doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Massive numbers of UK SxS's being scrapped

A gentleman names Cliff Taylor advertised a deactivated Reilly on Gunstar.
https://www.gunstar.co.uk/reilly-e-m-deactivated-shotgun/Shotguns/1716007

It is SN 14950 with the address "Oxford Street, London". It would date to January 1868 before rue Scribe opened and is an early example of the Reilly narrow fenced, noseless hammer "central-fire" guns as illustrated in the Reilly Paris Unverselle exposition of 1867 (discussed on the Reilly line). Mr. Taylor sent the following which is a sad commentary on the situation of SxS's in the UK.

Glad to help, it’s a shame to be deactivating these guns but in the UK now I’m seeing 10 a week coming in the scrapped but on a positive note at least they go on to become great decorative items in man caves.

Welcome to the future.
JR

I'd like to think Argo44 might have noticed the photos I have posted here of large piles of guns that were being scrapped after confiscations and forced gun buy-backs in countries like Australia, New Zealand, etc., after gun bans were enacted by Liberal Left anti-gunners. But some people find that offensive, and cry about "culture wars", because the truth might be damaging to the anti-gun Democrats they support.

The way the UK Government is now openly restricting Free Speech on Social Media platforms, and people have been arrested for speech that they deem hateful, it is only a matter of time before even deactivated guns in Man Caves may also be prohibited, and so will reading about them on forums like this. Ten years ago, you'd have been considered a paranoid nut if you had predicted that Brazil would totally ban access to Elon Musk's X or Twitter social media platform. Of course, until Musk bought Twitter, we saw censorship of unapproved content due to pressure from our current government, so the Orwellian future is already here.

While there was some internet streaming content of Shooting events in the 2024 Olympics, I didn't see any live NBC Network coverage or hear much news about it. Coverage of Olympic Shooting events is a tiny fraction of what it once was. It wasn't even mentioned in any Threads here, as it was in years past. I had to do an internet search to know that USA Shooting won 5 Gold Medals, which is 1/8th of the U.S. total of 40. However, we did get to see a Transgender biological male beat the crap out of an Italian woman in ladies boxing. Men beating up on women used to be a crime, but now it can get the abuser an Olympic Gold Medal. These are the "Culture Wars" we are supposed to pretend aren't happening.

I’m thinking that some of the 10 a week are likely out of proof and can’t legally be sold anyway.

Any bets on the Reilly pictured? I highly doubt that gun was in proof. And, with the changed proof laws and the two monster loads per tube used at the proof house today, nobody was going to be willing to pay the fee, and then pick up the pieces and go home.

Best,
Ted

1868 Gun was pretty much a wreck Ted...a fallacy in the post which I realized after the fact.

Yes, they are scrapping tons of guns.
We’ve covered the reasons before

Shotgun certificates
Non lead shot
Low market interest in low grade guns

I’ve been to plenty of their gun shops and every one has a pile of old sxs’s getting disposed of.

They could probably make good cash pulling all the pins and springs out of them and just selling them here by mail.

The disposal of old guns in the UK has always been part and parcel of the shooting scene though from the 1950s onwards it has gained pace, Klapper has come up with a number but in reality it is far more convoluted than that. These are the reasons for the way things are going here in Brit Land.
Firearm use and ownership it is no secret that British Governments since the 1940s have had a policy to restrict public gun ownership using various forms of restrictions from how firearms are stored. restricted numbers of ownership. Licencing requirements on a personal level with the bar being lifted higher each year and of course cost for the processing and now Doctors costs for their piece pf paper. These ongoing costs on top of the consumables needed is starting to make the average family man to take up Golf rather than jump through the compliance hoops.
The British Proof Laws also play a large part in the gun scrappage system, just an example take the ubiquitous 12 Bore once the barrel bore dimension reaches .740 it is out of proof it can only go two ways from here though in only one direction to a registered firearms dealer because it is now illegal to trade or sell the gun and what a dealer will give you for the gun is peanuts BUT you can still use it though for all intents and purposes it is valueless.
The gun retail trade have just one compunction "to sell guns" in any way they can. Put simply it is far better to make 20% from a £1000 pound sale than 20% £150 pound repair bill the incentive is obvious. If a person comes to them with an older gun that does require a repair, here are just a couple of sales tactics Oh! the repair will be expensive Oh! even if the gun is repaired its reliability will always be suspect. Oh!!! The oldest one of them all Damascus barrels are always suspect, can be dangerous even if they look good!!!! And it has Hammers! This new gun will give you many years of reliable service with the salesman's fingers crossed behind his back, just any thing to sell you a gun and scrap the one you have being offered a pittance for.
I kid you not!!! This gun was scrap and as a young man I purchased it as scrap because it was old a bit rusty stock had seen better days and sharp intake of breath it has Damascus barrels but lets not mention to the person who owned it the barrels where Nitro Proof and in Proof.




Not a bad purchase looking back for a scrapper though I did have to spend money on it to get it to this state though it was basically a sound usable gun when I purchased it, how many other fine guns of this type where never rescued and just lost in the name of profit.

Selling De Activated guns is not a new thing here in Brit Land until all the restrictions started to creep in an old shotgun could have the firing pins welded solid and a welded plugs fitted in to the barrel or barrels and that was fine for a wall hanger but now you have a lot of hoops to jump through and paperwork to go through at a cost, so having your favoured gun deactivated for you to keep not requiring a licence is difficult and expensive.
To sum things between the government type of shot restrictions and the gun trade itself there is not much hope for gun ownership in this country sadly.

Probably make even better cash selling the entire pile of parts, without the ham handed middleman, tearing it apart. The reasonable could certainly find a way, if they wanted to.

Oh!! take the guns apart and sell the parts as spares! You would have the Government Whitehall Muppets going apoplectic. When the subject comes to guns all sensibility and logic goes out of the window in Brit Land, causing Paranoid thoughts come to the for. Brit Land does not distinguish between Antique guns and modern guns THEY ARE ALL GUNS! example that gun in my post is a hundred and fifty years old a provable antique BUT because it can use a modern 12 bore cartridge in the eyes of the government it my just as well be made last year. Also spares for guns could be used to build or fitted to a gun to make it function as a modern gun so every part must have provable documentation of age use probably the name of the man who made it and of course the maiden name of his mothers grandmother. Any thing to do with guns here brings the irrational brain owners who have power to the fore.
Some time in the past I did look into breaking down antique guns for spares as a business though I thought the idea was good it opened a can of worms the size of an oil drum so things never got off the ground you could say.

Ban them in peace, beg them in wartime. Guns that is