Fox A grade 16 gauge returned to field use

[tom tutwiler]

Being the bottom feeder that I am, I am always looking to make a silk purse out of a sows ear. *A few weeks ago I wandered into an early A grade 16 Gauge with late style engraving on an auction site. *I say early style because it had the snap on forums which weren't around that long. *Snap on forearms with late style engraving are probably even harder to find. *The gun itself was mechanically in pretty sad shape (parts were missing). *The stock was also in sad shape. *It had been cut and then a cocobolo piece of wood added to lengthen the pull. *That work was actually pretty good. *Except whomever in their quest for perfection in a refinish and re-checker had also sanded the buttstock well below the metal on the receiver. *

The one thing that made me pull the trigger and purchase the gun was the barrels were Krupp steel and they hadn't been messed with. *I confirmed that by having a copy of the work order card sent to me before I bid. *Anyway, did the bid and won the auction. *Had it last week (Wed) shipped directly to Dan Rossiter at Custom Stocks and Steel. *

Yesterday Dan and I got together and measured the barrels and they passed with flying colors. *.039 Min barrel wall thickness and both chokes at .023. *Bores on both was .653. *I would have been happy with my purchase right then. *Graded Fox barrels don't grow on tree's and these are nice and by themselves worth what I paid for the gun IMO. *However, Dan likes a challenge and wanted to know if I wanted to turn this into shooter for this year. *At 6 lbs 2 oz (according to the work order card) it seemed like a no brainer provided Dan could scavenge enough parts around the shop to make it work. *Well, 4 plus hours later it was done. *Dan added all the required parts. *Worked to make everything work together as it should and the trigger pulls were set a 4 lbs (front) and 4.5 (rear). *He had to make a couple of parts (rear tang screw) and an internal action part during the process. *He also cut off the Cocobolo extension and added a salvaged orginal Jostam pan that already had a 1/4" spacer to make the length what I would need (14.5").

All done, its not the ugliest (or most lovely) gun I've hunted with. *I'm going to have to add something to the comb so I can use it this year (its got 3" DAH), but that's fine. *Down the road we will do something with it for sure, but in the meantime its an absolute rainy day Fox. *Anyway, a few before and after pictures:

Where we started:



Dan doing his thing with the action:




Where we finished (or should I say where Dan finished. *I watched a lot and told stories):