doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Best guns in the world today?

Again, we are arguing semantics. We are trying to compare apples to oranges. These guns we are discussing were made for different intended purpose. A 5 lb 2 oz English sidelock was not made or intended for shooting a 100 round trap doubles event nor was a 9 lb , 32 inch Perazzi Mirage built or intended for shooting timber doodle. Also, none of these guns were made by Providence and anything made by man will break. Let's move to another one of Chuck's fun topics.

Were'd my .410 killing power thread go?

How did the London pheasant poppers get back in here? The "Once upon a time in an old Roman town on a small island at the center of an Empire" (quoting myself of course) guns are a historical phenom pinned like butterflies in O&L cases and requiring OWD's annual spruceup. The best gun is one that's best for you for show and for go maybe but certainly for go. And of course, one would have to be able to buy the gun and have money left for Spam so "Best" would at some point attach itself to what we'd like to believe (but don't) is the philistine irrelevancy of price. So Best=Most Expensive. I like apples and oranges and clementines and Abbatico&Savinelli and Spam.

jack

I doubt many doubles have been shot more than this one:

http://www.gavingardiner.com/BidCat/detail.asp?SaleRef=0012&LotRef=192

Made in 1895, it's still in proof and you could use it today.

Sure the bbls are thin and you would want to replace them, but the gun itself is still going strong.

So to all the haters, that's what it means to be a Best.

OWD

To get back to the question posed:

It has not been my experience that London ever had a strangle hold on the "best gun" thing, either in numbers or uniqueness. There may have been a cache in the anglophile Empire thing but the guns themselves were certainly nothing special. Beautiful guns were made many places.

These days it would seem that the Italians have a pre-eminent position not only by number of gunmakers but the incredible quality of the products. Just as one has never stood alone, they do not now - but it would take some real doing for anyone to be better.

Even when it comes to making machines of most any kind, the Italians have a sense of line and style that is unequaled currently: toasters, coffee makers, cars, lathes, you name it they can make it prettier AWA functional.

Altho I admit that Marelli and Lucas can still meet anyone's expectations no matter how low they are.

HTH
have a day
Dr.WtS

I have a Perrazi SCO but if anyone thinks that�s a best gun they are in cloud cuckoo land, functional and 100% reliable yes, "best" NO, rgds, Mike

I don't think anyone would posit an SCO as a "best", it's just a way fancy production gun. Now, an SHO or DHO would be a different proposition. I've seen a couple DHO's that make Purdeys/etc look like small time stuff. And there was an SHO three bbl set that I would have committed illegal acts for - as in Way Best!

prolly not JMO

Dr.WtS

Mike, I brought it to the top.

CLEMENTINES RULE!!!

Best gunmaker in the world? Has to be Hartmann and Weiss! Everyone else is competing for second place.