My goodness. Could this be the pseudonymous ‘Zircon’ who issued a call on two public internet forums in 2005 “Contribute Junk To Advance Barrel Strength Knowledge” requesting barrel samples for composition and strength testing. By 2006 he had apparently accumulated almost 40 barrels, both fluid steel and Pattern Welded. Part of the sample included the Parker GH with Damascus barrels and the Parker VH with Vulcan Steel barrels that had been the subjects of destructive studies published by Sherman Bell.
An abbreviated Failure Analysis of these two barrels appeared in a public blog in January 2007 as follows (in part):
I am doing a failure analysis of a pair of Parker barrels - one set damascus, and the other set homogenous. A close examination of the fracture surface showed progressive, low cycle fatigue marks on the damascus barrel. Each succeeding round had higher and higher pressure. After several rounds, a crack started at the extractor screw hole. Each successive round caused the crack to open up just a bit further, until finally the pressure could not be contained and (the barrel) failed in a ductile fashion.
The “fluid steel” barrel failed by brittle rupture. The fracture surface was about 3X as long as for the damascus barrels. In other words, the same 30,000 psi final internal load created a lot more fracture surface in the homogenous barrel than in the damascus barrel.
One of the (myths) with damascus is that it will fail at the welds where the original rods were forge-welded together. When I looked at this particular set of damascus barrels using a metallographically prepared sample I saw NO EVIDENCE of weld joint failure, slag in the weld joints, porosity in the weld joints, etc.
Both barrels ripped lengthwise for some distance and then the rupture terminated in a circumferential crack. In the case of the damascus barrels, the crack spiraled around with the weld pattern, but it was not on a weld, rather it was on one of the in-between areas. The spiral welds (ribband edge welds) remained tight and the parent metal is what failed.
Zircon also sent a comprehensive Failure Analysis and Metallurigcal Study, complete with photomicrographs, to the BOD of the PGCA. I personally communicated with Zircon in February 2008 and he stated that the barrel testing had continued. He did not respond to my attempts to contact him thereafter. To my knowledge, there has been no other report by Zircon since that time. The fate of the donated barrels is unknown, but I believe PeteM was unable to retrieve the barrels he donated to his disappointment.
In the fall of 2014 I submitted a 2 part article to the DGJ for publication which includes a Failure Analysis and Metallurgical Study, part of which has been shared here, and more details from Zircon's study (that were made part of the public domain in a public blog) and our conversation.