Damascus anomaly

[Dean Romig]

Excellent information Drew - Thanks!





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[ArtS]

The gun I bought is earlier than that and the octagon twist section is not a monobloc. The octagon section extends to the end of the forearm tip and the wedding band turned section is beyond that.The damascus pattern only shows after the diameter reduction at the wedding band. The only conclusion I can reach is that the tube was formed with a full length Damascus layer and a twist section for weight and section overlaid at the rear.

Originally Posted by Drew Hause

Art: the French adopted Pieper's "Diana Breech" monobloc construction (or maybe Pieper stole the idea from the French?) and it is more likely that the breech monobloc was damascus and the tube twist.
Lots of Pieper's "Modified Diana" barrels (no step down) had a steel breech and damascus tubes

1882

[Dean Romig]

Yes, that's exactly what Drew's illustration shows.





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[Drew Hause]

Art: could you please post a close up high resolution images of the section of barrel where the twist and crolle meet? Or send it to me at drewhausemd@yahoo.com as a jpg attachment?

Looking down the bore are you able to see a seam?

[ArtS]

First, let me correct myself. I confused the actual details of the barrel layout. The wedding band is on a John Manton converted flintlock fowler hanging next to it. Also, the 10 gauge has a twist front section and the Damascus at the back. I am using the term loosely, but it appears to be a form of Damascus similar to Bernard. The gun is a Galand 10 gauge fowler. It has a 35" barrel with a rear V wing type sight. The barrel is very thick as can be seen from the last picture of the muzzle. The muzzle wall is 0.167" and the chamber wall at the flat (the thinnest point) is 0.356. The gun is heavier than a Scott single 8 gauge I own.

I am familiar with the French monobloc. The first picture is a Manufrance Simplex 26 that is much later fluid steel but has that construction. Most of the French guns I own are built that way. The second picture is of the Galand showing the location of the joint. It is positioned 16" or more down the barrel and no joint shows inside. The other pictures show closeups of the joint. It is obvious that they are made of two different materials. The front looks like a twist construction and the rear some sort of composite. If they are both considered a twist, they are very obviously not the same material. The pattern, ribband sizes and even, to me, the angle of winding are different. You will notice that rear pattern extends forward of the fore end where the taper was turned to merge the two sections and suddenly just runs out. As I say there is no joint seen inside, so I have to assume that the rear section was overlaid on the full length inner tube. The gun is early, heavy, has sights and has a 3-1/2 inch (at least) chamber. Based on that, Ihave to presume it was a market hunter type of gun.

[ArtS]

The rear portion also may be an early form of chain Damascus, but confused by the octagon form.

[Drew Hause]

Thanks for the effort Art.

There were clearly 2 tubes; thinner forward Twist and breech tube Bernard Ribbon - which started this thread

The arrow is the butt weld line



Is there a maker's marks on the bottom of the breech end of the barrel?

[ArtS]

Thanks Drew. I wasn't aware (and had never seen) that it was a practice to place a circumferential joint in composite tubes. Was this very common? I presume the strips would be end welded together and then ribbons wound and welded in a continuous process.

I will look for a maker's mark. Is there any particular form I should try to find?

[Aaron Beck]

If you follow the spiral around it may show where it was scarfed end on. In theory, it could have been jumped on like it appears in the photo, it wouldnt be any weaker than any of the other spiral welded ribbands. It might have been easier to control the location of the transitition to make it up in two pieces like that. I believe, one of the writeups on Drew's site mentions making barrels of three tube components of varying thicknesses all jumped together.

[Drew Hause]

What Aaron said - 2 different tubes are end to end butt welded/"jumped". Almost all damascus barrels were fabricated with 2 or 3 tube segments - thicker at the breech, and that usually changes the pattern apperance somewhat

Weld line between laminated steel tubes



This would be cool