Eleven Gauge Parker
 

My 3215, a $250 grade, is also a C12. I measured all my chambers with a plug gauge, not a bore mic.
Jim Parker's Eleven Ga lettered with B12 chambers. All of the 11 ga guns were made prior to 1875, when Parker flyers offered only 10 and 12 ga guns. Other gauges were available with a surcharge: ie Gary's first 20 ga. Do you think the surcharge should letter on the elevens?

Best, Austin

Austin,

I agree that almost all 11 gauge Parker's were made prior to S/N 6000, but there appear to be a few exceptions. The Parker Story lists 46740, which would have been made in 1885, as an 11 gauge with 30" barrels. I do not know if this gun still exists, but would love to get measurements from it if it does. Bill Furnish, Charlie Herzog and I have found evidence for four others with post 1875 serial numbers --- 1877 S/N 8900 (11 bore barrels chambered for 12A brass shells); 1878 - 12053 (chambered for paper 11 or brass 11A shells); 1879 - 14827 (chambered 10A); and 1882 - 25991 (chambered 11A).

I was also fascinated by what you said about Jim Parker's 11 gauge. Is it really chambered for a 12B shell? I have seen evidence for them chambered 11, 11A, 10B and 12A but never 11B or 12B.

I am intrugued about your comment regarding the surcharge. It would be interesting to see if there is an indication for a surcharge on any of these 5 post 1875 Parker 11 bores. Would you be able to check this out?

Richard

Parker 8900
 

The list of 11ga guns that I posted contains that top action gun. I think some one found it to be an entry error in our "Odd Gauges" discusion in Parker Pages.
I owned 8900 in the 1990's. It shows in the middle of a run of 12/30 inch guns in "Serialization. My notes show it to be .755/.755 cyl bores, with slightly short 12 ga chambers. Could that number be transposed?
7004 .756/.759
18122 .752/.751

The gauge surcharge was still present at 17448, as my lifter 20 carried it.

Best, Austin

Austin,

That data matches the measurements BIll Furnish and I got for S /N 8900 in the mid 1990's. WE concluded it was an 11-gauge gun with 810" diameter chambers, perfect for Brass 12A shells. Do you know if 46740 still exists and if the bores and chambers have been measured. I did not see the article you mentioned.

Thanks,

Richard

Parker Bores
 

The Parker Story shows that there was an abrupt change in Parker barrels near s/n 70000. This figure was used in a Parker Pages article relative to this, and has been on the forum in the past. It is a frequency analysis of Parker 12 ga bore diamerters, showing the abrupt change with the post 70000 tooling.
The two large circles are from live bird guns; much similar to Super Foxes, but may have been post production re bores.
Best, Austin

The full-length taper: I have a 10 ga 1883 Colt that he's a choked modified right barrel and a full length tapered left. I have often wondered about why one would go to the trouble of a full length tapered bore? David

David,

That is interesting. I suspect that those early full length tapered bores were made during experiments to obtain improvements in choke. In the late 1860's and 1870's Parker, Greener and other makers were just learning about choking methods, and some of the very early Parkers had relief muzzle boring, while others had constrictions of different extent, contour and degree.

Have you patterned your two barrels? Also did you do the measurements of the bores to determine the bore diameters were from chamber to muzzle. If so, I would be very much interested in learning the results.

Richard

Austin,

That plot is very strange. I would like to read the article where it was published. By the very definition of shotgun gauge it truly makes no sense. Did it say where the bore diameter was measured? It was well known long before Parker started making shotguns that a gun with a bore diameter of 0.740" to .751" is a tight 11-bore and .751" and above is a wide 11-gauge and should be proof tested accordingly. It seems to me that such over boring of the barrels would result in loss of pressure, permit escape of gasses around the wad, and reduce the shooting quality of the gun. Parker always prided themselves on making a hard shooting gun. I had always thought they abandoned production of eleven gauge guns by the mid-1870's. Why would they make 11-bore barrels for "12-gauge" guns? That is really wierd. Please give me the info about the Parker Pages article---maybe it gives some clues.

Thanks,


Richard

My grade 0 underlifter S/N 8036 has chambers (3") that measure .810 as best I can measure with small digital calipers. The bore diameters are .744 and .746. I'm sure the chambers, forcing cones, and chokes have been messed with. The bore diameters are consistant from about 6" from breach to the start of the choke.

What do I have?

Also, my 12ga TL S/N 27356 have chamber diameters of .810 and bores of .758. These are consistant with Austin's plot.

I am by no means an expert on this topic, all I can go on is guns that I have own/examined myself. My 12 bore G hammer has .751-.752 bores with .810 chambers (45,000 serial # range). Also, my 10 bore D hammer has .793 bores with standard chambers as well (50,000 range). I have recently examined another 0 grade 10 bore with this exact configuration (25,000 range).

I use thin walled brass in both my 12 and 10 bores, with 11 and 9 gauge wads respectably. From what I understand about this topic, these dimensions are common for Parker guns of this vintage. I don't know when "modern" dimensions became the standard, i.e .729, .775 etc. for Parker guns, although Austin's chart gives us a pretty good idea. There is nothing that confuses me more about Parker shotguns than the 11 gauge discussion. According to some people's definition I own one, as do many others. I think the larger bore diameters are just common for early guns.

Time to break open my copy of TPS to bone up on this topic.