A suitcase .410 looking for identification or information

[corbinace]

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Can anyone identify this 410 shot gun?

It is more than 80 years old as the owners dad owned it before he was born.

He indicates that the stock was always skeletinized.

His dad packed it in his milk route and harvested supper with it.


There are no maker Makers marks on it that I can see.

Only marks are the proof marks on either side of the locking lug and the three digit serial number on the bottom of the action.

The 10.4 leads me to believe European heritage.

A rough measurement gave 2.5" to the beginning of the forcing cone.

I could email or text you the original pictures as they have a bit better resolution.

There is no commercial bent to this enquiry, just helping an old guy learn a bit about his pride and joy.

[Reverend Al]

It is a typical, inexpensive, folding utility single shot shotgun of it's day. (Turn of the century until about the 1930's.) It has Belgian proofs so it would have been made by any one of the large number of Belgian gun-makers who manufactured economy guns for the sporting trade. They made a gazillion of these types of shotguns for farm and country use. You might want to measure the chamber length to see if it will chamber a full 2 1/2" length .410 shell. A lot of these lightweight "garden guns" were chambered for a shorter 2" version of the .410 that was very common in Europe. If it is a 2" chamber it should be marked "50mm" somewhere in the proofs under the barrel, while if it was factory chambered for the full length 2 1/2" hull it should be marked "65mm". A neat little gun and great fun to shoot, but I'd keep the loads you plan to shoot in it very light as they weren't terribly "robust" guns. Shooting heavy loads can cause wear and tear on the hinge pin if the metal is soft, and the barrel will become loose on the action. Just use common sense for the loads you put through it. If you plan to shoot it a bit with hand loads you can use .303 British brass blown out straight to load "everlasting" brass .410 shells. If your gun is chambered for the shorter 2" shell you could fire-form some .303 cases in a normal .410 shotgun and then trim them back to 2" length to fit your folder.

I have a similar Belgian made hammer gun in a SxS which is chambered for .44-40 Winchester shotshells instead of .410 shotshells.

http://i.imgur.com/0w3KjUG.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/PuhLL4D.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/HU3wRWQ.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Q2fHhSp.jpg

[corbinace]

Thank you Al for your very detailed answer.

My elderly friend wanted to know a bit of the heritage of his arm and I told him that I had a source of great knowledge at my fingertips and you proved me right.

He said he shot it a good deal in his younger years, but not so much the last thirty or so. The finish is all worn away right at the balance point of the receiver.

I did not see either a 50 or 65 marked for the cartridge length. When I get back over there, I will take some better tools to measure the actual chamber. Not that he is going to shoot it much, but his prodigy may and I do not want them to damage the firearm or themselves. Easy enough to hang a tag on it for the future.

Did you ever see any arms of that era that had the stock cut out that way, or is that something that his Pop may have done?

That little double of yours is sure a beauty. It matters not that it is not a high dollar master creation. I just like the looks of the old worn wood and steel. Such nice lines. Are those 30 or 32 inch tubes? I had no idea that there were 44-40 smooth bores. Thanks for sharing.

Tim

[Reverend Al]

Actually the buttstock on your friend's shotgun was factory "skeletonized" like that to lighten them. I've seen a few just like it over the years. (I worked for 38 years in retail sporting goods selling guns and ammunition and I've seen a number of odd looking guns in the time I spent behind the counter!)

From memory the barrels on my little Belgian .44-40 SxS double are 30" long, but it's still a very lightweight little gun.

[Ballistics in Scotland]

Yes, that is the ordinary Belgian .410, and an excellent weapon for its intended loads. It has always struck me as a pity to see a .410 built unnecessarily heavy. It was, in fact, the first firearm I ever handled, though not fired, at the age of eight. My uncle's had the same skeleton butt, which I would assume to be original though uncommon. They were very much knockabout utility guns, so yours is in better condition than many.

It could be about any age except wartime, from the nineteenth century to the mid-1960s, when I remember seeing the uncommon double version on sale new. By far the majority were .410, but the British government bought a large number of a 12ga version for issue to loyal natives in the Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya, and they were sold as surplus in the 1960s. I think the Liège ELG in an oval has a crown on top, which was added in 1893. If it was made in 1922 or later it would probably have the small year letter in cursive script:

http://www.hallowellco.com/proof_date_codes.htm

I have never seen one with a maker's name, and if one had, it would probably be a retailer. You might find something on this website, but the Belgian trade was a maze of subcontractors, guns bought in from other firms, etc.

http://www.littlegun.be/

Here is my 24ga Pieper with the year letter e for 1926. By that time they had the barrel weight, a useful guide if the barrel wall has been thinned by lapping or boring:

200987

One point to watch is that it very likely won't have a rebounding hammer like most shotguns. So there will be a half-cock notch, and you depend for safety on its not being worn or broken. The hammer would be case-hardened, and much later in life than eight I borrowed one which had the full-cock notch so badly worn that it wouldn't hold. I filed and inlaid a piece of hard steel, which was good enough to load only when the gun was pointing where I expected the pigeon to alight. (I wouldn't have done that if the owner had been excessively given to optimism.) Nowadays I would make a reliable repair by silver soldering in a piece of high speed steel square engraver, which wouldn't be annealed by that temperature.

[Cap'n Morgan]

I once had a Belgian single barrel, folding-stock gun of the same design only in twelve gauge. The weight could not have been much over four lbs. It was not a pleasant gun to shoot with anything but the lightest loads. A .410 (36), 32 or 28 gauge would have been much more practical.

[Outpost75]

I load for my H&R .44 shotgun using the Starline 5 in 1 blank cases, with a Buffalo Arms card wad over 5 grains of Bullseye, then a Federal 410SC plastic shot cup, cut off flush to the case mouth, 1/3 oz. of No.8 shot, and a .36 cal. card wad placed over the shot and roll crimped in place.

RCBS makes .44-40 Long Shot dies, or if you have a set of the .45 ACP Long Shot, you can use those.

It is important to load the card wad over the powder with the plastic shot cup. Take the .45 card, bend into a U shape, work it below the shoulder, then turn it square over the powder, using forceps or tweezers, then press down on the powder before seating the plastic shotcup.

This is necessary because the inside diameter of the .44-40 case is larger towards the base, and the .410 shot cup is too small to seal the powder behind the case wall.

Not having a tight fitting card wad over the powder results in "bloopers" and maybe leaving the wad in the barrel.

Assembled properly the 5 in 1 blank cases make effective shot loads for cylinder bore .44/.410s, such as the Marble Game Getter to about 10 metres.