doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com To open chokes or leave them be?

Thank goodness. Now I can sleep easy...

Choke is overrated in my book. I have a reconditioned Parker 16 that at one time had two inches of barrel cut off and it is now cylinder and cylinder and I shoot the best pheasant hunting with that gun. With todays modern loads and my own loads it patterns very well 30-40 yards out.

Great, just don't try to sell it to me.

Cylinder, or certainly nothing tighter than IC, are more valuable chokes than most people realize. The late Bob Brister, comparing IC and full, wrote: "Full choke is a demanding mistress; improved cylinder a forgiving friend." And he had good things to say about cylinder too:

"I do know that at 25 yards a pure cylinder barrel will throw one of the deadliest game-getting patterns you ever looked at . . . " And Mr. Brister looked at a lot of patterns.

Doubt that I'd want a gun choked C/C unless it were a pure woodcock gun. Some choke in the tight barrel can come in handy. But the combination of cylinder and the right loads will put a lot of birds in the freezer. And it's really all you need at American skeet, assuming you're shooting at least 3/4 oz of 8 1/2's or 9's.

Did Mr. Brister ever (mistakenly) refer to cylinder as choke? I'd be surprised to know that he did.

SRH

I know some said that German guns were often 3/4-full or fuller-fuller because Fritzie hunted them "chicken sized turkeys" from tree branches deep in the woods or shot bird by removing slinged gun from shoulder (many old German guns have sling swivels) before shooting therefore needing longer reach. I always thought they choked guns that way so we could open the chokes to our own liking.
As I stated previously some of the most practical guns were made by people from cultures with little upland hunting experience. Recently examined SKB Royal Light1/4-full choke combo underscores this notion.

I did spot one quote: " . . . pure-cylinder choke (no choke at all) . . . " Expect he did that because some people do refer to cylinder as a choke rather than the absence of choke. But what he put in parentheses cleared up his reference, I think. But it's usually thrown into discussions of choke, or certainly should be. And ends up being included in the general category.

Have them cut to .010 and .020 and go forth and break targets and kill birds. It isn't perfect for any one thing but that combination has served me well in all shooting, from skeet to pheasants and everything in between for a very long time. MKII

Mark, gunsmiths are lucky that so many people (like me!) are still looking for the magic combination!

Light Modified seems to be the way to go if one has single barrel. With double one would want loose left and tighter right barrel. Opposite would work for left hand/eye dominant person. Stuff like 3/4-full or full-extra full make no sense to me. That is just like having single barrel gun with full choke.