Double rifles
- Thread starter DGY
- Start date
- Location
- Saskatchewan
Sabatti let a bunch of big bore doubles go to Cabela's in the USA a few years ago that they rushed out of the factory to meet a low price point negotiated by Cabelas buyers. Regulated the point of impact and bore convergence with a dremel tool grinding burr applied to the crown of the muzzle. Bad mistake. Those rifles are their history and reputation now, but they reportedly have cleaned up their act since, and in any case their "medium" bore guns were never part of that debacle. I'd buy a Sabatti if I could inspect it and shoot it first.
i will not buy one sxs or o/u but that is just my money ...
Have you tried contacting them to ask about it? Don't see a phone number on the site, but there is an text contact.
Ted
I did send an email to ask if it has any mechanical issues because of the listed price.
Never got a response.
I’ve seen good ( paid) reviews of their single shot rifles and double shotguns on Italian hunting videos but nothing about the doubles besides the complaints about the Cabelas run from guys who had bought them on Africa hunting sites.
Never got a response.
I’ve seen good ( paid) reviews of their single shot rifles and double shotguns on Italian hunting videos but nothing about the doubles besides the complaints about the Cabelas run from guys who had bought them on Africa hunting sites.
Longwalker makes some good points - I don’t like the O/U because of the extra travel required to hinge open the barrels, but to each their own. On the Blaser S2 front, I do however disagree with the design. The famous Blaser decocker means that on the reload, one must recock the rifle before shooting. Under pressure in circumstances that involve angry DG bearing down on the hunter, it is a REALLY bad idea. The S2 is also only available with extractors. No ejectors available. Not a huge deal if one trains oneself to crack the rifle open and let the open action pivot earthward to let gravity drop the brass out. My first double was a Blaser S2 in .470 Nitro Express. Biggest mistake of my life buying that POS. The “adjustable” regulation entails taking the “rubber” rib off the barrel set and moving/sliding a wedge up and down between the barrels to control the amount of pressure midway between the barrels to control regulation on the horizontal plane. On the vertical plane, you’re pretty much screwed. Sort of. Mine shot about a foot apart at 50 yards on the vertical plane. I did fix it by taking a 2 pound ball peen hammer and giving the flimsy brass yoke that holds the muzzles together a judicious whack! to bend it enough to regulate the barrels on the vertical plane.
In the end, I got that S2 to regulate very well indeed, but the decocker was a huge design mistake that makes the whole affair a really bad idea for a DG gun. The stock also feels quite blocky and the gun pounds the shooter quite badly due to stock shape. The curl in the pistol grip is also way too tight and assures the user that the trigger hand knuckles get seriously pounded by the trigger guard with every discharge. Total NFG PoS speaking with experience. My Merkels shoot well and are of much better design. The only thing I can complain about with the Merkel is the auto safety. Another bad design idea. One does NOT want the safety to be automatically applied every time the rifle is opened. It should be a manual safety such as on my Heym rifles. As Longwalker stated, look for double triggers and if you’re looking at bigger cartridges with serious horsepower, the front trigger should be hinged. The whole notion of a double rifle is to have two separate guns in one - double triggers, double lock work and double barrels. The idea being redundancy if one side should somehow be disabled. Also, the double is designed to deliver the fastest two successive shots available. One can back up one’s own shot with the second barrel!!!!
For fun I also have a couple of other antique doubles - old hammer guns with Damascus barrels that are a lot of fun to shoot with NFB loads that I sometimes use for deer hunting in Ontario.
Another option for older failing eyes is to go with a Trijicon RMR. They work really well so long as one stays with the 3.5 or smaller MOA red dot or the trianglular reticle. The other huge advantage is that the RMRs, and Docter red dots and others similar is that they don’t spoil the handling characteristics of the double rifle. The double is supposed to handle like a perfectly fit shotgun and at least in my humble opinion, a scope tends to spoil the balance and fast handling nature of a double. Again my opinion only. I for a long time had a Leupy 1-4.5 VXIII on my Merkel 140A in 9.3x 74R….. great caribou gun and the Fish cops thought it was a .410 shotgun when they spot checked me in Northern Quebec when that hunt was still going on.
I do wish the OP all the best in his endeavours stepping into this fascinating world of the double rifle. Longwalker has some good valid opinions, as do others posting in this thread, and the best advice anyone can give the OP is to really go deep studying all you can before taking the plunge. It’s an expensive journey but really really exciting!! Try avoiding really expensive mistakes like the one I made with that .470 S2. Research research research !!!!!!!!
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