I think I became aware of fine double guns, reading Michael McIntosh in the early 1990's. Even then, steel shot was a concern.

Over the years since then, I've garnered from my reading the Double Gun Journal and the Shooting Sportsman, that steel shot and choke tubes are for the lower grades of firearms, and that truly fine guns only shoot lead or soft lead substitutes, and they never have any choke tubes, unless perhaps thin wall tubes added by Briley.

Are these prejudices still accurate? Do new side by side "best guns" come with choke tubes, proofed for steel shot, today?

The reason I ask, is that in America today, to shoot ducks and geese requires nontoxic shot, and almost all public hunting lands are requiring nontoxic shot, and the entire State of California, for hunting. The handwriting is on the wall, for target shooters and hunters on private lands, that someday nontoxic shot will be mandated by law.

And, I see seven dollars a box "cheap steel" loads. If those loads ever drop below the price of lead "promo loads", the lead loads will not be long available, at every big box store and gun shop.

There are many substitutes for lead shot, but only one seems to be economical to shoot a lot of shells, and that's steel shot.

And at the gun shows, the lower grades of old fixed choke shotguns are selling for less and less, every year. Like it or not, new shotgun users like and demand choke tubes.

Are the finest shotguns made on the earth, adapting to using steel shot, and the addition of choke tubes?

Simple answer, NO.

If you can afford one of those 'Best guns' you can afford the ammo it was intended to shoot. Not to be smart but those are hand built for each specific customer so you could call Holland & Holland to see if they will build you one.

I never liked the ballistics of steel so I'll pay the price for the alternatives to steel shot. What else can I do?

Please see GunsInternational #10096642.

I would say mostly no, but sometimes yes. Nobody wants thinwalls intalled in a nice American classic sxs, or an old London best in equally nice condition, but I have no problem with Teagues or Briley thinwalls in a gun ordered that way, regardless of the maker. I see that trend increasing rather than not.
JR

Zilch.
JR

I would think old soft solder giving away would be of more concern than chokes which could be opened to 3/4 constriction or less. Installing thin wall tubes seems like a waste of money and time.

The very finest British best guns, will always be worth owning, but they last for well over a century. One of my friends brought over a very nice W. Scott hammer gun, made with the thumbhole Purdey patent action, that was made in the early 1870's. He also had a I. Hollis hammer gun, not as high grade as the other, but still a very nice gun.

But as nice as those old damascus barreled, black powder shotguns are, they are worth only a fraction of what they'd be worth if they were made thirty years later with fluid steel barrels.

An old shotgun that requires expensive and hard to get ammo isn't going to be worth much, when that's the only ammo it can shoot.

One of the reasons I'm so fond of my old doubles, is that I can buy a box of cheap lead shell for five bucks and shoot them at the range with my friends.

I'm curious, if you wanted to shoot nontoxic shot that was soft enough for old double guns, how much a box would the shells cost?

The best price for 16ga Kent Bismuth used to be $12.97 or $12.79 for 10 shell pack at Cabela's when it was on sale. That is the least I have ever paid for new soft non-tox loads. The problems are they only come in #5 or #6 shot too "hot" for old vintage shotguns (desigend to function in old fixed choke repeaters like Belgian Auto-5, Model 12, Ithaca 37,......)and will probably never be seen at that price again. The new sale price is over $14.

I have good stash and if I ever buy vintage hammer gun I will make sure it has fluid steel barrels with plenty of thickness plus greener cross-bolt along with double Purdey underbites. Great Sauer & Son actioned German guns come to mind.

If lead shot were outlawed or regulated out of existence, then the price of soft nontoxic shot may fall somewhat.

But today, if you'd like a flat of one ounce RST 2 1/2 shells, that's $110 per flat.

If you'd like the same shell in Bismuth, they've sold out, but when they had them, they were $65 a box, $650 per flat.

Cheap steel shot loads are $70 per flat, at Walmart.

They don't sell many, yet, because Walmart also carries Federal cheap lead loads for less than five dollars a box.

In a hundred years, if it still costs almost ten times what it costs for cheap steel shot, the only folks shooting the finest game guns made today won't be shooting them very much.

Have you priced a bespoke James Purdey or Thomas Boss? If you're running around in those circles you're not worried about the price of a box of shells.

Go to this forum and look at the fees they pay to hunt in Africa.

http://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve

Those good ol boys make a pretty good living.

Don't have to go that far. A peg for two day driven upland game hunt plus food and lodging in Wyoming is $11,900.

The rich people, that can afford the hundred thousand dollar London bespoke best guns, don't worry about anything but ammunition availability, and the reason they can take their London best guns to Argentina and Africa is because lead shot ammo is available and legal to shoot there, in those places.

I understand a large percentage of brand new London best guns are ordered with 2 3/4 inch chambers, for the reason of easier ammo availability.

I own a side by side twenty gauge Turkish shotgun. It only cost $500 brand new, but it has silver soldered barrels, three inch chambers, choke tubes, and is proofed for steel shot. It's not by any stretch of the imagination a best gun, but is a good shotgun, handles well, and I can take it anywhere on the earth shotguns are legal and buy ammo for it, and so will my grandchildren's grandchildren.

You'd expect a hundred thousand dollar Holland and Holland to do anything a five hundred dollar Huglu would do, and do it with much better style.

But that's not the case, today.

What you're looking at are luxury items for the very wealthy. They have to prove their superiority every day by what they use, eat, how they dress whom they associate with and whom their kids date and marry. The education is obtained at boarding schools where they associate with people just like themselves this assures that they will do at least as well in their lives as their parents. It's entirely different world.

So is your initial question about steel shot or class envy?

They just paid that kind of money for a shotgun do you think they really care what a box of shells cost? And you can still use lead shot in America for upland game and tungsten and bismuth will always be available.

And the people who built their shotgun were the same people who built a shotgun for their great grandfather or great great grandfather.

The cost of a gun, and the cost of ammo are two entirely different things.

One thing I've always thought would be cool to own and shoot is a nice bolt action 50 BMG, one came up about a month ago that was "affordable", just a few thousand dollars, I could have paid cash for it, but at the price of ammo I declined.

The cost of the gun is a one time fee, once i have it I will never have to buy it again, but the price of ammo is the gift that just keeps on giving, or taking in this case, I don't own a 50 BMG, and likely never will.

Several years ago I commissioned a gun maker to build me a bolt action 416 Remmington rifle, mouser action, match grade barrel, nice gun, the only reason I can afford to shoot it is because I can fire form 375 brass to reload.

TM

I try to not be envious of the very rich. They have earned their money, or inherited it from those who have earned it.

I am very glad, that luxury goods for the very rich are made, because those things serve as templates for the rest of us, and the luxury items themselves in time usually depreciate to where ordinary folks can afford them.

A shotgun, is not the most costly luxury item the wealthy purchase.

An entry level Rolls Royce Ghost starts at $250,000, which would buy a matched pair of London best guns, and that new Rolls Royce runs on unleaded gasoline, available everywhere.

Truly impressive yachts are priced in the millions, but the old standard of a forty foot cabin cruiser is about ten thousand dollars a foot today, and it will run on unleaded gasoline or diesel, regardless of how much it costs.

And private jets are priced in the tens of millions, but a perfectly good single engine airplane today is over a half a million, with twins starting at a million dollars. The jets burn the standard jet fuel at all the airports, and while the piston engine models require standard leaded avgas, that's because there's not any unleaded gasoline for sale at most airports, yet. The do gooders are working on it, and when leaded avgas is phased out, at their next major overhaul the new piston engine planes today will run on the next generation of lead free avgas.

I've bought two new Caesar Guerini over and under shotguns. They aren't best guns, but they are surely some nice, wonderful shotguns, and the bottom of both have that Fleur-de-lis mark the Italian proof house requires for steel shot proof. The have chrome lined bores, silver soldered barrels, and the Tempio has three inch chambers. I understand to not use any steel shot larger than BB and no chokes tighter than modified.

But someday, those CG guns will be busting clays and shooting birds, using common steel shot loads, and a lot of true best guns made today will be curiosities like my friend's old damascus barreled hammer guns are.

If you can't shoot the currently available and legal ammo in a gun, it's not practical for volume use, no matter how wealthy you are.

The London and Birmingham proof houses would do the British gun trade and the world a favor, by introducing a steel shot proof mark, even if were voluntary, like the Italian one is.

Best guns ought to be able to shoot cheap steel shot.

I am not a fan of post parsing.
in a nutshell, you are mistaken on every premise you are holding.

You absolutely can buy steel shot ready, (even for large sized steel shot) best quality guns from modern makers.

I'm glad to hear it.

I hate the idea of being forced to use nontoxic shot, almost as much as I'd hate not shooting a shotgun.

I still think it would be a good idea for the British and Spanish proof houses to follow the lead of the Italians have have a special proof for steel shot guns.

It won't be all that many years, before lead shot will not be generally available, even if remains legal.

Don't forget copper shot as well.
The Euro shooting community is thriving.

At every income level.

Taking your education from poor, old, non shooting, non hunting, people, with social issues, and no experience, might lead to a biased and inaccurate education.

Another question is, do the Europeans require nontoxic shot the way America is starting to require it, which today is for all waterfowl, almost all public hunting lands, and the entire State of California for hunting anything?

And I'm so against nontoxic shot, words cannot express it.

But the writing is on the wall, here in America, against lead in all forms. Lead in the gas, lead in the paint, lead toy soldiers lead glass crystal, have all went the way of asbestos in my lifetime.

Shooting in America is thriving too, but when the US military and the entire State of California is outlawing lead projectiles, it's not long before the do gooders decide that lead shot itself, is the problem.

Another problem is the recent introduction of seven dollars a box cheap steel factory loads. Americans say they like the best, and buy the cheapest. Scrap iron is much cheaper per pound than scrap lead, and if loaded steel shotgun shells become cheaper than loaded cheap lead shotgun shells, the do gooders won't have to regulate anything to make lead shotgun shells disappear from the shelves.

Every new shotgun made in the United States in the last thirty years will handle steel shot, and like it.

It's the old Belgian Brownings, and old double guns I own so many of, that are threatened with steel shot.

There is some hope here kids of working classes are learning that field shorts are not only for the privileged......

Pretty sure #6 size and smaller steel (anything smaller than #7 is worthless, may not even be made any smaller) won't hurt these guns if shot through chokes no tighter than .015. Could be wrong about that.
JR

Seems as tho I recall reading some Limey tract and ref was made to Limey steel proofs. I could be wrong. Salopian would prolly know.

As to thinwall choke tubes done by anyone. My feeling is that they are The Work of Satan and I will not have them in my guns. I would be incredibly wary of pushing steel thru any of them as well. Factory steel noted tubes are quite another thing.

CIP 12g 76 mm = 3” LEAD “High performance/Superior Proof”
Service 1050 BAR = 15,229 psi
Maximum statistical individual pressure 1200 BAR = 17,405 psi
Magnum proof 1320 BAR = 19,145 psi
12g STEEL regulations: the barrels should carry the High Performance Steel Fleur de Lys stamp and be marked “Steel Shot”
http://www.chircuprodimpex.ro/produse/al...-ammunition.pdf

Italy is a member of CIP, but according to Gerhard Wirnsberger, “The Standard Directory of Proof Marks” in 1962 established Standard Proof at 12,801 psi (probably by LUP/crushers) indicated by a ‘star over PSF’ AND “Superior Proof” at 17,637 psi, with ‘2 stars over PSF’ marks.
“Superior Proof” is mandatory for chambers longer than 70mm = 2 3/4”.
FABARM voluntarily proof tests to 1630 BAR = 23,641 psi
http://www.fabarm.com/web_eng/caratteristiche-dettaglio-1630.asp

Great Britain adopted the 1969 Commission Internationale Permanente pour l'Epreuve des Armes à Feu Portatives standards March 1, 1980.

Why?? They'll get the ammo they need when money is no object.

Just to answer a few questions raised. As far as I am aware any of the current British Gunmakers will make you a gun fit for steel shot. Longthorne Hesketh www.longthorneguns.com and Boxall & Edmiston www.boxallandedmiston.co.uk reckon their guns will stand steel shot through their full choke barrels.

Yes, the London and Birmingham Proof Houses both steel shot proof guns and have done for some years. It consists of a Fleur-de-le symbol and two crowns over the letters 'SUP' for superior proof also the words 'steel shot' and the chamber length. Just looking at one my guns; a Turkish Hatsan semi-auto that was steel shot proofed in Birmingham in 2001. Lagopus.....

When breechloaders replaced muzzleloaders, the muzzleloaders were relegated to the closets, or the poor folks.

When smokeless powder replaced black powder, the damascus guns were mostly retired from the field, unless nitro proofed or sleeved. No more new damascus guns were made.

There are likely new best guns made in Britain for two and and a half inch twelve gauge ammo, but I'd bet the overwhelming majority of exported best guns made in Britain, and virtually all the best guns made elsewhere in 12 gauge are two and three quarter inch chambered,,,,for shell availability.

Already, cheap repeaters are the rule shooting wildfowl in America, because of nontoxic shot regulations. But a light game gun never was a wildfowl gun, anyway.

Light game guns are taken to the places where they can still be shot several hundred times or more in a day. They require being able to shoot the readily available ammunition. If they can't, they stay in the vault back home, or get replaced with a shotgun that can shoot the ammo that's available.

It may be, that shooting small steel shot, say size seven or six, is not a problem with the existing soft soldered double guns with fixed chokes, for target use. But I'm only going to shoot that stuff when lead shot is regulated away.

If I were the King, then nontoxic shot would be outlawed, and lead shot mandated, for shotguns. Nontoxic shot regulations are by far and away the greatest threat to our beloved old fixed choke guns.

But I ain't the King, and won't ever be.

The Missouri Department of Conservation takes a bunch of Mossberg 500 twenty gauge guns, and big buckets of 2 3/4" 20 gauge shells, to teach youngsters how to shoot shotguns on the ranges here in Missouri. They've outlawed lead shot on all public lands, too.

Missouri is a gun friendly state.

Think about the places, that aren't gun friendly.

Steel shot is coming. It's the only metal that is cheap enough to replace lead for common use for practical shotgun use.

Common use for common folk like us. these people ain't common folk. They'll get their ammunition lead or otherwise you needn't worry.

A question for somebody from Britain, the mother of best guns.

What are the nontoxic shot regulations in Britain, if any?

When the Prince of Wales has to shoot steel shot,,,,so will all his buddies.:)

It varies slightly. In England and Wales non-lead shot must be used for shooting ducks and geese (species specific) In Scotland and Northern Ireland the rules are that non-lead shot must be used over wetlands (area specific). Wetlands are basically rivers lakes and marshland. The differences are because of devolved government. Scotland, Wales and N. Ireland have their own parliament or legislature. Ironically England does not which means Members of Parliament from the other three U.K, countries can vote on English issues but English M.P.'s are forbidden to vote on issues which are only specific to the other three. Very frustrating when the Scots decide to scupper something that does not in any way affect them just to spite the English. That's politics I suppose. Slightly off the target but explains why there are differences in the regions. In all cases lead cannot be used below high water mark on the coast or on Sites of Special Scientific Interest or SSSI's.

Royalty are not exempt; except for the Queen and she doesn't shoot wildfowl as far as I know.

I know someone who uses a punt gun for wildfowling and by necessity loads his own. The only shot that will carry for punt gunning; other than lead, is Tungsten Polymer and he reckons it costs him £90 per shot.

This explains things far better than I can. https://basc.org.uk/lead/ Lagopus.....

I personally think too many people get their panties in a wad over something that we most likely can't change. I'm not rich, I busted my butt for a long time and made enough money to retire at 62 I live on my SS and a returns from investments that bring my income up to what I would have gotten if I worked to 65.

Over the years I bought some nice guns and hunt a lot now. I can afford to load Bismuth and ITX shot($35./bx) for all my upland and waterfowl hunting out of my hammer guns and old sxs's. If I fire a box of shells a day I am having a very bad day in the field and still that was nearly the least expensive part of the hunt. If I have to shoot a high volume of steel for some reason I also have an inexpensive Turkish sxs that will do the job with steel.

I'm not about to let something like a change in shot requirements keep me out of the field.