I realize there are many people who seem to have trouble walking around, from stumbling over "Burst Damascus barrels". However; in some 55 years of being interested in & associated with many others also interested in old classic dbl shotguns, I have yet to be showed a bursted barrrel, which could be definitively stated it burst "Because it was Damascus", Period. I have in this time witnessed a good number of Damascus & Twist bbls being shot on a fairly regular basis, though not high volume targets, with regular "Store Bought" shells. I used to tell people they should not be shooting such shells in their guns & most just laughed at me & kept right on. None of them ever seemed to have reached that Nth shell. All the burst barrels I have personally seen, both steel & damascus, had those tell-tale signs of having had an obstruction. For my Damascus/Twist bbls I try to keep my smokeless load pressures around 7500-8000 psi. I use neither max SAAMI pressures or those super low ones. My use of these guns is strictly for hunting purposes & may entail cold weather & those super low pressures scare me under such conditions, too much danger of leaving something in the bore, most efficient way of bursting a bbl I know of.
