doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Twin Purdey Barrels

The seller got back to me with his answer to my question about the whereabouts of the rest of the guns :

"Unfortunately no. I have written to Purdey for help in reuniting them. I'm guessing they'd be a great deal more valuable to whoever has the receivers. Let me know if you have any other questions. Gary"

Very bizarre! Makes a guy wonder how a matched pair of Purdey SLE's ended up like this, barrels only. There's got to be a whole lot more to this story.

Maybe not Purdey barrels, but eBay allows the sale of barrels and it is actually a pretty good place to sell or buy shotgun barrels, including Beretta and Browning O/U barrels.

I would probably say that the owner of the pair died and guns were sold without the second set of barrels that were probably found later and now being put out for sale.

A two minute search on google resulted in the solution to the mystery. The barrels were once part of a four barrel set, having been fitted to another gun with two sets. They were offered at auction, not sold, and, now, separated for some reason. What a shame.

How are you going to fit barrels to a Purdey with all the hand work that goes into making one of those? Maybe the current owner will get wind of this sale and reunite the barrels. Probably a long shot though.

Like many other shotguns that were built during a time of more hand fitting and labor, fitting a set of barrels from a different shotgun is possible, but dicey. If the frame size is the same, and the breech height and width is very close to the same, it could simply be a matter of removing a small amount of material from the hook and lumps, just as was done to fit the original set with stones, files, and a smoke lamp. If there is a loose fit of the donor barrels, then things become more difficult, or economically unfeasible. But metal can be added to the hook by TIG welding, just as in re-fitting a set of off the face barrels. This is why skeetx advised Mike to try to meet the seller for a fit test if he was interested in buying them. Cost of gunsmithing and fitting must be factored into the decision. Not a job for Billy-Bob, the scope mounting guy at the local gun shop. Purdey barrels probably aren't the place for a shim made out of a Pabst Blue Ribbon can.

And the bits don't fit in the lumps and the ejectors don't work, it could be endless problems when you're dealing with a hand built gun. I would check to see but I wouldn't hold out to much hope.

These barrels may be of sufficient quality to have been of utility in the repair of a Boss gun I once owned:





...Geo

Yes, I do rather enjoy making posts using the phrase:"a Boss gun I once owned".

Someone, somewhere would probably give their right arm for those.