Availability or 2 1/2 shells?
- Thread starter Gunney
- Start date
No they're not Damascus. Near as I can tell it's one of the last made to bear the H&A name from about 1902-1905 and has regular type barrels. My other concern is that I have been advised not to use regular shells in the older guns as the steel shot can mess up the barrels when it hits the chokes.
Bulls**t. I don't know why this rumour persists. Plenty of damascus barrels were nitro-proofed, and plenty strong. I definitely would not be shooting steel shot in any older guns, particularly damascus, but normal shells are fine, particularly when they are in the shorter lengths, such as 2" or 2.5". I myself shoot 2.5" 12 ga. in an original 1880's vintage 5 3/4 lb. English double. Check out the "Finding out for myself" series of articles in the Double Gun Journal to see how well a set of damascus barrels fared when subjected to ungodly pressures before you tell people not to shoot damascus barrels.
I agree with the above re: damascus barrels, I use my damascus barreled guns for shooting and hunting whenever I can and don't consider them dangerous with the Black Powder handloads I use. Back to the orig. poster, you may as well dig in and start making your own 2 1/2" shells whether 12 or 16ga., save your old brass, contact Bp or some such and order a tool to cut cases back and a roll crimping tool, all for under $50, and thats all you need to reload as many 2 1/2" shells as you want, whether smokeless or black. Contact me for more info. on this type of inexpensive reloading as well as tools to safely prime and deprime cases without cost.
..random comment....One can also use an older Lee hand reloading kit to do 2.5 or 2" shells. I have one that I use for both in the 12 ga. It has a number of pieces that you use with a mallet to reload, and it works great, albeit rather slowly. It comes with both a 6 or 8-section crimp starter. The only difficulty in this is that it reduces the capacity inside the hull, and increases pressures somewhat. I have actually had good results using Hogdon 777 with plastic shot wads, with part of the tail section cut off. I know this sounds a bit involved, but there is a price (and a sense of pride!) that comes with shooting these older non-mainstream guns. Get to it!
