My luck I’ll grow fond of both of them…
Great North Guns 12 ga Coach Gun
- Thread starter sidvicious
- Start date
I had a Boito S X S in .410; what an ugly, ill fitting little shotgun that shot, and shot well. I had the chokes reamed to cylinder and used it for skeet; I loved that gun. Heck of a squirrel gun, but just not pretty. I bought it used in about 1985 for $60 bucks.If you want a good 12 gauge coach gun, then save yourself some grief and just buy a Boito.
Reliable has the 20" barrel model (with fiberglass stock) for $549.99 and the 14" barrel model for $579.99.
They're both built very strong. You literally cannot legally cut a barrel down to 14", so it's a win on that alone.
As of this post, there are two left in stock for each of them.
Boito Side-By-Side Shotgun - 12Ga, 3", 20", Blued, Black Synthetic Stock, Brass Bead Front Sight, Fixed (IC,M), Double Trigger
https://www.reliablegun.com/boito-s...ass-bead-front-sight-fixed-icm-double-trigger
Boito A680 Side-By-Side Shotgun - 12Ga, 3", 14", Blued, Satin Wood Stock, Fiber Optic Front Sight, Fixed (Cyl,Cyl), Double Trigger
https://www.reliablegun.com/boito-a...optic-front-sight-fixed-cylcyl-double-trigger
- Location
- Southern Vancouver Island
That Boito 14" barreled unit would be a fun one to tinker on and have fun with fer me. The Boito's are decent, solidly built shotguns that
will last longer than their owners with proper care.
will last longer than their owners with proper care.
MapleSugar
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- On the loose from NIMH
I don't know, I haven't even properly cleaned mine yet. They come slathered in thick grease and it stinks like hell.
I'm going to contact Boito to see if they sell spare stock sets. I might as well ask them for a spare brass bead, too.
Thanks for the idea!
FatCatsDad
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
Yup, the Stoeger coaches are easy to slick up.
I have seen some that have become wall hangers in the wrong hands.
To keep your self out of trouble when funneling and polishing chambers, you need to have a good understanding of head spacing
MapleSugar
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- On the loose from NIMH
How many coach guns have any of those features and why would you think that they matter?
all of them, and you can always buy a full length barrel gun and cut it to 18" and install a bead site in a half hour. with the price difference you could pay a smith to do it if you cant yourself
they matter because some people like nice things, some people like more than bare bones basic piece of crap. why buy any rifle other then a savage axis? it shoots doesnt it? why would fancy things like quality or looks/handling/accuracy matter at all.
i bought this at intersurplus for $239 in January. i would have a very hard time saying the Boito for twice the money is a better buy.
and that's not even that nice, when you get into the $350-450 range there are some world class shotguns
Agree totally with the above 2 posts. If I am just sitting on stand while hunting, I want my gun to make me smile when I look at it.
My very first double shotgun was a Stoeger SxS, bought brand new from LeBaron's back in the day for a price that was cheap even back then. It was one of those smoking-hot superdeals at the front of the catalog. It shot okay, but its appearance and handling made me wonder why so many guys swooned over SxS shotguns. It swung like a 2x4. I was hugely disappointed with it, but I wanted to give it a chance and used it almost exclusively for ducks during the next few seasons before finding a crack on the receiver, short but scary. Sold it to a guy with full disclosure; he "fixed it up", not sure how, and shot it for several more years, often sitting right next to me in the blind...which kinda scared the crap out of me...
That beat-up old Husky in my earlier post is cosmetically worn and definitely shows its age...but it handles, points and shoots better than any new Stoeger, Boito or other re-labeled piece of crap you can get that comes with plastic stocks. Breaking it open and dropping a couple of shells in, and then snapping it shut...it feels like quality. The Boitos...well, remember that 2x4?
My very first double shotgun was a Stoeger SxS, bought brand new from LeBaron's back in the day for a price that was cheap even back then. It was one of those smoking-hot superdeals at the front of the catalog. It shot okay, but its appearance and handling made me wonder why so many guys swooned over SxS shotguns. It swung like a 2x4. I was hugely disappointed with it, but I wanted to give it a chance and used it almost exclusively for ducks during the next few seasons before finding a crack on the receiver, short but scary. Sold it to a guy with full disclosure; he "fixed it up", not sure how, and shot it for several more years, often sitting right next to me in the blind...which kinda scared the crap out of me...
That beat-up old Husky in my earlier post is cosmetically worn and definitely shows its age...but it handles, points and shoots better than any new Stoeger, Boito or other re-labeled piece of crap you can get that comes with plastic stocks. Breaking it open and dropping a couple of shells in, and then snapping it shut...it feels like quality. The Boitos...well, remember that 2x4?
MapleSugar
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- On the loose from NIMH
Who hunts ducks with a coach gun? That's what this thread is about.
You're comparing a long barreled shotgun to a 14" or 20" coachgun and then wondering why they don't swing the same?
Try wielding your 28" barreled duck gun in close confines or bang it around in a truck for awhile and tell me how superior it is.
For me they're a nice looking and very functional tool. Mostly used as an "in case" gun, when I fall asleep on the outside deck, surrounded by hundreds of acres of forest mind you. This is not any of the guns in the discussion but, it's my "go everywhere" gun and the 1st sxs I felt I had to have over the years. ...and ya it's a Norc but it makes holes in the right direction. I love the Turkish Walnut stock, but if I had to beat on the business end of a black bear with it I wouldn't hesitate. I really like it
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MapleSugar
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- On the loose from NIMH
No they don't.all of them, and you can always buy a full length barrel gun and cut it to 18" and install a bead site in a half hour. with the price difference you could pay a smith to do it if you cant yourself
they matter because some people like nice things, some people like more than bare bones basic piece of crap. why buy any rifle other then a savage axis? it shoots doesnt it? why would fancy things like quality or looks/handling/accuracy matter at all.
i bought this at intersurplus for $239 in January. i would have a very hard time saying the Boito for twice the money is a better buy.
and that's not even that nice, when you get into the $350-450 range there are some world class shotguns
I've yet to see one coach gun with a Greener cross-bolt safety. Your gun doesn't even have one, it doesn't even have a blind cross-bolt.
At best, you just have a third bite with no locking mechanism.
This is what a Greener cross-bolt safety looks like:
I literally spent hours looking at all the SxS's on the InterSurplus site trying to find a few good ones to either cut down, or leave as they are.
I was looking for guns with the Greener cross-bolt safety and a Deeley forend release. (I hate Anson releases.)
I think I found 2 or 3 that didn't have cracked stocks with old and frail wood, loose actions, or broken loaded-chamber indicators (which I did not want anyways.)
Then I read this and decided to stop wasting my time trying to turn a worn out shotgun into a reliable shooter.
Are third bites necessary on shotguns?
Published by Vintage Guns Ltd on 26th June 2019
Birmingham makers were very fond of their extra locking systems but do they actually work?
The Anson & Deeley of 1875 was a design ahead of its time. It was the basis for a reliable, strong, safe and neat hammerless sporting shotgun virtually indistinguishable from the boxlocks now made by firms from Turkey to Italy, Spain to Birmingham.
What was not at the time universally understood, however, was the science and metallurgy concerned with the mating of breech to barrels. Gunmakers and shooters were extremely concerned with breech-locking safety.
The original locking system used by Westley Richards on Anson & Deeley guns was the 1863 patent bolted top-lever without any under-bolts. However, the two systems were quickly mated and the treble-grip action (Purdey under-bolts plus Westley Richards bolted top-lever and doll’s head rib extension) was born.
Some gunmakers, like W.W Greener, made a selling point for their guns by championing third bites as an extra means of securing the breech to the action face. Competition for market share was strong and Birmingham makers emphasized the robust nature of their guns, as opposed to the London reliance on Purdey bolts.
Greener, promoting his ‘treble-wedge-fast’ system wrote: ‘Any gun with a well fitting bolted top connection is vastly superior to those with bottom bolts only, or with extension of the rib without any bolt fastening into it.’ He cites the live-pigeon shot W.F Carver firing over 40,000 shots in 200 days and continuing to use it for another two years, in which over 130,000 shots were fired without it shooting loose.
Greener also draws attention to some poor quality guns then available: ‘The Anson & Deeley gun, as made by some firms in this country and abroad, now that (patent) rights have lapsed is far from equalling the original type from whatever point of view it may be regarded.’ He refers to ‘sham top-fasteners’ and continues: ‘..these guns do not stand continual wear; not only does the lock action prove faulty but even the breech mechanisms, after firing but a few shots, are found to gape at the breech joint...’.
Irritatingly for Greener, his own patented third grip was widely mimicked by the producers of poor quality guns, trading on Greener’s well-known advocacy of the system.
Of course, they neglected his strenuous quality control and made guns that loosely resemble Greener’s output but these third fasteners are actually almost totally ineffective, due to the sloppy engineering involved and the loose fit. After a few shots, the third fastener becomes mere decoration as it is not holding the gun shut when it fires and the bar flexes, the tolerances being such that the flexing happens anyway and the cross bolt is a mere spectator to the action.
So, what happens when the lock does its work and fires the charge in the chamber?
The burning of powder in the cartridge sends pressure waves out in every direction. The chamber walls prevent outward movement and the force is therefore channelled backwards into the breech face, and forwards, sending the wadding and shot charge down the bores. The backward force into the un-moving breech face is channelled through the static barrels onto the hook, braced against the hinge pin and prevented from opening by the under-bolts.
The force is absorbed by the bar of the the action, which flexes at the radius between action face and bar. The tensile strength of quality steel allows it to flex and then return to its original shape immediately. These stresses, however, do not work to open the gun. I have fired a 12-bore shotgun un-bolted without event.
If a gun is properly made of quality materials and jointed correctly, then it requires no top extension to hold it together. The action will flex upon firing, opening a ‘V’ shaped gap,with the sharp end at the radius and the open end at the top of the action. When the right barrel is fired, lateral flexing also occurs, with the open end of the ‘V’ on the right side and the sharp end at the left. The hook, hinge pin and lumps engaging with the machined recesses in the bar ensure the process of expansion and spring-back is controlled and not damaging.
My own experience suggests very strongly that one of the most important virtues a pleasant shooting gun possesses is rigidity. An action with less observable flexing is better to shoot. It vibrates less, it feels steadier, it is easier to shoot consistently and less likely to give you a headache.
If the action is sufficiently robust, flexing will be minimised and third bites become superfluous. Their presence makes manufacturing more expensive because properly fitting them is skilled and time consuming. Vintage guns with third bites are more difficult to re-joint because there are more surfaces to be reconciled when the barrels are brought back onto the face. Second hand guns often have noticeable gaps at the front of the doll’s head from repeated re-jointing.
For game guns, third bites are not really necessary, though they may be useful in double rifles. They remain an interesting avenue of 19th century design but few modern game guns bother with them.
https://www.vintageguns.co.uk/magazine/third-bites
I'd rather have a firearm that I can easily get replacement parts for if necessary. I also couldn't care less about cheap engravings.
If I wanted a museum piece to look at, I'd buy a Purdey.
FWIW, your gun isn't even that nice in the eyes of serious collectors. So I don't understand why you're calling a Boito a "bare bones basic piece of crap". That's all your gun ever was and all it will ever be.
Just because it's old doesn't mean that it's awesome. Compare it to the best guns of it's day and it's going to fall short.
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MapleSugar
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- On the loose from NIMH
As long as it works and you're happy with it, that's all that matters!
That's a #### ton of research and very impressive, but forgive me...aren't we talking about vintage European shotguns at a relatively affordable price? Something smells...offNo they don't.
I've yet to see one coach gun with a Greener cross-bolt safety. Your gun doesn't even have one, it doesn't even have a blind cross-bolt.
At best, you just have a third bite with no locking mechanism.
This is what a Greener cross-bolt safety looks like:
I literally spent hours looking at all the SxS's on the InterSurplus site trying to find a few good ones to either cut down, or leave as they are.
I was looking for guns with the Greener cross-bolt safety and a Deeley forend release. (I hate Anson releases.)
I think I found 2 or 3 that didn't have cracked stocks with old and frail wood, loose actions, or broken loaded-chamber indicators (which I did not want anyways.)
Then I read this and decided to stop wasting my time trying to turn a worn out shotgun into a reliable shooter.
Are third bites necessary on shotguns?
Published by Vintage Guns Ltd on 26th June 2019
Birmingham makers were very fond of their extra locking systems but do they actually work?
The Anson & Deeley of 1875 was a design ahead of its time. It was the basis for a reliable, strong, safe and neat hammerless sporting shotgun virtually indistinguishable from the boxlocks now made by firms from Turkey to Italy, Spain to Birmingham.
What was not at the time universally understood, however, was the science and metallurgy concerned with the mating of breech to barrels. Gunmakers and shooters were extremely concerned with breech-locking safety.
The original locking system used by Westley Richards on Anson & Deeley guns was the 1863 patent bolted top-lever without any under-bolts. However, the two systems were quickly mated and the treble-grip action (Purdey under-bolts plus Westley Richards bolted top-lever and doll’s head rib extension) was born.
Some gunmakers, like W.W Greener, made a selling point for their guns by championing third bites as an extra means of securing the breech to the action face. Competition for market share was strong and Birmingham makers emphasized the robust nature of their guns, as opposed to the London reliance on Purdey bolts.
Greener, promoting his ‘treble-wedge-fast’ system wrote: ‘Any gun with a well fitting bolted top connection is vastly superior to those with bottom bolts only, or with extension of the rib without any bolt fastening into it.’ He cites the live-pigeon shot W.F Carver firing over 40,000 shots in 200 days and continuing to use it for another two years, in which over 130,000 shots were fired without it shooting loose.
Greener also draws attention to some poor quality guns then available: ‘The Anson & Deeley gun, as made by some firms in this country and abroad, now that (patent) rights have lapsed is far from equalling the original type from whatever point of view it may be regarded.’ He refers to ‘sham top-fasteners’ and continues: ‘..these guns do not stand continual wear; not only does the lock action prove faulty but even the breech mechanisms, after firing but a few shots, are found to gape at the breech joint...’.
Irritatingly for Greener, his own patented third grip was widely mimicked by the producers of poor quality guns, trading on Greener’s well-known advocacy of the system.
Of course, they neglected his strenuous quality control and made guns that loosely resemble Greener’s output but these third fasteners are actually almost totally ineffective, due to the sloppy engineering involved and the loose fit. After a few shots, the third fastener becomes mere decoration as it is not holding the gun shut when it fires and the bar flexes, the tolerances being such that the flexing happens anyway and the cross bolt is a mere spectator to the action.
So, what happens when the lock does its work and fires the charge in the chamber?
The burning of powder in the cartridge sends pressure waves out in every direction. The chamber walls prevent outward movement and the force is therefore channelled backwards into the breech face, and forwards, sending the wadding and shot charge down the bores. The backward force into the un-moving breech face is channelled through the static barrels onto the hook, braced against the hinge pin and prevented from opening by the under-bolts.
The force is absorbed by the bar of the the action, which flexes at the radius between action face and bar. The tensile strength of quality steel allows it to flex and then return to its original shape immediately. These stresses, however, do not work to open the gun. I have fired a 12-bore shotgun un-bolted without event.
If a gun is properly made of quality materials and jointed correctly, then it requires no top extension to hold it together. The action will flex upon firing, opening a ‘V’ shaped gap,with the sharp end at the radius and the open end at the top of the action. When the right barrel is fired, lateral flexing also occurs, with the open end of the ‘V’ on the right side and the sharp end at the left. The hook, hinge pin and lumps engaging with the machined recesses in the bar ensure the process of expansion and spring-back is controlled and not damaging.
My own experience suggests very strongly that one of the most important virtues a pleasant shooting gun possesses is rigidity. An action with less observable flexing is better to shoot. It vibrates less, it feels steadier, it is easier to shoot consistently and less likely to give you a headache.
If the action is sufficiently robust, flexing will be minimised and third bites become superfluous. Their presence makes manufacturing more expensive because properly fitting them is skilled and time consuming. Vintage guns with third bites are more difficult to re-joint because there are more surfaces to be reconciled when the barrels are brought back onto the face. Second hand guns often have noticeable gaps at the front of the doll’s head from repeated re-jointing.
For game guns, third bites are not really necessary, though they may be useful in double rifles. They remain an interesting avenue of 19th century design but few modern game guns bother with them.
https://www.vintageguns.co.uk/magazine/third-bites
I'd rather have a firearm that I can easily get replacement parts for if necessary. I also couldn't care less about cheap engravings.
If I wanted a museum piece to look at, I'd buy a Purdey.
sure bud, so you know quality but buy junk. ok.No they don't.
I've yet to see one coach gun with a Greener cross-bolt safety. Your gun doesn't even have one, it doesn't even have a blind cross-bolt.
At best, you just have a third bite with no locking mechanism.
This is what a Greener cross-bolt safety looks like:
I literally spent hours looking at all the SxS's on the InterSurplus site trying to find a few good ones to either cut down, or leave as they are.
I was looking for guns with the Greener cross-bolt safety and a Deeley forend release. (I hate Anson releases.)
I think I found 2 or 3 that didn't have cracked stocks with old and frail wood, loose actions, or broken loaded-chamber indicators (which I did not want anyways.)
Then I read this and decided to stop wasting my time trying to turn a worn out shotgun into a reliable shooter.
Are third bites necessary on shotguns?
Published by Vintage Guns Ltd on 26th June 2019
Birmingham makers were very fond of their extra locking systems but do they actually work?
The Anson & Deeley of 1875 was a design ahead of its time. It was the basis for a reliable, strong, safe and neat hammerless sporting shotgun virtually indistinguishable from the boxlocks now made by firms from Turkey to Italy, Spain to Birmingham.
What was not at the time universally understood, however, was the science and metallurgy concerned with the mating of breech to barrels. Gunmakers and shooters were extremely concerned with breech-locking safety.
The original locking system used by Westley Richards on Anson & Deeley guns was the 1863 patent bolted top-lever without any under-bolts. However, the two systems were quickly mated and the treble-grip action (Purdey under-bolts plus Westley Richards bolted top-lever and doll’s head rib extension) was born.
Some gunmakers, like W.W Greener, made a selling point for their guns by championing third bites as an extra means of securing the breech to the action face. Competition for market share was strong and Birmingham makers emphasized the robust nature of their guns, as opposed to the London reliance on Purdey bolts.
Greener, promoting his ‘treble-wedge-fast’ system wrote: ‘Any gun with a well fitting bolted top connection is vastly superior to those with bottom bolts only, or with extension of the rib without any bolt fastening into it.’ He cites the live-pigeon shot W.F Carver firing over 40,000 shots in 200 days and continuing to use it for another two years, in which over 130,000 shots were fired without it shooting loose.
Greener also draws attention to some poor quality guns then available: ‘The Anson & Deeley gun, as made by some firms in this country and abroad, now that (patent) rights have lapsed is far from equalling the original type from whatever point of view it may be regarded.’ He refers to ‘sham top-fasteners’ and continues: ‘..these guns do not stand continual wear; not only does the lock action prove faulty but even the breech mechanisms, after firing but a few shots, are found to gape at the breech joint...’.
Irritatingly for Greener, his own patented third grip was widely mimicked by the producers of poor quality guns, trading on Greener’s well-known advocacy of the system.
Of course, they neglected his strenuous quality control and made guns that loosely resemble Greener’s output but these third fasteners are actually almost totally ineffective, due to the sloppy engineering involved and the loose fit. After a few shots, the third fastener becomes mere decoration as it is not holding the gun shut when it fires and the bar flexes, the tolerances being such that the flexing happens anyway and the cross bolt is a mere spectator to the action.
So, what happens when the lock does its work and fires the charge in the chamber?
The burning of powder in the cartridge sends pressure waves out in every direction. The chamber walls prevent outward movement and the force is therefore channelled backwards into the breech face, and forwards, sending the wadding and shot charge down the bores. The backward force into the un-moving breech face is channelled through the static barrels onto the hook, braced against the hinge pin and prevented from opening by the under-bolts.
The force is absorbed by the bar of the the action, which flexes at the radius between action face and bar. The tensile strength of quality steel allows it to flex and then return to its original shape immediately. These stresses, however, do not work to open the gun. I have fired a 12-bore shotgun un-bolted without event.
If a gun is properly made of quality materials and jointed correctly, then it requires no top extension to hold it together. The action will flex upon firing, opening a ‘V’ shaped gap,with the sharp end at the radius and the open end at the top of the action. When the right barrel is fired, lateral flexing also occurs, with the open end of the ‘V’ on the right side and the sharp end at the left. The hook, hinge pin and lumps engaging with the machined recesses in the bar ensure the process of expansion and spring-back is controlled and not damaging.
My own experience suggests very strongly that one of the most important virtues a pleasant shooting gun possesses is rigidity. An action with less observable flexing is better to shoot. It vibrates less, it feels steadier, it is easier to shoot consistently and less likely to give you a headache.
If the action is sufficiently robust, flexing will be minimised and third bites become superfluous. Their presence makes manufacturing more expensive because properly fitting them is skilled and time consuming. Vintage guns with third bites are more difficult to re-joint because there are more surfaces to be reconciled when the barrels are brought back onto the face. Second hand guns often have noticeable gaps at the front of the doll’s head from repeated re-jointing.
For game guns, third bites are not really necessary, though they may be useful in double rifles. They remain an interesting avenue of 19th century design but few modern game guns bother with them.
https://www.vintageguns.co.uk/magazine/third-bites
I'd rather have a firearm that I can easily get replacement parts for if necessary. I also couldn't care less about cheap engravings.
If I wanted a museum piece to look at, I'd buy a Purdey.
FWIW, your gun isn't even that nice in the eyes of serious collectors. So I don't understand why you're calling a Boito a "bare bones basic piece of crap". That's all your gun ever was and all it will ever be.
Just because it's old doesn't mean that it's awesome. Compare it to the best guns of it's day and it's going to fall short.
the first pics i showed shows a hidden 3rd bite, The shul shows a greener cross bolt, and the underlever doesnt need anything more, its already stronger than the rest.
we are just talking about bare bones base model new junk vs old world used high quality gear. that is it. you cant compare the Boito to these, not for quality, not for looks or feel, not for options and not even on price, the Boito loose 100% of the time.
but if you don't agree, that's fine. you don have to agree. but the convo is about guns so here we are, talking about guns
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Indeed, who on Earth would shoot ducks with a coachgun? I sure as hell wouldn't, and never said anything about it. And I'm not comparing a long-barreled shotgun to a coachgun, for any applications whatsoever.
I said that my first double shotgun was a Stoeger Brazil-made SxS; it had 28-inch tubes and was a typical hunting shotgun configuration. It was heavy and awkward and handled very poorly. Their coachguns are simply short-barreled versions of those same guns. I am comparing those cheapo guns...short and long...to the older quality-built Euro and American SxS shotguns as illustrated in posts above.
For fun I shot ducks with a Norinco 12 or 14” barrels. I had to pattern it lots and put on turkey sights to keep my head down. Over decoys it worked. Swings poor and muzzle blast is crazy. No longer have it as I only used it for cans etc.
ps: everyone wanted to try it was fun.
ps: everyone wanted to try it was fun.
MapleSugar
CGN Ultra frequent flyer
- Location
- On the loose from NIMH
You didn't read the article that I posted, did you?
If you did, you would realize that the "old world used high quality gear" that you bought was the equivalent of the "bare bones base model new junk" Boito that you love to bash.
You'd also know that the Greener cross-bolt safety becomes ineffective when it's on a low end shotgun that wasn't fitted properly.
If you're happy with your shotguns, that's great. But it's pretty naive to think that you now possess guns that were high end in their day. If you had, they would still command high prices. Vintage Purdey's usually start in the $15,000 USD range and can easily be worth more than $150,000 USD.
Personally, I'd never waste my money on something that would give me so little return on my investment. I bought something that is just perfect for what I require AFTER I passed over the exact same type of shotguns that you now own.
FWIW, the original conversation was about the OP buying an affordable coach gun. I offered my opinion based on my experience.
In my opinion, I'd rather buy a new gun that's built solid and will give me decades of dependable service.
Buying a used SxS shotgun (that could easily be over 70 years old) is not something I would recommend when they can easily end up costing a lot more in repairs down the road.
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