Rifled Choke Tubes

[vzerone]

I'd like to know member's experiences and thoughts on rifled choke tubes. The ones that owned them was there an improvement you could see? What type of slugs performed the best in them for you?

[GBertolet]

In my 1100 Rem, with the rifled choke tubes, I found that the sabot slugs shot the best, the BRI slugs in particular. Remington did not make fully rifled barrels for the 1100 at that time.

Possibly they shot better because of the hard plastic of the sabot doesn't tend to strip, like lead would. The lower velocity of the BRI, (1200 fps) likely contributed to the good accuracy also. Forester slugs would lead up the shallow rifling badly within a few shots. I also considered purchasing the extended rifled choke tube to try, but never did. I discovered that using the I/C tube the cheaper Remington forester slugs shot well enough for 50 yard shots at deer.

I found an inexpensive NEF 12 ga Slug Hunter that shot RB very good, and never pursued the rifled choke tubes further. Although they were a fad at one time, I think the rifled choke tubes have fallen out of favor.

[Hardcast416taylor]

In my 870 Wingmaster I found that the old style Winchester 1 oz Foster slugs shot the best, a 100 yd. 5 shot group usually went 5" or smaller using a #4 scope on a good day. Besides those slugs cost about $5 for 5 compared to $20 for the same box of saboted rounds.Robert

[vzerone]

Thanks for that information.

[Lon246]

I have an 870 Express, 3" chamber with an extended Hastings rifled choke tube. Loaded one of the hotter 2 3/4" loads in the Lyman manual with a cast 525 gr sabot Lyman slug. Tested 3 shot 3" group 3" inches high at 50 yds, 6" group dead on at 100 yds. Beyond 100 yds groups opened and dropped rapidly. Called it a 100 yd gun. Installed rifle type iron sites. Took 5 whitetail in shotgun only river bottom areas. Certainly not as much bloodshot as a Mach 2 rifle, and the hard cast watercooled slug penetrates well with nearly a 3/4" hole. Would use it again but laws and areas have changed.

[Tripplebeards]

I've tried them...a gimmic. I own a fully rifled 20 gauge savage 220 that will put three shots in one big oblong hole at a hundred yards. After a slug is going down 20 plus inches of barrel and then gets squeezed through 3" -5" of a tight rifled choke tube trying to make it spin can't be a good thing.

[bdicki]

I had trouble with the remchokes tightening with every shot because of the direction of the rifling. Smooth bore 11-87 best accuracy was with Winchester rifled 2 3/4 inch slugs and an IC choke. Switched to an Encore 20ga rifled barrel with Remington Core Lokt Ultra slugs.

[W.R.Buchanan]

Guys,,, this is nothing new. There have been Smoothbore guns with the last 2" of the barrels rifled since Holland and Holland or Westley Richards (I think) invented them in the late 19th century. The rifled choke tube is simply an interchangeable way to do it.

The intention was to have a gun that would do everything from taking birds to elephants so a guy could only take one gun to Africa. They were called "Paradox Guns." All the big time British gun makers made them in 12,10 and 8 bores.

I first heard of them while reading a Gun Magazine when I was 12. The gun in the article was an Evans 8 bore. Evans was one of the more inexpensive makers in London and this gun was definitely a working gun.

It fired a 1250 gr Conical Slug or a Round Ball or Shot in brass casings over Black Powder. I remember the guy shooting 3" groups at 50 yards with both barrels grouping in their own 3 shot groups about 6" apart. Holes were nearly 1" in diameter! He cast the bullets from the original mould that came with the gun, which was made around 1890-1900.

The gun weighed 14 lbs and I remember the guy describing the Recoil as "Devastating." He still managed to soldier thru about 50 shots for the article. I can't imagine shooting that gun off a bench !!! But he did it!!!

This was in 1962.

Randy

As a side note: If you watch the show "Under Wild Skies" on the Outdoor Channel, The host, Tony Makras, used a 12 ga Paradox gun from a maker I don't remember, on a high end wing shooting trip in South Africa in a recent episode. He then switched off to a Blaser F3 for the rest of the hunt which lasted for about a week being shuttled from place to place on a train with "Royal Class Appointments." The trip must have easily cost $50K a person as everything was all way above first class. Other friends of his on the trip were retired Generals and Admirals and their wives so everyone could afford it. Nobody was shooting a Remington 870 !!!

[Ballistics in Scotland]

The Paradox wasn't quite as good a rifle as a rifle, whicn theh could have had a flatter trajectory and long range. Nor was it quite as good a shotgun as a shotgun, for it was usually heavier. That is the sort of deal you would expect with anything dual-purpose, and it wasn't at all bad as either. It was usually the weapon of a farmer, explorer or scientist on expedition. I don't believe they were ever cheap, and people on a tight budget would more often go for a surplus Martini-Henry.

The Paradox had various friends and relations, under names like "Jungle gun", which resembled it more as the patents expired. Fine full-length rifling or an oval bore were sometimes used, and there were similar smoothbores which also gave a useful if not brilliant performance with ball.

I believe the rifling at the muzzle was considerably faster twist than the missile would normally require, which seems an odd way to do it when you needed to stop it stripping in the rifling. But Colonel Fosbery was an extremely capable designer, who is very unlikely to have just guessed at it. I think the engraving on the bullet was partly distorted by the impact instead of a steady start at the rear of the barrel, and the bullet ended up spinning more slowly than the rifling.

As to regulation, those barrels shooting six inches apart could probably be brought closer by the use of a lighter bullet. Regulating the powder charge makes very little difference, since if you make the gun recoil or flex its barrels more in that way, the bullet also leaves the muzzle earlier in the proceedings.