doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Trigger Pulls on English Sidelocks?

What's a good trigger pull weight on a 12 gauge English Sidelock SxS? 4 pounds for the front trigger/right barrel and 4.5 pounds for the rear trigger/left barrel?

Would the trigger pull weights be the same with smaller gauge guns i.e. 16, 20 & 28 bore?

Thanks,
1cDog

Personal preference is always a factor but 3 1/2 lbs front and 4 1/4 lbs back works as a basic setting for most people and most guns.

Not withstanding Small Bore's contribution, it is not just personal preference but also the gun itself.
Some guns measure up at a 'perfect' nominal poundage but feel terrible in practice.
Some of this is to do with the degree of creep but it isn't as simple as that. I have noticed that many sidelocks of the later H&H pattern feel strangely 'soggy' and lack the crispness of guns of far less exclusive heritage.
An example was a William Evans which measured up at 3 1/2 and 4lb but felt like you were pulling the trigger through a cotton wool pad!
I suspect that over powerful sear springs or the combination of both ordinary sear and interceptor sear springs may produce this feel but I have never felt motivated enough to experiment.
Another feature that can make it very difficult to regulate pulls to a nice feel are the very 'knife' edge sear noses on earlier hammerguns, especially those converted to rebounding.
The interaction between these very sharp and thin noses and a deep bent can produce normal pull weights that feel like a hair trigger to the finger.
The only solution to this, other than radically reworking (and therefore shortening) the nose is to regulate for a much higher pull weight than one would think normal but which 'feels' right.
This is why we often say 'regulated for feel rather than measured pull weight' on our gun details.

Dig, would you please help me understand the rationale behind the differing pull weights on S x S triggers? I have tried to come up with a good reason for it but, the best I can do is possibly the difference in "leverage" created by having one trigger closer than the other, maybe causing the rear at, say, 4 1/4# to actually FEEL the same as the front at 3 1/2#.

But, even that would only apply if the rear trigger were pulled with the finger inserted farther through the guard, contacting the trigger farther up the finger and creating greater leverage, right?

Thanks, Stan

The traditional argument runs like this:
Most people pull the front trigger first, whatever they should do to take account of the distance or nature of the target. By having the front trigger set at the minimum sensible pull weight and the rear trigger set at the maximum sensible pull weight the possibility of the second barrel going off with the shock of the first barrel firing is reduced.
Personally, I don't subscribe to this and regulate my own guns pulls roughly the same BY FEEL, not by pull weight. This is because as principally a clay and driven game shooter, I usually have plenty of time to decide which barrel (ie. choke) I want to use.
However, I do regulate guns for sale in the traditional manner, partly because tradition requires me to but also because, given the truth of my first statement, I think that people tend to snatch at the second trigger in a game shooting situation and therefore a slightly heavier pull is not noticed and even be an advantage.

I have heard that reasoning, about the added trigger pull weight helping to keep the left sear from recoiling out of bent, but don't buy into it. I have done a good many triggers myself, on rifles, shotguns and pistols. Just finished a .410 S x S. My understanding of the geometry of sear engagement causes me to believe if a trigger can be safe at 4 1/4#, under recoil, it can be safe at 3-3 1/2#.

If most people pull the front trigger first, which I also am convinced they do, then making the trigger pull heavier on the rear contradicts one of the biggest arguments for double triggers, that being an instant choice of chokes, because if you choose the rear trigger first, which I often do, then your weight of trigger pulls is all of a sudden reversed, and by following that argument, the front would be more likely to go off under recoil.

No, I set mine up as nearly the same, by feel as you say, as I can, and have NEVER had one I have worked on to double.

Thanks for the reply, Toby. Hope Dig weighs in on it, along with crossedchisles and SDH. Still larnin'.

SRH