doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Sleeved Barrels

Gough Thomas, gun editor of the British Shooting Times and author of several books on shotguns, regarded the stepped monobloc an aesthetic plus. He drew parallels between the stepped bloc and ancient columns.

What constitutes �best� method? Monobloc is the easiest method of barrel construction, but I�m not sure I�d say the best method. I�d vote for chopper lump or demi bloc as best.

Careful, dude. Pretty soon they will start calling you a wall, or some other nonsense.

Buzz, the monoblock is one, solid piece of steel, through to where the barrels begin. No voids, no place for corrosion to begin between the tubes or lumps, and nothing to join together. Chamber area fully supported.

See the burst chamber thread? Wasn't a monoblock gun, was it?



Best,
Ted

Ted, you've made it clear you don't think sleeving is an acceptable method of renovating a barrel damaged double. Do you take that position from a safety concern or the aesthetic?

Probably a mixture of the two, but assume a well done sleeve by an expert gunsmith and a perfectly good receiver whether monoblock or some other accepted joining method. What is the safety concern?...Geo

Best is a weird term.

I�m not sure I�d call a monobloc best work. The skill to knit two chopperlump barrels together seems more best to me. But, my money would still be on a monoblock gun passing the old French triple proof level of 27,000 psi. Because, it was mostly monobloc guns that did. When Kennett pointed out it was �a rare piece of steel that had those 4 crossed sheaths of wheat stamped into it�, he wasn�t kidding. It is easier to put a monobloc set of barrels right if something bad happens to a tube, but, the world hasn�t needed a whole lot of that skill, to date. Nobody specializes in it, that I am aware of. The Bruchets did one, here and there.

Geo, it is both. I�ve never seen an invisible sleeve. I�ve seen messed up handling, two tone blue, Damascus sleeved to steel, and pictures of all of the above.
To me, finding a better example seems like a much better option. I can hardly believe all the guys piping up about how much cheaper it is to buy a sleever than an example in good condition. �Why, finding an example of this with good barrels is almost impossible, and look how economical it was with the sleeved barrels�!

Yea, maybe.

Whatever.

Best,
Ted

John Foster did truly invisible sleeving. I have imported guns he sleeved and the work was superb.

For me it comes down to price point for what is being bought or sold. I buy a few sleevers and I sell a few. Never for big money but if I can put a guy in a nice British sleeved boxlock for under 1K we both usually walk away happy. No I am not trading in my H&H for a sleeved version of the same gun.

The E.C. Green you have at $1250, vs a $1000 sleever pretty much makes my point.
I don�t have anything I�d trade for a sleeved gun, either.

Best,
Ted

Hey I am not arguing your point but the market is what it is today. Now days people complain about the price of a gun like that Green.

It is a bargain. It has beautiful, long, in proof tubes, choked about CYL and FULL, and I wish I had room in my safe for it, and a use not covered by the dozen or so 12s already here. Double triggers and no ejectors give it an edge in reliability.

I believe it is superior to any sleeved boxlock off the Isle. Period.

Best,
Ted

Ok I will change the word "best" for the word safest as in most secure.

Chopper lumps require more skill at the execution stage, mostly in judging the temperature right, since the braze that holds the two barrels together runs at a temperature close to the critical temperature for steel, I recall it being somewhere around 650 centigrade. The mere thought that the barrels get red hot in the process worries me. Contrast that with the 200 or so centigrade that melt the solder in monobloc tubes.

Beretta SO series OUs use monobloc barrels, they are generally considered among the best sidelock OUs. Perazzis also use monobloc and they are among the most intensively used doubles ever made, being mostly target guns.