Do we know how many vent rib guns were made and how many for each grade?? :corn: scott

Here are some pics from the American Machinist article of 1913 including text describing the procedure.
Here is the link. There is a good deal of info on the milling of the barrels and lugs also, just scroll up in the article a bit.
http://books.google.com/books?id=1rJ...atting&f=false

I have several times before posted photos of a 12ga CHE Bernard with Bernard ventilated rib. It is the only one I know of, but of course there could be more.

There are a number of damascus barreled guns with vent ribs. From what I have seen, the guns were originally made before vent ribs were available, then returned to Parker for addition of the rib when they began to be offered.

Doc Drew shows a rib milling machine above. The classic double with the most complex rib matting that I know of is the Lefever.

David, I would love to have a hard copy of that article but I can't get it off the site.

Dave, I couldn't get it off the site either. I used my cell phone to snap some pics off my laptop screen! I tried to find a vendor that had a copy but no success to date.

I believe the single line matting machine was used on vent rib guns with pins attached. I find it hard to believe that the pins were dressed and engraved after the installation of the rib. What is the opinion of other posters? Second question; why are some pins more visible than others? Is this a result of a repair job with the rib being separated from the pins? Every pin on Jared's gun is quite visible, although well aligned. Has this rib been removed from the pins at some time in the past? By the way, Jared's gun, the Puglisi gun, the gun pictured by Bruce Day, seem to be about all of the composite steel vent rib guns out there. There must be more. Where are they?

go easy on yourself Scott - No one just grabbed this gun. It was a war of bids! I was a casualty. Congrats to Jared!

Factory-installed prototype vent rib guns were seen way before 1922. I believe there was an article in Double Gun Journal years ago about a very unusual vent rib gun down in the 171XXX range that also had a "rippled" pistol grip trigger guard (grooved to fit the fingers). My BHE pigeon gun SN 183562 had a factory vent rib with BTFE as well as a SFE, built in the 1917-18 timeframe.

This gun was hard to put a value on. A few of us, PGCA members bid on the gun. I happened to be runnerup, and was glad to let it go at that price. If it would of had a trap stock, higher comb, I believe there would have been more interest.

Yes, that is John Dunkle's great-grandfather's fantastic AAHE Double Trap gun that I mentioned earlier in this thread. And I believe it was the very first vent-rib gun produced by Parker Bros.






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