cylinder hone

[49FMarlin]

Ive been shooting STS and Nitro 27's out of my 12Ga. 20inch cylinder bore Ithaca,
I have no problem ejecting quicky,

when i went over to fiocchi and Cheddite tall hulls, i started sticking,
even in my cimmeron SXS clyinder bore this is with low published data loads,
the hulls are flaring out at the top edge, I can feel it, a cutting edge, and catching in the bore,
the short hull/real brass/ are not doing this

im thinking i need to do a polishing of the Ithaca, in the chamber, I can see machine lines, the bore is silky smooth

Do I use the long hard brake hones ?
or
the multi ball brake hones?

common sense tells me the long hard ones would leave a mess at the forcing cone,

john

[SuperBlazingSabots]

Greetings, go easy and be gentle:





Put the other end in a hand drill and gently move back and forth. The foam came free from my shirts that I buy.
Ajay K. Madan
Super Blazing Sabots.

[rking22]

I would not mess with the chamber to shoot the junk hulls. I have a 16 ga M37 that will not eject the cheap rio type factory loads, chamber is a mirror finish. I talked with a Rio rep when they were located in TN. Their 20ga shells will not work in a tube set, the “brass” expands and locks itself into the space in the tube ejectors. Know issue, he told me they use one powder type only, so it is way too fast for 20 gage. Don’t know if that is still true, but I only shoot them in guns they work in, M37 is not one of those.
I know I did not answer your question, please use caution the gun isn’t the problem.

[megasupermagnum]

I may be overly cautious, but a fine steel wool wrapped around a bore brush, then chucked in a hand drill is as aggressive as I'll go. Just run it in and out slightly like you are using a hone. Don't worry about getting the whole chamber, and I would not touch the forcing cone.

[Hogtamer]

Leave the hones alone and stick with decent hulls...your gun told you it doesn't like them.

[Walks]

Brownells sells a chamber hone. I used one 20+yrs ago in all my 12's. Including the Savage, Winchester, Rossi and Brazilian SxS guns. Made dumping empty hulls really easy during Cowboy Shooting.

And most shotgun hulls have mild steel heads, brass plated. That's why they have to have the case head sized.
Before about 1980, we never sized FED Paper, REM Blue Magic or WIN AA hulls. They were all Brass back then.
We put a mild taper on the finished Shells.

And now the WIN AA hulls are junk. Glad I Don't have to reload shotgun anymore.

[longbow]

My 3 stone cylinder hone was too big to fit the chamber of a 12 ga. by just a bit. I wound up using very fine emery cloth on a dowel as Ajay shows.

Brownells has a small two stone hone I was looking at but I found a set of two stone and three stone hones at a local auto parts place so I plan to pick one up. They are cheaper than Brownells hones. I like the idea of the rigid fine stones just to polish the chamber a bit.

If your chambers are nice and shiny I wouldn't worry about it but if you can see machining marks then a polish will likely help.

[Hickory]

I have used tee shirt fabric and Flitz on a dowel rod to polish things. I wouldn't ever use sand paper, even 600 grit paper unless I wanted to change the dimensions.

[centershot]

Leave the hones alone and stick with decent hulls...your gun told you it doesn't like them.

This! ^^^^^ Please don't mess with that fine old shotgun, use the hulls that work!

[6pt-sika]

I sure wouldn’t go removing metal from the gun so I could shoot junk hulls . Get AA or STS hulls and go on about your buisness .

[nhithaca]

On the Model 37, barrel to receiver fit is critical to keep from having issues with shells sticking in the chamber. When remounting the barrel, make sure the barrel cutouts for the extractors are lined up with the matching cutouts in the receiver. Sometimes you may even have to readjust the yoke on the mag tube to make this happen.
A clean and smooth chamber is desirable for any shotgun. You will not remove a measurable amount of metal using AJ's method if you pay attention and don't go at it like a bull in a china shop. I have done this to a number of guns with a followup polishing using steel wool and oil. On a Model 37 you can just bump the butt on the bench with a fired shell in the chamber and the action will open.
On the other hand, cheap shells are just that; cheap for a reason. If you still are having issues then change brands.

[49FMarlin]

I sure wouldn’t go removing metal from the gun so I could shoot junk hulls . Get AA or STS hulls and go on about your buisness .

Thank You for those tips, I checked it, the extractors were lined up, I did the AJ method, and then steel whool, I didnt go ape-crazy,
I learned alot from you, as I tried the bump it took some bump but did open, as ive got a soft recoil pad I fitted on the back,
the cheap shells will be used for my SXS, and ill save the STSand Nitro 27's for my Itaca
when there in stock ill try the short hulls--maybe,

shooting some of the BPI (longshot) buck loads in there shells, compared to same buckshot load by Hadgdon (HS-6) in the STS
the BPI load seems more of a top end book load--so says my shoulder

the STS and Nitro's If I wanted or Needed I could do the slam-fire,
not a chance of surviving an attack of coyotes with those BPI's Good thing our guys didnt have those BPI's back when
they uses the Ithaca's in the trenches
the newfangled mossbergs must be more forgiving

[Cap'n Morgan]

I have used brake hones for rusty chambers. Salt water and negligence is a bad combination - don't ask how I know. (If there's a shotgun god he will probably punish me for an eternity)
One thing I found was that the compression formed hulls - like Winchester AA low brass - was less "sticky" than high brass, base wad hulls.

If your side by side has a single extractor with too much slack it can cause sticking with high pressure loads when shooting both barrels: The first shot will push the extractor away from the chamber, and the next shot will push it back against the first shell, causing both shells to stick.

[W.R.Buchanan]

The device AJ showed is what is known commonly as a "Polish Hone." They can be made in any size and are the simplest and cheapest way to polish an ID. 400+ grit sandpaper with oil is no more destructive to a barrel than a cleaning brush. You just can't go ape (meaning holding it in one place for a long time) and take your time and use plenty of oil.

I recently went so far as to buy a 400 and 800 grit "Flex Hones" to polish my shotgun barrels. They are made specifically for this purpose and the 800 grit hone leaves a mirror finish on the bore. They were $55 each but did such a perfect job it was worth it.

Flex Hones are the ones with bristles that have dingle balls of abrasive on the ends. These ones have 36" long stems on them and will go completely thru just about any barrel.

I had the "Buck Special Barrel" for my A5 ported by Vang Comp to get rid of the muzzle rise during recoil so the gun would come back to target quicker. (It worked !!!) however they left burrs from the drilling inside the bore. These would have eventually shot out, but I knew I would have massive amounts of plastic to deal with before that happened, so I elected to hone them out. I took care to spend time in the chamber area and to make sure the front edge of the chamber was not sharp.

If any of you have seen the inside of a quality shotgun barrel, you've seen that they have a mirror finish. 5 minutes with each hone soaked in oil ran in a drill motor and I have a mirror finish equal to or better than Miroku did. After shooting 300 rounds thru that gun at Front Sight I had no plastic transfer whatsoever. One pass with a bore snake and the barrel was clean.

Randy

[DaveM]

I fixed sticky extraction in a Mossberg 500 Mariner by wrapping t-shirt material around a 12 gauge bore brush, applying Fitz metal polish, and working it back and forth in the chamber while turning it with a drill. It took a couple of applications but worked well.

IMO the key is to take your time and don't try to polish it too much at once.

[john.k]

Most of the hones are too big to fit......but when the stones are worn down ,they do fit ok,and produce a nice finish.

[samari46]

I've an old three piece of shotgun cleaning rod so can vary the length by adding or taking away one piece. Regular bronze bore brush on one end and a variable speed drill on the other. Bought 2 Rem 870 police turn in shotguns. The lead and powder fouling that came out of those two barrels had to be seen to be believed. one old bronze brush I wrapped some 4/0 steel wool around the brush and some Hoppes and polished the chamber and bore. Then patched the heck out of the barrels. That's about it. Frank