

And the pieces don't match. The top looks like 3 iron "oxford" and the bottom "horseshoe" - must have used whatever was handy ;)

[Brian Dudley]

Breck,

Your assessment as to what happens seems logical to me. Material was added.

[Breck Gorman]

I thought it looked like Bernard too. I even wrote it in my notes, then I wasn’t sure, and scratched it out. Great catch.

[Drew Hause]

Breck: are these your barrels? Similar pattern

https://photos.smugmug.com/Damascus/Parker/i-cG8wKWt/0/0dd4d732/L/Bernard%20Ribbon%20%20Refinished%20Parker%20Stub%2 0Twist-L.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/Damascus/Parker/i-cG8wKWt/A)

[Channing Will]

That is quite an interesting addition. Someone at Lefever must have been a little heavy handed on the milling machine. Could you see a brazing line on any of the sides?

[Arthur Shaffer]

I have never seen a pecelike that, but I did buy an oddity not long ago that seems related. It was a French 10 gauge hammer single fowler that had a Damascus barrel that had a heavy octagon rear portion that stepped down at a wedding ring to a round lighter diameter. The barrel was Damascus but the thicker octagon section was twist. My guess was that it was a lighter damascus overlaid with twist during the welding to give the diameter needed for the octagon section. Odd.

[Drew Hause]

Art: the French adopted Pieper's "Diana Breech" monobloc construction (or maybe Pieper stole the idea from the French?) and it is more likely that the breech monobloc was damascus and the tube twist.
Lots of Pieper's "Modified Diana" barrels (no step down) had a steel breech and damascus tubes

1882

https://photos.smugmug.com/Belgian/Pieper-Monobloc/i-MZmDshk/0/948350c6/S/S%2CD%20%26%20G%20Forest%20%26%20Stream%201882-S.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/Belgian/Pieper-Monobloc/i-MZmDshk/A)

[Dean Romig]

Excellent information Drew - Thanks!





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[Arthur Shaffer]

The gun I bought is earlier than that and the octagon twist section is not a monobloc. The octagon section extends to the end of the forearm tip and the wedding band turned section is beyond that.The damascus pattern only shows after the diameter reduction at the wedding band. The only conclusion I can reach is that the tube was formed with a full length Damascus layer and a twist section for weight and section overlaid at the rear.


Art: the French adopted Pieper's "Diana Breech" monobloc construction (or maybe Pieper stole the idea from the French?) and it is more likely that the breech monobloc was damascus and the tube twist.
Lots of Pieper's "Modified Diana" barrels (no step down) had a steel breech and damascus tubes

1882

https://photos.smugmug.com/Belgian/Pieper-Monobloc/i-MZmDshk/0/948350c6/S/S%2CD%20%26%20G%20Forest%20%26%20Stream%201882-S.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/Belgian/Pieper-Monobloc/i-MZmDshk/A)

[Dean Romig]

Yes, that's exactly what Drew's illustration shows.





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[Drew Hause]

Art: could you please post a close up high resolution images of the section of barrel where the twist and crolle meet? Or send it to me at drewhausemd@yahoo.com as a jpg attachment?

Looking down the bore are you able to see a seam?

https://photos.smugmug.com/Belgian/Pieper-Monobloc/i-wPF6vfd/0/64b2cc83/S/Pieper%20bbl%20interior-S.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/Belgian/Pieper-Monobloc/i-wPF6vfd/A)

[Arthur Shaffer]

First, let me correct myself. I confused the actual details of the barrel layout. The wedding band is on a John Manton converted flintlock fowler hanging next to it. Also, the 10 gauge has a twist front section and the Damascus at the back. I am using the term loosely, but it appears to be a form of Damascus similar to Bernard. The gun is a Galand 10 gauge fowler. It has a 35" barrel with a rear V wing type sight. The barrel is very thick as can be seen from the last picture of the muzzle. The muzzle wall is 0.167" and the chamber wall at the flat (the thinnest point) is 0.356. The gun is heavier than a Scott single 8 gauge I own.

I am familiar with the French monobloc. The first picture is a Manufrance Simplex 26 that is much later fluid steel but has that construction. Most of the French guns I own are built that way. The second picture is of the Galand showing the location of the joint. It is positioned 16" or more down the barrel and no joint shows inside. The other pictures show closeups of the joint. It is obvious that they are made of two different materials. The front looks like a twist construction and the rear some sort of composite. If they are both considered a twist, they are very obviously not the same material. The pattern, ribband sizes and even, to me, the angle of winding are different. You will notice that rear pattern extends forward of the fore end where the taper was turned to merge the two sections and suddenly just runs out. As I say there is no joint seen inside, so I have to assume that the rear section was overlaid on the full length inner tube. The gun is early, heavy, has sights and has a 3-1/2 inch (at least) chamber. Based on that, Ihave to presume it was a market hunter type of gun.

[Arthur Shaffer]

The rear portion also may be an early form of chain Damascus, but confused by the octagon form.

[Drew Hause]

Thanks for the effort Art.

There were clearly 2 tubes; thinner forward Twist and breech tube Bernard Ribbon - which started this thread :)

The arrow is the butt weld line

https://photos.smugmug.com/Damascus/Ferlach-French/i-ZwT6GwV/0/8a264dcc/L/Galand%20Joint%203%20weld-L.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/Damascus/Ferlach-French/i-ZwT6GwV/A)

Is there a maker's marks on the bottom of the breech end of the barrel?

[Arthur Shaffer]

Thanks Drew. I wasn't aware (and had never seen) that it was a practice to place a circumferential joint in composite tubes. Was this very common? I presume the strips would be end welded together and then ribbons wound and welded in a continuous process.

I will look for a maker's mark. Is there any particular form I should try to find?

[Aaron Beck]

If you follow the spiral around it may show where it was scarfed end on. In theory, it could have been jumped on like it appears in the photo, it wouldnt be any weaker than any of the other spiral welded ribbands. It might have been easier to control the location of the transitition to make it up in two pieces like that. I believe, one of the writeups on Drew's site mentions making barrels of three tube components of varying thicknesses all jumped together.

[Drew Hause]

What Aaron said - 2 different tubes are end to end butt welded/"jumped". Almost all damascus barrels were fabricated with 2 or 3 tube segments - thicker at the breech, and that usually changes the pattern apperance somewhat

Weld line between laminated steel tubes

https://photos.smugmug.com/Damascus/Defects/i-5TgbhwZ/0/21bbd8ff/L/4b%20Reilly%20weld%20line-L.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/Damascus/Defects/i-5TgbhwZ/A)

This would be cool :)

https://photos.smugmug.com/Damascus/Ferlach-French/i-MP43WNr/0/2f5aa299/M/Bernard%20Fleurey%20a%20Versoul1848-M.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/Damascus/Ferlach-French/i-MP43WNr/A)

[Arthur Shaffer]

I couldn't get a good picture of all the marks. Most are understood.

At the fron are 8844, C 46, and 10x. Spacing varies between letters and numbers. There is a single B on the fore end loop.

At the rear are CANON DE GALAND, FABRICANT A PARIS, 17.8 and CHOKE. All pretty obvious. There is also a capital M with an asterisk over which is an 1877- Belgium inspector's mark and thePost 1853 Radio Tower proof mark. There is an oval cartouche that is essentially gone so no info. The only thing that looks like a maker's mark is a square punched field that contains a pair of interlaced semicircular shaped horns, or that is my take on it under a magnifier. I couldn't locate anything like it in the limited references I had on the subject.

I knowGaland was better known for revolvers, but I have seen several very nice doubles from him. This gun is marked Galand Paris on the top rib, and he had shops both there and in belgium. The bottom of the barrel would seem to indicate that it was manufactured in Paris in his Paris shop, but the proofs show that either it went to Melgium for proof or the barrel was proofed there. Probably late 1870's. The intertwined antlers may be the barrel maker mark.

[Arthur Shaffer]

By the way. The 17.8 makes no sense, as that is not even 12 bore, and the chamber is a perfect fit for a modern 10 gauge 3-1/2". I don't have a 10 gauge bore gauge.

[Drew Hause]

You've no doubt seen this
http://www.littlegun.be/arme%20belge/artisans%20identifies%20g/a%20galand%2014367%20gb.htm

The proof marks indicate that at least the barrels, and likely the action was made in Belgium, and possibly finished in Galand's shop in Paris. Very common.

When you get a chance chalk the intertwined antlers marks and I'll try to ID the maker.

18.4 = .724" which would be the standard 12g bore of the time.

Apparently there were some 3 1/2" and 4" English 10g black powder loads in the 1880s. In the 1890s Winchester offered the 10 gauge in 2 1/2, 2 9/16, 2 3/4, 2 7/8, 3, 3 1/4 and 3 1/2 inch shells.

The Belgian Proof House typically marked the bore at the time of preliminary proof, and it is possible Galand bored the barrel and chamber to 10g in Paris.
Have you measured the end-of-chamber wall thickness?

Odd that it is marked CHOKE.
NON POUR BALLE was used for choked unrifled bores 1878 - 1897

[Dean Romig]

Parker Bros. in-house made Laminated Steel barrels are a good example of this. I have three of them and they are composed of roughly 15” segments butt-welded together.





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[Arthur Shaffer]

As to the bore, it is definitely marked 17.8, which is very close to 0.700". The entire barrel assembly profile is very close to the outside dimensions of a W&C Scott 8 gauge from 1872 which I own. I suspect that Galand may have made one gun for 12, 10 and 8 gauges, so the outside would have been duplicated and fit the same action. I think the 10 x mark may be related to the 10 gauge chambering (10x being a long chamber?). As mentioned, the chamber wall at the back is over 0.36" at the thinnest. Based on the outside taper, the thickness at the front would be around 0.32", and near 0.5" under the octagon corners.
I will try to measure the length with a 10 gauge chamber gauge. It has enough length to measure longer than 3-1/2".

I don't know if a tracing will work, but I will try or maybe make a scketch.

[Arthur Shaffer]

I checked the chamber and it appears to be 3-1/2". A new 3-1/2" 10 gauge brass shell fits with no play, as does a 3-1/2" new primed Cheddite. My Brownell's 10 bore chamber gauge only goes in to the 2-7/8" mark, but I have run into this before.

The entire twist forward section is exactly 1.00" outside. That makes the wall thickness from the butt section forward right at 0.10". The muzzle measures approximately 0.723". That amounts to a whopping choke of around 0.075" constriction.

I tried a tracing of the mark with no luck. I held it under a lighted desk magnifier and sketched it as well as I could. The picture is included. The arrow indicates the direction that indicates what I beliefe to be up. All the inspector and proof marks around it are oriented this way. Note that the box I sketched is actually the base of a square punch which was struck hard enough to impact the base into the barrel. The actual mark is only the curves inside. The mark itself is only about 1/4"square.

I had looked before at the littlegun.be link you listed. My gun is very similar to the first gun (the Model 16). However mine is much larger and, I believe built to a higher grade. The actions are very similar as to style and shape, but mine is built with a swivel underlever and wedge fore end attachment. The action has engraving and the wood is of a very high grade. Also, the guns shown are in the 15K to 20K serial number range. Mine is 44xx. The writeup shows they had shops in London and Liege. Mine is marked Galand Paris and is stamped as Manufacturer in Paris (in French). I have no doubt however that it was made and proofed in Liege and likely finished in Paris for that market.

[Drew Hause]

I suspect that is what is left of the Le Banc d'épreuve des armes à feu de Liège provisional proof mark

This is a Lefever and the mark is often distorted with barrel finishing

https://photos.smugmug.com/Belgian/Proof-Marks/i-XN8M6KB/0/114e8188/M/Liege%20proof%201-M.jpg (https://drewhause.smugmug.com/Belgian/Proof-Marks/i-XN8M6KB/A)

[Arthur Shaffer]

I think you are correct Drew. The top half looks like what I have.
Thanks for the effort.