Fox Collectors

I just picked up a original straight stock HE , The last owner had the gun lettered a long time ago, it was ordered to be finished less than 8lbs and its 7lbs 13oz with 1wt 32" barrels, and it was ordered by Western Cartiride co. with these custom feaures is there any way I could find out if ths was John Olins gun? The triggerguard looks like it was case colored and there is a mark on the barrels behind both #1's that is S B & Co that was there before they were blued never seen this before.
Thanks
John

How about some pics to look at. sounds interesting.

Can't wait to see some pics on that one!

Welcome back to the U.S.A., and Georgia, Brian. Thanks for your service.

Stan

I seems some HE's were ordered to be lighter than the norm and were built on regular 12 gauge sized frames, not the somewhat larger 0 frame, and their barrels were heavy profiled 1-weights.

I recently measured the heavy 30" 1-weights on a regular frame HE, comparing with the same measurements on a 12 gauge with 1-weight barrels on a 1916 gun. Both barrels had "1" stamps. The HE barrels were basically the same as the 1916 Krupp barrels except for larger bores, but their O.D.'s were somewhat larger beginning about 1/3 way down the tubes. I assume this was in deference to the progressive powders then in use, although the walls were plenty thick on both sets of barrels.

Most anything about HE's is a facinating subject for me; a highlight was when I had the opportunity to handle the Bartholomew 32" HE with regular frame brought by Russ Bickel to our Bo-Whoop Trophy shoot in June. Silvers

Nothing posted. at lesst I cant see any.

There is a misconception about fox making different size receivers for the HE guns , they did not, The He guns had the same size frame they were not filed down as much as a regular grade gun when they were finished , I bought a huge load of original parts and over 100 barrels all in the white some years ago form Mitzi Belein who when he retired Savage gave him all the AH Fox tooling and parts since they were not going to do any more repairs them, In the parts there were HE 12 and He 20 full guns in the white and HE actions marked with a H and regular graded actions in the white and they were the same size in 12 and 20 (these are 2 diferent size actions one is for all 12ga guns other is for all 20ga guns and 16's). from a production point off view this would be the most cost effective way to build them , it was neat seeing all the choke boring tools and the rip matting machine, I dont want to ruffle anyones feathers but that was the way the parts were.

I hope to make this a little clearer the 12 ga frames were the same size in the white ( HE and standard )and the small bore 20 frames both HE and rstandard were also the same size as the small bore action, there were 2 action sizes one for 12 and the other for small bore 20 -16
John
Sorry I do not have any parts for sale, they were sold a while ago

I don't agree with what you posted. The differences in the frame sizes for a regular 20-gauge, a 20-gauge Super-Fox and a regular 12-gauge was published in McIntosh's article in Sporting Classics Jan/Feb 1996. We have certainly recorded a number of HE-Grades both in 12- and 20-gauge built on regular size-frames with 1-weight barrels.

The S.B.&Co. marking is the marking of the tube supplier -- Sanderson Brothers & Company, part of Crucible Steel. The other tube maker's marks often see on Ansley H. Fox doubles are a D with a three-lobed crown over it and LLH.

That is fine but I owned the original actions in the white and will get you some pics of them , I know they built guns on #1 Barrels but there is no difference for the actions for 12 HE and 20HE from regular actionst, the 20HE was a regular small bore and the 12HE was a regular 12 they all fit the same internal parts , there were wooden boxes full of parts for 12 and small bore guns ,and there were no special HE parts , Macintosh may have said that but from observation and it seems like there are 2 different sizes but there is not, where did he get his info from where was it written from Fox or Savage Co. but again you can never say never with the custom guns they made. Give me a call if you want to discuss this as I am not the greats typist , Ill PM you my phone #
Thanks John

Pretty gun; the stock seems to have a slight "swan" (term?) to it. Is this typical of the Fox straight stocks?

HE John.... like Dave I respectfully disagree with your statement there is no difference in the frames for 12 HE's and regular 12 gauge guns, except that the regular ones were filed to an increased extent. That doesn't make sense IMO considering typical machine shop practice, i.e. make the forging as close to finished size as possible, machine tool time is money wasted. The frames were undoubtedly filed a bit to remove tooling marks but taking off an extensive amount of metal on a way oversized forging by files or even machine tools isn't cost justified. Also, the fact is there are tons more regular 12 gauge guns than HE's and why would the frames for the vast majority be made way oversize and then made smaller, just so a few could be made into HE's?

Yes of course the internal parts like hammers, sears, etc. are the same no matter which 12 gauge frame they were fitted to. That makes good sense from the production standpoint since the internal maching cuts could be made uniformly. The strength is in the mass of the frame, not the size of the internal fire control parts.

Data: width across the frame flats for regular 12 gauge frame is ~ 1.735" and is about .100" over that for the 0-frame HE's. Width across the breech balls is ~2.350" and 2.420" respectively. That's an awful lot of filing. Silvers

EDITED: I corrected a typo on the width across the breech balls.

While I am sure there were regular sized frame guns marked H in the ones you bought I Have to ask if they really made all 12 and 20 bore frames that over sized for the many years before the HE came in existence?

jess

I will get the pics and measurments of the frames from the person who has them now , they are not that much over sized all stanard and HE frames were this size and they were filed down , I knew this would cause a strir becuse that has been the belief for so long, give me a few days and I will get the photos and measurements then the people here can decide on it.
I measured across the breach ball on my serlingworth 12 and both of my HE's all Phily guns , the HE's were 2.38 and 2.40 and the sterling was 2.35
one of the HE's is a 9lb 9oz 0 barreled 30" gun that Im going to get rid of since I got this light one.
Thanks John

I believe the gun is 30020 which was consigned to Western. I believe it is the only sub 8lbs Super Fox 12 made. The record says nothing about belonging to Mr. Olin. We have knowledge of guns with Super Fox frames and regular non-overbored barrels, but these guns are not marked H.

We've all seen different things and had different input to our senses as we've wandered thru life in general and this Fox stuff in particular. I will note that the very highest serial number graded 12-gauge guns in the records from right at the end of production were a bunch of HE-Grades and the very highest 12-gauge serial numbers are actually five Fox-Sterlingworth Wildfowls built with graded gun serial numbers. So, it seems they were working on big guns when they pulled the plug.

Not owning an H gun of any kind so maybe this is a dumb question but to settle the frame size issue , wouldnt measuring center to center on firing pin holes indicate once and for all whether or not there were "larger frames " made for the HE's or that the frames were all same by gauge and just struck differently??
or am I missing what is being said?