Fox Collectors

Would it be possible (and safe) generally speaking, to open the chokes on a gun with #4 weight barrels from F/XF to IC/M?
I don't have access to the gun in question, so I can't measure wall thickness.
Thanks in advance for your opinions.

Yes. There is comparatively very little pressure remaining in the barrels by the time the ejecta (shot and wad) reaches the chokes and certainly not enough to bulge or split the barrels.

Full choked smallbore # 4 barrels can be thin at muzzles.Better get a top gunsmith who knows what he is doing to choke to improved cylinder. There was a thread somewhere about a set of Fox #4 barrels being ruined when chokes were opened and walls were paper thin at muzzles. Bobby

I see a lot of articles about bbl thickness or maybe thiness in the forum and all I can say, I think some of it maybe okay and some not.

I will be the first to admit that I don't know alot about it, but having been raised on a one mule farm and having been in the heavy construction business for 35 years, a few things will rub off on you. By the way, I was smart enough that I learned not to walk right up back of that mule, not a second time anyway. I have never had heard of a gun blowing up around here due to thin bbls, plugged bbls yes, as I have a couple in the room with me that some of my 9, 10, 11 yr old sons stuck in the mud and around the bend, a bird few by and guess what, a banana peel bbl, but a few minutes with a hack saw and gun was back in service and it seemed like they were killing more birds after that. (This was before you had to be 18 before you were allowed to see the picture of a gun.)

Anybody concerned about quality and meas. should read summer 2008 and spring 2007 issues, articles by Sherman Bell titled " Finding Out For Myself". Very interesting articles, where he tries to blow up old rusty, pitted damascus & twist barreled guns with proof loads as well as boring the bbls out to very thin wall thickness. I feel Fox bbls were some better than these.

By the way, those articles are in "Double Gun Journal".

bbman3 wrote:Better get a top gunsmith who knows what he is doing to choke to improved cylinder. Bobby

Sorry Bobby I took it for granted that Laxcoach would only have the best barrel men around working on his Foxes. I have a great smith that I have do all my barrel work and sometimes take it for granted that others do also.

While on the subject of barrels with thin walls at the muzzles I remember an article written by I think Boothyard that described a set of barrels that had been honed so much at the muzzle that they could actually be cut with a pocket knife but were not affected by firing.