doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Monoblock - why machine barrels separately?

Ok, let this newbie clarify: why don't modern double manufacturers machine both the barrels, rib, and block all from one piece of steel instead of joining separate barrels as with chopper lump style or monoblocks to barrel sets? Or am I a dope and someone's already doing this? I would think this would be the easiest, cleanest, strongest solution. What am I missing?

Barrel weight comes to mind.

Production costs also come strongly to mind as well as the Wt problem Don mentioned. There would of course be several areas where un-needed metal would have to be left which would add useless wt as Don suggested, but machining costs would be astronomicl in comparsion to conventional methods. Just not much of a way to run a Railroad.

A double shotgun barrel is not neccesarily straight. It needs to be adjusted a bit for both barrels to shoot to point of aim. It would be nearly impossible to do this if the holes were drilled in a piece of steel that includes all the parts you mention. Yes, it is being done, but not neccesarily successfully.

The one I saw looked like crap. A. McFarlane was promoting such a device.

Interesting that Parker single barrel trap guns were made from one piece and it is a wonderful piece of machining. I'm amazed how they pulled it off, even for a single barrel. I can't imagine the difficulty of doing two.

a guy named lipperd was selling an overunder with the Wilks name with one piece machined barrels go to j Brazier.com and you can see them, i always wanted to ask how they were regulated.a stockmaker named Chuck Grace brought one to Dennis Potters Class a few years ago.(chuck was stocking it) mc

Here is a picture and description from Joseph Brazier, who manufactures these barrels for Mr. Lippard. I would like to see how they manage "adjustable impact".



This is the "SolidSolid"™ one piece shotgun O/U barrel made of S7 VAC. Made by Brazier, this Karl Lippard Patented Design covers 8 different types of barrels covering the full range of barrels made in the world today. SolidSolid™ barrels can be made for your Fabbri, Holland & Holland, Perazzi, Purdey, Westley Richards or other fine gun "one off" for $10,000.00 each. Barrels for the Trade are discounted at 10 and 100 barrel orders. Other barrels are available in Side by Side, and double rifle with adjustable impact. All ribs and false ribs, are integral....One Off SolidSolid barrels are $10,000. each and MonoSolid barrels like the Monobloc in common use today such as Perazzi's would be $4,000.00 each. We bore all our barrels in-house by CNC using S7 tool steel. We also make Winchester type actions as well.

All the reasons above are valid. Regulating monolithic barrel sets is an issue. I'm sure the material between the ribs could be removed to produce separate barrels, except for the action area, so that they could be regulated just like currently produced conventional barrel sets. But, to what end? The cost would be much higher (as illustrated by the examples above) and no practical reasons can be produced for such construction.

Bill is very correct. The English used a pnuematic device early on to straighten barrels once they were bored. This image is of Lucien Clement's straightening operation circa 1890 in Nessonvaux.



The original monobloc patent (1881- Henri Pieper) won all sorts of awards, as it was recognized for it's strength. Beretta still uses it for most of their guns.





Pete