doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com The Fox SxS Returns

You might want to check your calculation again because .072" is .005" greater than the difference between a 12 gauge and a 16 gauge bore. That is hardly a negligible difference.

How about the shotguns built by John Nichols or Nichols and Lefever?

That screw with the face spanner holes is one of Lefever's wear compensating features. If your barrels are proud of the action at the breech face, moving that screw probably won't help at all. Some barrels were just struck that way, and some are struck a bit smaller than the breech balls. The compensating screw is only used to put barrels back on face. If the gun is loose, the bolting surfaces are worn, and the early Lefevers had another compensating screw to tighten that up. For later guns, it is easier to just make a new bolt a few thousandths thicker.

Many Lefevers are found with this compensating screw all buggered up because they are usually very difficult or impossible to move after 125 or more years. The later versions had a large screw slot that could withstand more torque, but even those can be very stubborn. I have had some that finally broke free after several months of soaking with good penetrating oil (forget about Kroil for these), heating with a soldering iron, rapid cooling with refrigerant, tapping with a brass rod, etc.

On the few that I have removed, I found a very slight taper to the threads, and I think the female threads also have a very slight taper, so getting them to go much deeper isn't easy anyway. I believe that when the guns were built, the assemblers probably ran the tap in a bit at a time to end up with a tight fit so this screw wouldn't back out. Retired Oregon Lefever Gunsmith Keith Kearcher recommended polishing the threads on a buffing wheel to get them to go a bit deeper. Good luck with finding a replacement screw though, if your buffing wheel grabs it and throws it into some dark corner of your shop. I forget the thread size, but it is most definitely not a standard size that you can simply buy a tap to run into the hole. I noticed that a couple seemed to have a hard black substance that may have been some early version of thread locker compound that prevented any penetrating oil from getting down into the threads. I have a loose I Grade gun on which I never was able to move this screw despite numerous attempts. I keep occasionally hitting it with Tasgon penetrating oil in the hope that it might eventually break free. After two years or so... no luck yet.

I made a face spanner for this type of Lefever compensating screw by drilling properly spaced holes into the end of a piece of drill rod with a small tee handle welded on, and using needle bearings from an old universal joint for my hardened pins. I suppose you could also use the end of the correct size drill bit to make pins. Some people recommend making a face spanner tool by carefully filing pins out of the end of a grade 8 bolt. That seemed like too much work for something that will probably break anyway. Naturally, a couple small pins won't take the same amount of torque that a good screwdriver blade will take, so great care must be taken to not get impatient and do damage to the screw or action knuckle.

You have an early thumb push opener model that was built when E was the lowest grade Lefever. The insert in the tip of the forend would have been made of a dark colored buffalo horn. It will take some care to remove the piece of wood that was used to replace the missing horn tip without doing damage, especially if glue was used in addition to the brads.

It looks like your gun still has a lot of original case hardening color on the sideplates. I notice that the forend iron is not attached to the wood, and the forend release and escutcheon is also removed. I hope it isn't missing because finding a replacement would be very difficult. The buttstock appears to have very nice figure and looks to be in pretty nice shape. If you decide to have someone refinish it, make certain it is someone who knows what they are doing. That wood is over 125 years old, and Lefevers tend to crack or split at the head of the stock above and below the sideplates where the thin and fragile wood meets the action. Great care must be taken during any disassembly. It is also for this reason that only low pressure low recoil loads should be used if the barrels are un-pitted and still safe to fire. You may be able to find pictures of the forend checkering when one comes up for sale on Gunbroker or other online source. Or enough of the original pattern may still be seen after stripping the finish for a good stock checkerer to re-cut it exactly as it was originally. Here's a pic of the forend checkering and the horn tip.



A good restoration will not be cheap, but a cheap restoration will likely do more harm than good. You would be better off leaving it as is than letting someone screw it up with incorrect techniques and materials.