doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com damascus shooting

Sheep Dip is pretty good scotch. And remained available under that name purchased from the vet. no less, when they went the wrong way across the pond as we did w/prohibition, making the common and uncommon man both suffer that sufferance. Common sense finally prevailed, but Sheep Dip kept its name.

The Damascus vs. fluid steel thing has been around since the very introduction of fluid steel bbl's. Can you imagine that!? Some Damascus patterns could make good wood blush. I wish that we had a compilation of Oscar's writings on the subject accompanied by true colour plates. A finely bbl'd Damascus gun is precious ... in the Gollum sense. Think Purdey doesn't know that!?

I assume this is the same Tom Roster who is an anti-lead shot disciple and who often tries to tell us that steel is the ballistic equal of lead shot. Even better in some respects according to him, because of better pattern percentages from the same choke. But he neglects to tell you that the steel shot with its' better pattern percentage contains significantly less shot per ounce because of its' lesser density or specific gravity.

Needless to say, I am not impressed with Tom Roster's firearms knowledge. Just wish I hadn't spent so much of my life believing people like him when it comes to Damascus.

i couldn't agree more!

Could be going after ammo makers . . . although US shotshells usually carry the warning that they're not to be used in Damascus guns.

Concerning Roster and steel vs lead: To give him his due, I don't believe I've ever read him claiming that steel is better than lead. Or even as good. He has done a lot to demonstrate that steel is better than many naysayers would have us believe. At the same time, his research involving steel and pheasants (which probably needs to be updated--he used pretty anemic steel loads) revealed some issues that he hadn't observed with waterfowl.

He is convinced that lead shot is probably going to be prohibited in the near future. I think he's wrong about that, given the current political climate and the likely linkage of any lead ban to an assault on gun rights in general. But he simply doesn't have the expertise in the field of vintage guns, proof, pressure etc that he does when it comes to steel and other varieties of nontoxic shot.

I have only been shooting Damascus for about 30 years, so I am no expert . I am in the Securities business and I find that the Annuity bashers seem to be supported by the Mutual Fund companies and vice versa with the Mutual Fund bashers. Since Tom
Is generally supported by the modern gun and shotshell manufacturers, it gives me the same thoughts of conflict.

Larry,
In CA, we've been legislated to going lead free on all hunting by 2019, I believe. That pretty much kaboshes my .410 quail/chukar hunting here. It wasn't great hunting in CA, but it had its moments.


I have some 20ga BSS guns that I can use for steel if I need to hunt here. Otherwise, I'll spend more time (and money) in neighboring states that allow lead.

Never have thought much of Mr. Roster's writings or stances on lead shot. His articles in Sporting Clays magazine, which comes with NSCA mebership and is the same crap over and over, are not worth reading.
JR

Again. Has anyone seen the article he wrote in that skeet magazine? Let's not hang him till we have seen the evidence.....then it'll be ok to string him up. Let's see some direct quotes. I agree on what I've seen in SSM, it's generally not worth wasting time on.

I recently read a comment by him in a question and answer section in a gun magazine where he said Damascus shotguns were unsafe to shoot. I emailed him saying the British proof house still proofs Damascus barrel guns for nitro, and if they're so unsafe, why would they still pass them. Also mentioned Sherman Bells testing in DGJ and all he said in his reply was " as long as American shotgun shell manufactures say they're unsafe, I'm sticking with them". Maybe that's what qualifies him as an expert.

Hi all,

I'm a long time double owner, but new contributor to this forum. I think most of us with experience shooting Damascus know better...but for those who are still unsure, or who are prone to parrot wives tales, I would point to Sherman Bell's excellent series of articles in the Doublegun Journal entitled "Finding Out For Myself."

Using a bunch of rather junky old donated barrels, including fluid steel, Damascus, and twist...the testing was done by Tom Armbrust of Ballistic Research in Illinois. Larry Potterfield of MidwayUSA donated a large share of the barrels.

Basically, using insane proof loads they could barely damage any barrels with crazy PROOF loads! Tom told me the only way they were able to really damage the barrels was by obstructing them...leaving a jag in there...jamming a 16 ga shell in front of a 12ga...that kind of thing.

By the time they were able to get failures...the loads were RIDICULOUS, and as I recall the fluid steel barrels actually averaged slightly WORSE than the Damascus.

My personal belief is that when the world moved from black powder to smokeless, no one explained well enough to the public that the measurements were NOT one-to-one. So it took only a few people to load shells with smokeless in place of black powder using the same recipe, and ka-BLOOEY. Because the black powder/smokeless transition happened around the same time fluid steel was getting popular, I think people concluded the reason fluid was coming out more was because it was proven stronger...or that you NEEDED fluid steel for smokeless shells. Then it took no time for word to get around that Damascus barrels were weak. Just my opinion.

I want to stress that the barrels Tom tested with were, according to him, absolute JUNK. And they still held up. So consider how much better put together your gorgeous American Flag Damascus barrels on your high grade Lefever are!

The "Finding Out For Myself" series Sherman Bell wrote were done so over a bunch of DGJ issues...I'm sure they could be back-ordered. I know of no one else the, or since, who have put that degree of unbiased time and energy into actually testing Damascus strength the way Sherman and Tom did.

- Nudge