My new Car Gun.

[megasupermagnum]

Even with that tall front sight it shoots high? Can you try another choke tube to make sure that isn't it? I've got one barrel that I want to bend too. It shoots low, but not that much. Maybe 1 foot low at 40 yards, so little stock fit can over come it. I tried to bend it once by the redneck method of sticking it in a hitch receiver. I pulled on it pretty good, to where I was scared, and it didn't move it one bit. I've seen where people have built elaborate barrel bending jigs, and they all seem to end up with the same thing. A pipe bender, and the only way to do it is by feel and testing.

[W.R.Buchanan]

This is something I'll have to creep up on. When I screw the choke tubes in they all have tight spots which leads me to believe that the threading may have gone in cockeyed.

I have to really look close at this problem.

I had one other problem with the slide release not popping down when the gun was in battery. that slide release is the only thing that holds the bolt in battery. As soon as the hammer falls it pushes the slide release down and the bolt is free to move back. This is why you pinch the op rods when firing off a bench. It holds the bolt in position until you move the slide back, otherwise the recoil does it for you and that can be unpleasant..

Well it turns out that that GG&G part was stopping the Fore Arm from going all the way forward and the bolt wasn't completely in battery and the slide stop wasn't behind the bolt holding it in battery.

So I took it off and ground about .050 off it and now everything is fine.

Things like this are why I have to go slow and really look at the problem. I don't want to do something stupid and ruin the barrel over a misdiagnosis .

Randy

[GoodOlBoy]

I have admiration for you as well as all others living in ANY state but New York! In New York State (NYS) one may NOT have a loaded rifle or shotgun in a motorized vehicle (including tractors, atv, utv, motorcycle, etc.) under ANY circumstance. Further, if one simply has ammo "accessible" to the unloaded/empty firearm in or on said vehicle, then it is presumed/treated by law as if it IS a loaded firearm! (Firearms, unloaded, need be in one part of vehicle (e.g., passenger compartment) with ammunition in another (e.g., the trunk)). For those sans separate compartment vehicles (e.g., pickup truck or van) ammunition must be in a LOCKED box/case.

In Texas your automobile is an extension of your home (castle law) and you can have it loaded mounted on the dash with a mounting lug, belt fed, with laser targeting assist, spotlights (except in hunting areas), and a cup holder for that 64 ounce bladder buster from the Texaco. However. If you spray somebody with bug spray that is a chemical attack and you are going to jail for years. So just shoot 'em and be done with it.

Richard

[W.R.Buchanan]

Well after shooting it today I was 6" high at 25 yards with the rear sight all the way down. Shooting Balls and Lee Slugs as tests. It was grouping around 3" at 25 yards which I could work with but,,,,

With the same setting it was 3 feet high at 50 yards and 6 feet high at 100 yards !

Conclusion: The barrel is bent! So I've got to find another barrel.

Bummed! It looked so good.

Randy

[Hamish]

Randy, I’m surprised at you giving up already,,,,

https://youtu.be/hzLK8SwWW90

[longbow]

Surely you can straighten it?

Shouldn't take much to do it as long as there is no visible kink/wrinkle... a gentle bend should be easy to correct.

Here's a couple of posts about straightening barrels:

http://rvbprecision.com/shooting/sho...nt-impact.html

https://www.doublegunshop.com/forums...t&Number=91514

A friend told me that his gunsmith grandfather used to straighten shotgun barrels by sighting down the bore to locate the direction of curve then smack the barrel on a block of wood in the "appropriate" spot with and "appropriate" amount of force to correct it.

I think I'd opt for the methods in those posts though.

You've got nothing to lose!

Longbow

[Cap'n Morgan]

Well after shooting it today I was 6" high at 25 yards with the rear sight all the way down. Shooting Balls and Lee Slugs as tests. It was grouping around 3" at 25 yards which I could work with but,,,,

With the same setting it was 3 feet high at 50 yards and 6 feet high at 100 yards !

Conclusion: The barrel is bent! So I've got to find another barrel.

Randy.

Something is wrong here! If the gun shoots 6" high at 25 yards, it should be 12" high at 50, not 3 feet! The difference should be linear over distance, not progressive.

You could try checking the inside of the bore with a simple "bowstring" tool, but my best guess is that your rear sight simply is too high or your front sight too low.
(from the look of the pictures, the rear sight actually seems to be quite high)

[Hamish]

Randy,

Have meant to ask for some time, in these combat shotgun classes, are you seeing standard LOP, or are youth length stocks showing up? I’m 6’3”, but actually prefer a shorter LOP for anything other than SC’s.

[centershot]

Randy,

Have meant to ask for some time, in these combat shotgun classes, are you seeing standard LOP, or are youth length stocks showing up? I’m 6’3”, but actually prefer a shorter LOP for anything other than SC’s.

^^^ Me too! I like a LOP at 13 to 13-1/4", depending on the gun. I read once that a shotgun used in the field should have a length of pull as short as possible providing you don't get smacked in the nose with your thumb when you pull the trigger. This has worked out well for me over the years but gets expensive to have stocks cut and pads installed.

[GoodOlBoy]

In all seriousness? Yank the front and rear sight OFF of the gun. Sight down the rib and re-shoot at the distances. I think the gents are correct and those sights are just not in proportion to that gun. I shudder looking at them anyway, thinking about everything they would hang up on, but that's just me and my preferences. Mechanically I would test it without the sights on it and go from there.

God Bless

Richard

[zarrinvz24]

George, since COVID I've noticed lots of NY plates appearing among my neighbors who apparently moved full-time into their weekend cabins and cottages, doing the remote access thing. Several have since re-registered their vehicles and changed their legal residence to West Virginia so that they could legally buy guns and carry them anywhere except the courthouse, airport, a school or the post office, without a permit. Several I have met and talked to say they have taken the sacred oath to be Mountaineer football fans for life, having found voice coaches to lose the Yankee nasal whine and even got new wardrobes at Tractor Supply and have sworn never return to the big city.

We have been having a lot of that as well down here in South Carolina. Some assimilate and accept our way of life in the South, however there are many more that don't. They move in and immediately try to do things like raise taxes and complain about the 2A friendly atmosphere. I like to take mental note of the folks that have a car with NY plates at a house for awhile and use the County Accessor's anonymous report hotline

[W.R.Buchanan]

OK in case you hadn't noticed I was banned for two weeks for using an acronym with an unpopular meaning. (Language) I was completely in the wrong so nothing on the site or No1. I did my time and now moving on.

However during that time I was able to construct a Barrel Bending Jig that is almost done. needs paint and some small refinements.

Right before I got banned I was looking at some pics posted by Longbow and had seen a Jig shown for about 15 seconds before I was cut off. However that was more than enough time to get the gist of the fixture and I was able to construct my own version with materials at hand in my shop. I was a complete blank before seeing that picture.

It allows predictable changes to the barrel instead of jsut sticking teh end between two tree limbs a Reefing on it.

All that is left is making some barrel supports and a pusher for the screw that won't mar the barrel.

Then yesterday an old collogue of mine who still works for the same outfit we worked at, called me looking for someone to make a few parts for them. We got to taking about bent barrels and since he was a big time trap shooter he had encountered the problem many times.

He told me the way to confirm that the barrel is bent is by Taking a Empty Shotshell and push the primer out. Then put it in the chamber and sight thru the muzzle back. The Ring you see in the barrel will be perfectly concentric if the barrel is strait. If it is bent,,, one side of the ring will be thicker than the other.

Low and behold when looking thru it the very first time the ring was thicker on the bottom side of the barrel which confirmed that the gun will shoot high. Not much mind you, but enough to warrant a Tweak. I might add that this was not a case of a small hardly noticeable amount that you had to be seasoned expert to see. It was obvious!

What caused this? well the Vent Rib is not silver soldered onto the barrel. It is "spot welded" on and with every weld the barrel got more upward bend induced into it.. Those who understand welding know that when a weld cools, it shrinks. Such is the case with the Dozen or so standoffs for the rib. They caused the barrel to have a gentle upward rise to it. Not a big problem for a Bird Hunting Gun but not gonna work for a Slug Gun.

There is one place that shrunk more than others and it was the primary factor and will be where the pusher is positioned when tweaking the barrel.

The Dial Indicator allows you to push a specific amount and then compensate for spring back which will be happing.

So currently that's my story.

Randy

[longbow]

Looking good Randy! I figured you could fix that gun and I bet you get some PM's from others wanting barrels tweaked now!

Longbow

[centershot]

Welcome back Randy! I was told once that a barrel could be checked for straightness by sighting through the bore at a straight vertical line. If the line appeared straight in the bore then the barrel was straight. If the line appeared to have a "step" in it, the the barrel was bent. I remember seeing photos of the 'smiths in the barrel shop at Ithaca Gun Co. peering through barrels that were clamped into large overhead barrel straightening vises doing this very operation.

Attachment 290593

[megasupermagnum]

Your vent rib is welded on? That doesn't sound good, I doubt Mossberg made them that way. Well, you can fix that bend now. From what I've seen, Mossberg always made ribs that were separate from the standoff's. They seem to have a pin or two on each end that you can push out, and then you can slide the rib right off those standoff's. It might be helpful to have the rib out of the way for bending.

P.S. When you were away, I finally got a wild hair, and bent the barrel on my Winchester 1897 because of this thread. I stuck it in the fork of a tree, and give it a precision 1, 2, oof. After a couple of tries, it shoots exactly to the bead. Mine was only off by about a foot at 40 yards, but if I can do it, you can easily.

[Cap'n Morgan]

Randy.

Now that you've done all the hard work with your bending jig, I hate to tell you that you probably had one in your shop already.

Clamp the chamber end in the chuck on a fairly sturdy lathe and support the muzzle with a tailstock center. Then use the cross slide to push/bend the barrel. No need for a dial indicator as you already have a scale (or DRO) on the cross slide.

[W.R.Buchanan]

Randy.

Now that you've done all the hard work with your bending jig, I hate to tell you that you probably had one in your shop already.

Clamp the chamber end in the chuck on a fairly sturdy lathe and support the muzzle with a tailstock center. Then use the cross slide to push/bend the barrel. No need for a dial indicator as you already have a scale (or DRO) on the cross slide.

My Lathe is a Hardinge Chucker the barrel is too big to go over the Turret and it has no Tailstock. If I had an Engine Lathe I could have done that, but I'd never thought of it until you mentioned it, so the jig would already exist. The jig has some other benefits as I can place the barrel Standoff Blocks anywhere and the Pusher anywhere as well just by positioning them all in different places. IE: it should work for any length barrel.

I cogitated a lot on this problem but until I saw the pictures of the jig in Longbows post,,, I was totally clueless. Like I said, it took me 30 seconds to have the design beat after I saw the other one.

Sometimes we just need a little nudge to push us in the tight direction. I have never been a "New Idea" kind of designer. But I can take your idea and make it alot better. My Hand Press is a perfect example of that, a completely re engineered version of an existing design with all of the previous shortcomings removed..

Randy

[megasupermagnum]

Here's a treat for those of you looking for the somewhat rare 18 1/2" slugster barrel. There is one on Gunbroker, item #912042122. It has gone with 0 bids for two cycles now, it might be worth shooting the guy an offer. I've been thinking about it myself, but I have no honest use for the barrel. I already have the 24" slugster, and I've got plenty of 18 1/2" and 20" barrels already.

[W.R.Buchanan]

OK: after much cogitation and sleepless night I have finally made some progress on the barrel bending jig. It is done, however it will require special barrel support blocks for each barrel.

I made my first bend today on the Monkeyberg barrel.

Some background: First after talking to those that know how to do this, I found that a Shotshell with the primer removed and placed into the chamber will reveal a Ring of Light in the barrel. If the barrel is strait that ring will be the smae thickness all the way around. If the barrel is bent one side of the ring will be thicker than the others. The thick side is opposite of the bend in the barrel. This was obvious on my barrel.
An alternate method is to sight down the outside of the barrel against a Vertical Line like a door jam. There will be a line down the top edge of the barrel (looking down the side) and it will have a dog leg in it where the barrel is bent. For me this was much easier to see and the barrel had a distinct dog leg under one of the Rib standoffs.

After making a pusher that had a 7/16 radius on it that matched the barrel I set it up between a Vee Block under the breach end and a piece of Plywood that supported the rib under two standoffs on the muzzle end.

Then I started tweaking it. I first screwed down on the pusher and deflected the barrel about .050. After spring back, that yielded exactly .002 of bend! I took the barrel out of the jig and sighted down it and saw very little had changed. So back in and this time I went to .100 total and that yielded about .005 bend after spring back.

Once again I sighted down the barrel and saw it was going in the right direction.

So back in the jig and this time I went to .150,,, (see the picture!) I let it sit and soak like that for a few minutes and then backed off the pusher and found I had achieved .010 deflection after spring back. That is where I quit and the gun must be shot now to see if I need more tweaking to get it to shoot flat.

Please note that the Dog Leg in the barrel was directly under where the pusher is located.

You can see in the picture just what .150 grand of deflection looks like. And I must say, it looks pretty scary!

So that's where we are at right now, might get to shoot it tomorrow, and will report back.

The whole point of all this is to be able to "Predictably" bend a barrel and get a decent and repeatable result without messing it up. And the Jig works perfectly!

More to come.

Randy

[longbow]

Looking good Randy! I knew you could outsmart a bent barrel! That straightening jig looks really good!

I still have my choke adapter to silver solder on one of my single shots so I can try the Carlson's rifled choke tube to see if I can get it to work. One of my concerns is lining it all up for silver soldering. I suspect it will be difficult to get it exact unless it is pretty much a light press fit. I'll try but I suspect I may be making a brother to your barrel straightening jig for fine tuning... if the slugs group that is.

Looking forward to your range report.

Longbow