Thanks for the clarification, Bruce. I was scratching my head because your reply said something very similar to what I had written. No worries.

Jim

Jim and Bruce, it is certainly a fact that there were countless guns of inferrior quality, especially in the quality of the barrels, in the hands of the 'common man' in those days and certainly there were probably a lot of burst barrels as a result of the confusion over "dr. eq." of the new smokeless powders. And without question this confusion could have been cleared up to a great degree by the ammunition companies (which were largely subsidiaries of major gun manufacturers or in business agreements with them) with more widespread warnings.... BUT they didn't go as far as they could have - opting instead to do what they did - to blanket ALL Damascus or Twist barreled guns with the dire warnings they printed on all boxes of ammunition and cans of smokeless powders - and that, gentlemen, is fact.

Here is an interesting letter from the 60's

[IMG]http://www.hunt101.com/data/500/33919Ithaca.jpg[/IMG]

I wonder if Parker Bros. were still in business in 1966 would they have given the same advice.

Given the litigious nature of American society, if not in 1966, certainly by now they would have. In the early part of the 1900's people took responsibility for their own actions but ever more prevalent as the century churned onward was the threat to manufacturers of liability for the failure of their products even due to the blatant stupidity of the user.

Ya, I would think you're right....:banghead:

Wow! Talk about taking it a step further, “not even black powder” :eek:
I can just imagine a good number of fine American turn of the century
skilled craftsmen in unison rolling over in their grave's in total disgust.

Note: HIS COMMENT" AFTER CAREFUL CONSIDERATION IN WHICH SUCH BARRELS HAVE FAILED"
I SUSPECT THAT HE HAD A VERY SHORT LIST OF SUCH BARRELS
HAVING FAILED ,IF ANY. OF THE MANY THAT I KNOW OF THAT FAILED, MOST WERE STEEL BARRELS NOT DAMASCUS. HOW MANY THOUSANDS IF NOT MILLIONS OF ROUNDS HAVE BEEN FIRED IN TWIST AND DAMASCUS AND FEW EVERY REPORTED?

If I remember Shermans black powder pressure curves it seems that black powder might be more likely than smokeless to blow a damascus bbl. Seems it reached peak pressure sooner than smokeless did. Am I remembering correctly??

I don't no about the black powder pressure question. But I do know first hand when
going above the 3 dram level of black powder, the recoil gets very intense.
I got very concerned about the beating the stock was taking.