Advice for a Vintage Shotgun Newbie

[Cthulhu]

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[Mills]

I would take your time and wait for the right gun with more open chokes to come along. They are out there. Having been new at one time myself, there is a lot of temptation to get the first thing you see and that is a mistake. Good luck whatever you decide.

[Cthulhu]

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[FoxintheHenHouse]

I'll 2nd the waiting for a more open choked gun. I hate it when I hear a buyer of an old quality untouched gun says "it's my gun and I'll open the chokes if I want to". If you are anything like myself, you probably won't own that gun until death do you part, unless you are not much into collecting and one gun will be enough, so leave it as it is and search for another. I love tight choked guns and I find them much harder to find than an open choked one. I always thought, that in due time, there may not be any untouched guns left to pick from.

FoxintheHenHouse

[FoxintheHenHouse]

I would take your time and wait for the right gun with more open chokes to come along. They are out there. Having been new at one time myself, there is a lot of temptation to get the first thing you see and that is a mistake. Good luck whatever you decide.

Thank you for the advice and it sounds like you feel my "pain" of wanting to get something right away. Out of curiosity, would it be a travesty to open the chokes or am I being overly dramatic? It has been re case colored and rust blued so it's not untouched.

I can accept recased and blued, if done properly, but messing with the metal just destroys my interest.

FoxintheHenHouse

[eightbore]

Opening chokes, shipping, insurance and related costs are ridiculously expensive and often not done well. Somehow, I have survived sixty years of buying and trading double shotguns and have never felt the need to ruin the bores of one of my guns. The same sixty years have been used to learn how to shoot.

[Researcher]

"Meat-in-the-Pot" (12-gauge A-Grade 28-inch Krupp 3-weight barrels with a straight grip) left North 18th Street and Windrim Avenue in 1914 choked improved modified in both barrels. I got her in the summer of 1966, almost immediately had the right barrel opened to improved cylinder and have never regretted it one bit. I was going to school in Colorado in 1970 and MITP had lots of fun there --

September 1970 near Craig, Colorado

Opening Day, Colorado, 1970

Similarly my favorite 20-gauge Ansley H. Fox for hunting is a 1913 vintage 28-inch barrel A-Grade, I've had for 25 years, that left the factory full and full, but an old Annapolis, Maryland, Quail hunter had opened to .004" and .016". It gets out and about much more often then my 20-gauges with .031" in both barrels or another with .027" and .032".

Unless it is a near mint condition "collectors item" I'm in favor of making the gun useful for what you want to do.

[Cthulhu]

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[Cthulhu]

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[Cthulhu]

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[Stan Hillis]

Yes. Spreader loads work well, some better than others. Experiment with them by patterning, and then take them hunting. I use them a lot because I really do not like messing with original chokes. They will open your pattern by the equivalent of .005" to .010", or in layman's terms, from full choke to modified, or possibly even light modified or improved cylinder, according to the spreader load used. They won't make a full choked gun into a skeet choked gun.

I go through two flats a year. Great alternative to opening chokes.

SRH

[Jeff S]

My experience has been that a Fox with .037 points of constriction, using RST #8 shot, put 84% of the BBs in a 30" circle at 40 paces. Moments later, the exact same gun, using RST #8 spreaders, put 54% of the BBs in a 30" circle at 40 paces. These results are the average of only 3 shots each, and I have no actual hunting "kills" to substantiate the performance of spreaders. I really have zero ballistics expertise, but I figured I would share the results of my test with you, since you asked.

[Cthulhu]

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[Sporrns]

I have been using Morris Baker's #10 RST spreader loads for woodcock for 2 years now out of my 20 ga. 28" AE which left Philly choked M & F. They do a great job on woodcock up close in dense, heavy cover and the patterns are about all done @ 20 yards, which is all you (I) want any way. The season 2nd half opens back up the week before MLK day. I'll either take that combo above, or my UTE Sterly SKUGG 16 ga. which needs no spreaders of any kind at .005 RB and .010 LB! Kevin

[TOOL MAN]

CThulhu,

Unless I missed something, you haven't told us the grade/model of the vintage, Philly Fox you're fretting over??? Is it a 20 bore Sterlingworth?? If it was once owned by Czar Nicholas, I'd suggest using spreaders. If not, hold-on to your day job, open the chokes and good hunting!