Left home with no Cooey shotguns, came home with two

marshall said:
Back when you could buy a new one, I did not even know about 28 ga.
I worked on a high end single shot trap gun or two, great, looked like a high end sports car, BUT take it out in the swamp or trapper line and it would not stand up, like a jeep (cooey) would in the bush
I would not one in 10 ga, but would look nice to complete a set.
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True, all true,marshall.

Seems to me there was an 8 gauge Cooey made for industrial use.Could be wrong ,but seems to me I read that somewhere.Anyone else heard of an 8 gauge Cooey industrial gun ?
 
I’ve got two 28g....an 84 and an 840. They come up every now and then, but when they do, its best you pounce on them quickly because they wont last long. What are the going rates for them nowadays?
 
I shot my first duck with a cooey 20 gauge single shot...many many years later I still own that gun! :)
 
1963beretta said:
I’ve got two 28g....an 84 and an 840. They come up every now and then, but when they do, its best you pounce on them quickly because they wont last long. What are the going rates for them nowadays?
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Sold a NIB 84 for $500 and a excellent used 84 for $300 and could have sold at least 6 of each at the time
Kind of kick myself for selling the NIB :(
Just have one 84 and one 840 left and they will die with me
Cheers
 
I recently picked up a Cooey 840 12 gauge with 36 inch barrel. I'm shooting black powder Trap with it. It's a bit of a rough one, rode hard and put away wet, but the action has not seen much shooting.
I had to replace the missing forend spacer with a brass one, cast by a friend. The extra weight of the 36 incher sops up recoil and the extra length keeps the gun swinging.
I plan to install a $40 recoil pad, doubling the cost of the gun.
It's no Bt99 but it is fun.
 
saskbooknut said:
I recently picked up a Cooey 840 12 gauge with 36 inch barrel. I'm shooting black powder Trap with it. It's a bit of a rough one, rode hard and put away wet, but the action has not seen much shooting.
I had to replace the missing forend spacer with a brass one, cast by a friend. The extra weight of the 36 incher sops up recoil and the extra length keeps the gun swinging.
I plan to install a $40 recoil pad, doubling the cost of the gun.
It's no Bt99 but it is fun.
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Very cool :) They were common down east since guys used them on the sea ducks.Also seen 34 and 32 inch barrels down here . I save one 36" for my collection. There is a guy on the EE that sells the factory metal spacers for like $20 bucks if you ever want an original
Cheers
 
3macs1 said:
Very cool :) They were common down east since guys used them on the sea ducks.Also seen 34 and 32 inch barrels down here . I save one 36" for my collection. There is a guy on the EE that sells the factory metal spacers for like $20 bucks if you ever want an original
Cheers
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Would love to see the 34,32 barreled 84s. Always though they were a myth even though I've seen literature on them. Seen those sizes from the 840 but never the 84.
 
the spank said:
In what class do you base that statement on? In the budget minded single shot hunting gun I would assume because outside of that class of guns there are many single shot shotguns made that will outvolume and outlive a cooey. If you were to put 150,000 rds through a cooey as opposed to say a Perazzi or Krieghoff etc you wouldn’t be doing a light servicing to get another 150,000 out of it, you’d be replacing it as it would be so loose the barrel would almost fall off the receiver.
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I'm with you on this Spank. I'm glad some people love them and great story by the OP, but at the end of the day, they were and are still budget, price point guns. To me, it's like someone going on and on about Motomaster car parts as though they are the best car parts made. They fill a niche, but that's it. And the Canadian connection does nothing for me.

At the end of the day, it's still a Cooey. I'll take my 100 year old hand crafted English made 12 gauge single shot with stunning wood, full CC and almost perfect bluing, that only cost me 2.5 times what I might pay for a Cooey because no one knew what they were looking at.
 
Yup, Cooey guns are a utilitarian tool, that gave most Canadian kids of older generations their first encounter with firearms.
Cheap tools that continue to work well enough.
I have quite a few fine shotguns, but there is some fun in remembering where we came from.
 
canvasback said:
I'm with you on this Spank. I'm glad some people love them and great story by the OP, but at the end of the day, they were and are still budget, price point guns. To me, it's like someone going on and on about Motomaster car parts as though they are the best car parts made. They fill a niche, but that's it. And the Canadian connection does nothing for me.

At the end of the day, it's still a Cooey. I'll take my 100 year old hand crafted English made 12 gauge single shot with stunning wood, full CC and almost perfect bluing, that only cost me 2.5 times what I might pay for a Cooey because no one knew what they were looking at.
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That is sad. No wonder canada has almost nothing for firearm manufacturers
How does 3" smokeless work in the english in fact does it fire 2 3/4 OK .Both work great in my old 12ga cooey
I see you are into cars also to make that Motomaster comment. In fact motor master parts are indeed identical to brand name and even made by the same company only the packaging and price differs since Canadian Tire (MotoMaster) does not manufacture it's own parts
I think you need to understand a manufacturing production line. It would cost more to de-grade the quality and production than it would to continue with the same quality product.
The real difference, 99% of the time, is the sticker they slap on and the box they put it in at the final stage.
To each their own
Cheers
 
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3macs1 said:
That is sad. No wonder canada has almost nothing for firearm manufacturers
How does 3" smokeless work in the english in fact does it fire 2 3/4 OK .Both works great in my old cooey
I see you are into cars also to make that Motomaster comment. In fact many motor master parts are indeed identical to brand name and even made by the same company only the packaging and price differs
To each their own
Cheers
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What's sad? Both Cooey and Motomaster fill a niche. And do a good job of it. What Cooeys are not is the finest single shot shotgun made today (or at any time). And no amount of nostalgia or supporting Canadian content will make it so. And it was that comment that I was expressing solidarity with The Spank.

BTW, first gun I ever had or shot was a Cooey.

As far as Canadian manufacturing goes, all a Canadian company has to do to be successful is be good. Figure out a niche and do it to a world class level. Its the dependence on being "Canadian" that is the death of so many companies.
 
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canvasback said:
What's sad? Both Cooey and Motomaster fill a niche. And do a good job of it. What Cooeys are not is the finest single shot shotgun made today (or at any time). And no amount of nostalgia or supporting Canadian content will make it so. And it was that comment that I was expressing solidarity with The Spank.
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I don't know any better I could have bought new for under 40 bucks do you
So does your english fire 2 3/4 and 3" modern ammo
Like I said to each their own
I am positive the last english single shot I got in a package deal it is welded shut and bolted to this old wagon in my front yard
Cheers

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3macs1 said:
I don't know any better I could have bought new for under 40 bucks do you
So does your english fire 2 3/4 and 3" modern ammo
Like I said to each their own
I am positive the last english single shot I got in a package deal it is welded shut and bolted to this old wagon in my front yard

LmBL6wC.jpg
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Well, if by "modern" you mean 3" steel at 1600 fps, then no. But I doubt Cooey's were made for that either. As far as your experience with "the last English shotgun I got", perhaps you have no idea how to assess English shotguns. Better be safe in the future and stick to what you know.

I like the wagon, though. Don't see many of those any more and when I was a kid in the 1960's they were all over the place. Too many people just let them rot away.
 
canvasback said:
Well, if by "modern" you mean 3" steel at 1600 fps, then no. But I doubt Cooey's were made for that either. As far as your experience with "the last English shotgun I got", perhaps you have no idea how to assess English shotguns. Better be safe in the future and stick to what you know.

I like the wagon, though. Don't see many of those any more and when I was a kid in the 1960's they were all over the place. Too many people just let them rot away.
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I agree with that and will keep looking for old winchesters like model 21 etc
Had a lot of wagons 10 years ago.Some too good for yard display so I sold them to a restoration company in Ontario . Could not get anything for them locally
Here is one load waiting for the 18 wheeler to pick them up
Cheers
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Wow that’s fantastic 3macs1. I’m glad someone is finding, collecting and doing something with those wagons. I liked seeing them because when I was a kid, I knew people, old people, for whom the wagons were their primary transportation. It was a cool connection to a real different era at a time when man was going to the moon. I used to think about what my grandfather thought.....born before cars or airplanes and lived to see a man on the moon. Incredible.
 
canvasback said:
Wow that’s fantastic 3macs1. I’m glad someone is finding, collecting and doing something with those wagons. I liked seeing them because when I was a kid, I knew people, old people, for whom the wagons were their primary transportation. It was a cool connection to a real different era at a time when man was going to the moon. I used to think about what my grandfather thought.....born before cars or airplanes and lived to see a man on the moon. Incredible.
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Thanks. I love the old stuff but I am a dying breed here. Seems I am the last generation for collecting this old stuff
I am off topic and apologize to the OP but might as well finish this and share a pick of one of my greenhouses if you like the old stuff
take care
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I have seen a Cooey single shot shotgun fly off the roof of a 1964 Valiant going "60 miles an hour", bouncing along a gravel road, and with some first aid tape on the fore-end the firearm continued to function. Duct Tape came around a few years later. The gun was borrowed and I watched the borrower return the gun to the borrowee. The verbal exchange between the borrower and borrowee was hilarious. That was part of the fun of being a teenager in Alberta.
Fast Forward. I was working on a First Nations Reserve and I took a look at a pile of hunting guns our First Nations people were using to shoot game. Again, there were Cooey single shot shotguns. All made ready to function...this time with good ol CT duct tape. Conclusion: That is one tough little shotgun.
 
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