doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com SxS Sporting Clays Suggestions

Beautiful job, how I envy people with such talent.

Hal, Tell us about your experiences shooting high volume with your 21's.
That's a beautiful Fox. Unless I was a master stocker, and had an annealing furnace, I can't make a Sterly 12 bought today into that for $3,000.00 There's a nice thread on the internals and their wear on Upland Journal in the gun forum. Every little thing just piles on time and cost.

I just ordered a clays gun from CSMC. It will be a 21 Pigeon Grade with 32" bbls. Should make a nice shooter and go with my Fox nicely. I looked at their clays RBL's a few weeks ago and they were very nice, especially the 32" gun. I don't see how you could go wrong with that, unless you are a Mike Campbell and can build your own. He can shoot that Fox better then most too.

Nice job with bOndo....






Beautiful gun....hows she choked ?

Thanks for the nice comments, Guys.

Joe, it's choked .022 & .022. I've found those chokes and 1 ounce #7.5 do it all for me.

Making my own stocks has long been a serious hobby of mine and it meshes nicely with learning all the nuances of stock fit that are so critical to shooting better. Doing some of the work myself saved me a few hundred bucks but anybody can own a similar 12ga Fox for $3,000.

You can still buy a 12ga Sterlingworth that's unaltered and functionally as-new for $700-1,000. Don't compromise here...settle for nothing less than perfect barrels tight on face. They'll likely be 30" IM/F and excellent ones are not that uncommon.

Let's say you spent the whole $1,000.

You can buy a very nice American black walnut blank with 50% feathercrotch figure (for instance) for ~$250. A decent California English blank like I used can be had for $5-600. Buy the prettiest you can afford....pretty wood is forever.

You can send the blank and entire gun out and have the a new stock made to your specs, hand-fitted to the metal with a recoil pad and returned to you in <4 months, ready for finishing. Total cost ~$800.

You spend $10 for a can of ProCustom Oil (or whatever) and finish the stock. Anybody can finish a stock. Learn how.

You take the wood off and send all the metal parts out, as fully assembled as possible. The shop will disassemble, polish barrels and action, slow rust blue the barrels and color case harden the action, alter the chokes to your specs, reassemble and return it looking brand new for ~$800. Again <4 months.
Somewhere during this time, the finish has cured for 6-8 weeks and you've rubbed it out with some 3F-4F pumice, maybe some 5F rottenstone and you send the wood out to be nicely checkered for $150, < 1 month.

What you have, in a year or less, is not a knockout, full-custom Fox. It's just a Sterlingworth with double triggers, extractors, snap-off splinter forend and semi-pistolgrip. But the metal finishes are as fine as factory-new, the stock is seriously upgraded and, if you've done your homework, it fits you like a glove; like no off-the-rack gun is likely to. You can spend a little more at any stage, but this can definitely be done...

Gun......$1,000
Blank.......250
Stocking....800
Metal work..800
Checkering..150

for $3,000.

Z,

Have you considered a 12ga Parker Repro Sporting Clays model??? It is a grand more than you hope to spend but when you're in the middle of the ocean whats a couple more drops of rain??? The Parker Repros are very high quality and have a great proven track record. The interchangeable chokes, beavertail and ejectors are a big plus...WITH steel shot use ok t'boot. Great shooting dimensions and nice wood....cased. The best part is it will be a great investment with less than a hundred of them produced. I didnt realize how nice they were until I just took one in on trade.

Mike,

.....love your pictures! I've seen the gun and watched you shoot it and both are very impressive. You make the "work" sound very easy but I think it takes a ample helping of "innate ability" which some of us just cant muster. (kinda like the shooting).
Cheers!! tom

ClapperZapper-
Not sure just what information you desire. The CAMC M-21 I shoot the most is a 12 gauge 2 bbl set. 28 inch bbls with Briley thin wall chokes and a 32 inch fixed choke .032 & .038.
Both barrels have vent ribs and are ported. I shoot this gun at all the target games.

After 4 years and 40,000 targets I had the trigger pull increased. The gun has a lifetime warranty and CSMC refreshed the entire gun to as new condition in less that 3 weeks.

Any poor performances are due to the shooter rather than the gun.

Hope this helps.

When I was "customizing" a 21 for sc use, I read some of your posts regarding foreend issues, and made mental note of them, that's all. I thought you might like to share your wear and repair experiences with those considering a similar effort.
I don't know if CSMC warrantied the repairs, or charged you for them under wear or abuse.
If I am mis-remembering the posts, I apologize.

Club Clay Shooting had an on line magazine that, among other things, reviewed guns. An article about a FabArms SxS with 30" barrels, adjustable comb, tri bore barrels, four locking lugs, etc. said its build quality is about like a Citori clay gun. It apparently was built for clay target shooting. It appeared to be sturdy enough to just shoot and not worry about too much. The price is probably below the $3-$4k range.

http://web.archive.org/web/20061109070322/www.clay-shooting.com/guntests/index.html if you scroll down to the Fabarm link July 2002 it gives the review.