Steel Shot in Parkers

[Big Friend Ten (BFT)]

Although a small sample, when caught off guard and ammo-less (What didn't I remember from Marine Corps training, "I can never have too much ammo!") by an approaching flight of Buffies my Steel Shooting Parker friend handed me a half dozen of his steel shot shells. I used them with Gauge Mates in my Parker EH 10 with the only bad results being suffered by the ducks. Parker chokes and bores are still A'okay!

PS: A 10 gauge has 9% more area than does a 12 gauge. The pressure drop should correspond. Accurate pressure testing of course should be done before trying this at home...

[Blind Dog]

Bill, The NH is cosmeticly Remington/DelGrego and the dimensions are up to date. I asked Lawrence if he thought the gun came out of their shop, and he was certain that it did. I didn't ask specifically about the barrel work, but I believe that at the time this work was done that the DelGregos had the sleeving done by Lefever. Pic to follow, can't get one on here.

[Blind Dog]

Bill, Here's a pic from the file. I'll have to take some more for a better presentation.

Heck, I always pay too much.

[Theodore LeDurt]

Sorry for getting to the "dance" late.

First off, I have shot well over a 1000 rounds of 3" steel (2#,3#,4#) shot out of an Auto 5 Belgium gun with modified choke with no problems. Also I have fired 100's of steel rounds from a 10ga Berreta Siverhawk. 12ga Grulla, and a 12ga James.

After hours of conversation with Tom Armbrust and Worth Mathewson, all my chokes were opened to .017 left and .009 right barrel. Twelve gauge loads were kept under 1400fps, only 1 1/8oz, #2 shot or larger, in 2 3/4", except the 1oz load of #3 Black Cloud, which I believe to be 1500 fps. I realize this is antidotal, but there was no barrel damage from any of my guns. This conversation is only referencing steel barrels, not damascus.

I have never shot steel from my Parker as I want to retain the full and full in the 32" barrels (Buckingham wannabe) and am now loading ITX for this gun, but would not hesitate to shoot steel if the chokes were opened.

[Big Friend Ten (BFT)]

Theodore,

Welcome aboard! Your information shall serve as a data point in the overall assessment. Since your experiance was not from a "controlled test" we shall enter it as Shooter Experiance.

Could you measure your Browning's modified choke?
Also, what brand/model steel shot did you predominately shoot?

[Bruce Day]

xxxx

Originally Posted by Destry L. Hoffard

What all this really means is that anybody with good sense won't shoot steel in a vintage shotgun unless it's just some old beater piece of crap they don't care about. Notice I said, anybody with good sense......

Destry

[Bruce Day]

xxxx

Originally Posted by Dave Suponski

Yup, We can move on now.

[Bruce Day]

Fellows, thanks for considering these important issues.

I got several emails from forum members about their gun clubs moving to non tox ammo and how that seemed to be a disturbing and coming trend. If we don't look at these issues, vintage gun collectors are going to find their use of these guns increasingly restricted.

Generally , we are the most well thought out vintage gun collectors organization, in my opinion. If we don't investigate or push for investigation of shooting steel in vintage guns, who will? Not the gun makers , they want to sell you a new gun, just like they did when fluid steel barrels surpassed damascus barrels. We have some good members, maybe the best in the gun collecting community, and maybe we lead the way in serious investigation for the Browning, Winchester, Fox, Smith, etc folks.

The chamber pressure and recoil issues can be addressed in steel loads just like in lead loads.....don't shoot the heavy stuff that whacks you and the gun.

The unresolved and important issues are constriction and barrel streaking. The Roster shot cup is supposed to prevent streaking and bore erosion, so tests demonstrating that in mild steel vintage barrels are needed. The constriction issue may be resolved now, and there may be research already done that we could retrieve. Maybe what we need is a new series in the DGJ dealing with steel in vintage guns. Remember when the shooting damascus article series came out? Before that there were those who had all sorts of misinformation and rumors about black powder, smokeless powder and damascus.

So all we have so far is anecdotal information, some people have courageously admitted good experiences, maybe there is something there, but certainly more investigation needs to be done. I'm thankful that Mark is interested and wants to look more into it. If we can develop an acceptable and doable testing protocol, that would be best.

We have a person with sleeved barrels and his barrel man told him that steel was acceptable in those barrels. Let's think about that. What makes the sleeved barrels more resistant to steel shot than original Parker fluid steel barrels ? Both are mild steel tubes. Parker then later Rem used the best steel available. Was the best steel available then inferior to the steel tubes used for sleeving today?

So, fellows, thanks for keeping an open mind, as we set out to do in post #1.

[Bill Murphy]

Fred, if your gun came through Del Grego's shop a while back, the sleeving was probably done at Lefever. My sleeved Magnum ten DH actually has Lefever markings on the rib, but it is the only one I have ever seen marked like that. My gun has no other marking that would indicate where the sleeving was done. The rib inscription was changed to "Lefever Steel" from Damascus Steel. The new inscription looks like it was done at the Parker factory, very professional.

[Big Friend Ten (BFT)]

Gentlemen,

As Bill commeted, research is needed. It is our intention to conduct controlled tests to investigate how much pressure and strain older barrels can endure without deformation or failure. The test protocols will be very important.

What is most important in conducting research in this emotionally charged subject is to leave those emotions behind and gather data for analysis. These tests will however take time. If we have agreed upon protocols we could establish multiple test teams are different locations. This would provide more data and potentially faster results.

We very seriously intend to publish our results.

If anyone desires to contribute their time, knowledge, or resources please contact me via PM.

Respectfully,
Mark