Here is sectioned action with parts in.
Original action that had defects.I
ground out the top to allow case
to set higher, representing a
the taller action that we will have. That
lever we will use with longer stroke,
breechblock, hammer, trigger with a
12GA FH in front, all in to check layout.
This lever looks to be easier to fit
and shape to bigger action and stock,
with a good pistolgrip to handle recoil.
Lever shape fits where trigger is better.Ed

Ed, have you looked at the Hopkins & Allen 12 ga falling block actions? If it was built with modern steel and beefed up in the right places...



I rockwell tested one of the actions and it was really soft. There was somebody in Alaska that offered to do a material analisys. I cut off a couple of strips from the inside of the tang to send, but then life happened and it's 2 years later.
I'm going to put a rifled barrel on one but keep it to low pressure levels. I did a pile of math on different parts of the action and the weak link is the sighting groove on the top of the action.

More pics of the H&A action, maybe they might give you some ideas for the action you are building.

LAR-I studied them a while back in
SingleShot book. Though built strong for their
day, the barrels only pinned in or set screwed
in, so the book says. Author says there
were 3 sizes and the bigger shotgun one
is quite wide.I think if bigger one was
heatreated and a heavy barrel threaded
in, could do as good as NEF, or little
better. Ed

I have 2 different take down actions, one with a set screw up from the bottom and the other with pics here that has a bolt that goes sideways through the action to match a round groove in the bottom of the barrel. A couple others seem to be pressed in barrels?
The sight groove down the top really limits what kind of threads could be cut in it.
I wasn't thinking of one of these for a full on 12gaFH, just thought it might give you some ideas for your action you're building.

Lar-How thick is metal where that sight
groove is on the top of the H&A
reciever. In picture it looks as thick
as the thin area in my Savage where the
three locking lugs turn in reciever.
You put in heavy alloy barrel, possibility
with proper heat treating of the action.
The double I described above also fits info
on one that a guy on ShotgunWorld has
that is a Zabala.Ed.

The sight groove thickness at the breach is .100". At the front of the action where it tapers down, it is .083" thick. The hole for the barrel shank is 1.092" ID and 1.875 long.

Another one of my 12 actions is .095 thick at the breach and .060" at the front. The hole for the barrel is stepped down slightly towards the breach and is 1.09", the front of the action is 1.126" and 2.163" long.

The grooves for the breach block to slide in are .147" thick, .45" long and have a height of around 2"
The second one has a thickness of .164" for the breach block grooves.

I've looked for my notes, but haven't found them yet. I have the action hardness and estimated a strength from that. Then calculated the hoop strain for the barrel shank and the amount of bolt thrust it would take to stretch the action.
I don't remember exactly what it all was, but the weak link was the sight groove and I think was good for a chamber pressure up to 24ksi with a saftey factor of 2 to the yield limit. I think the rest of the action was at least twice as strong.
This was all with the action not being heat treated.

I have a couple of Spanish made 10 ga doubles with chopper lumps and Greener cross bolt. I think they might be a good platform for a heavy 12 bore, but not up to the pressures you're running in your savage action.

The Spanish doubles could do the 4759 loads
with slugs. If they are as heavy in breech
as the two I mentioned there is enough
metal to make monoblock design and screw in
rifled barrels. The two I mentioned are
2.5+ wide at breech. Are the ones you
have that wide at breech.Setup like that do as good as Nef.The thin part reciever in Savage is
.120" so your H&A isn't real thin; and if
heatreated, and alloy rifled barrel it would do as good as NEF, which can get you way into
big bore power.The overall thickness of
your action with alloy barrels would be more
than NEF at breech, just like Spanish 10 guages
set up monoblock with 12ga barrels are thicker than NEF.My Nef does 600gr at 24-2500,
with long case at 22-24K.Ed.

The 10 ga doubles are both 2.5" at the breach. They say Tradewinds Tacoma WA. One is marked by Zabala, the other says ZH made in Spain and looks almost identicle to the Zabala, so I'm guessing it's probably made by Zabala also.

Somebody chopped the barrels down to 27.5" on the Zabala marked gun, so it would be the first to volunteer as guinea pig. It's pretty fun shooting 10 ga 3.5" slugs at gallon milk jugs filled with water.

Do you know what grade of steel is in the NEF rifled slug barrels?
Do you think they would complain if I sent a handi rifle in for new barrels and asked for 3 12 ga barrels?

If I understand right, is the 12 ga Ultra slug built on the 10 ga action? and the regular 12 ga and Ultra 20 ga are built on the rifle/12 ga actions?
Is your NEF the Ultra 12ga or regular?

NEF Ultra has alloy barrels, and heat
treated alloy action.It is investment cast
ala Ruger guns and heat treated.It is
SB2 action like NEF makes bigger rifles from
only it has bigger firing pin.It is also
used for 10ga Ultra..It is a bit heavier than their regular steel actions.You probably
could get NEf barrels for 12ga Ultra from
company but I'd get longer ones elsewhere. I
don't like that short 24" barrel.They won't
make long alloy 12ga barrels at NEF,
I asked them a couple times.There other
12 guages and 20 ga are on SB1 actions
which are regular steel, no heatreating.
A decent length barrel adds up to a bunch free
muzzle energy with same short barrel
loadings, IE don't have to jackup
pressures.Ed

Ed- I have a old Bridgeport shaper attachment on my mill and can use it to square corners once you drill and mill out the breechblock section. -Rob

Thanks alot Rob. The one old guy here has
one also on an extra old machine and he
got it hooked up. It hardly ever got used he said, so it's like new. It is milling machine
on one side and vertical shaper on other
that swivels around to be over the table
while the milling side swivels to the back.
And he says we just lock actions to table
and using x and y table adjustment to move it,
do the corners. I been practicing milling
holes toward square with 1/4 inch radius
corner so it won't take a lot to shape
them out square. I think we are
gaining on it.Ed

I think this topic should be stickied. It has about 3% of total views for this topic .
Just a thought.
-Josh

It would be great. I plan on continuous
research and testing on this and
my 700 that's in the other thread.Ed.

A double pumper big bore,
20 shots. Be something with
all those rounds our 600 gr
4759 slug loads.Fires both or
one at a time.Classifieds THR.Ed

Do you have a link to it in the classifieds? I searched through 5 pages and didn't see it. Not interested in buying ,just wanted to look at the pics.
tks.

BTW should have new 1887 here this next week. Already have ER Shaw 25" rifled blank.
Built jig for cutting flutes on reamers. I'll practice on tube first so I don't have to keep chopping the barrel back 3" at a time.
Haven't decided on sights yet. Maybe something like the NECG ones on the 470? I've been looking at the front sight on my BFRs and think that might be doable with ghost ring peep on the back?

Lar- It is in ttheir classifieds
forums. I think 4th forum from the bottom
of their list of forums, it's called rifle
and shotgun. It is on first page, and
I even put on a reply. thehighroad.org.
They have a bunch of pics of it.
Griz from TX is the seller..Ed

what is the website? I'd like to see that pup too.

regards,

Rich
DRSS
4-bore junkie

it is-- thehighroad.org

http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=250733
Here's a link to it.
You have to be signed in to get to the classified section.

Looks pretty crazy. He says 2 slugs fired at the same time do more damage than fired one at a time. I could just image 2 shells loaded with the clusterbombs.

This was a project that ended up being loads of fun. This beast is fully functional. Basically 2 remington 870's are joined as 1 side-by-side lead slinger. Each gun has a 10 round magazine. The guns can be fired seperately or use the hail mary trigger and fire both at the same time. The recoil is less than my winchester defender (due to the weight I guess). It's a head turner. It's easy to manage the gun. Both pumps can be racked together with one hand with ease (regardless of your size). I was amazed at how well this project turned out. Both shotguns are in excellent working order but are used. The wood on the 2 guns does not match. For an extra $10 I'll try to find the original stocks. I learned that 2 slugs fired at the same time do WAY MORE damage than 2 slugs fired in succession.Left hand gun has a left hand ejection - I put one lefty and righty together. Ejection is not a problem whether shooting from the shoulder or the hip.

When I first thought of this concept I thought of MANY potentional problems:
Would ejection be a problem
How would the safety work
How on earth can the trigger do everything I need but still be reliable
Would it be too much to handle
Would accuracy be a problem
Would storage be a problem

Bottom line is it worked out extraordinarily well. Some of your friends will wet themselves if you ask them to shoot this thing. Truth is, other than being on the heavy side, everybody who tried it didn't have any trouble handling or shooting it (including some smaller than average guys).

The hail mary trigger folds up between the guns when you don't need it. It works great when you do need it. It's easy to move. I prefer to shoot both barrels at once - I really like the feel of the big trigger.

I had to smile to see somebody speechless. Sometimes a guy just needs a gun that makes you smile real big when you shoot it. But for now I have a new project. You may see it here later this year

damn that looks fun

for less than $800 it is worth it to reverse engeneer it and sell kits. it needs a front grip that will cylce both with ease though imho

Yes a front grip would make little easier.
I was mentioning a double falling block
in the future. Getting aquainted with machine
shop guys, I will check on feasabiltiy of
drilling both barrels in one billet, which
keeps the strength and keeps the gun a little
narrower. And have the billet with top and bottom flanges on breech end, which will be rectangular, and slide billet into
from the back of action, the reciever
bridge, and out the front of tha action. lock it in with a half dozen alleh head set
screws. That idea from Lar with pics of H&A,
only from the back instead of front.There was
a gun from EU I think, built into a double by drilling a billet and they did it so that
they had convergience for regulation.It
was a breah action I think. I am fast learning
that falling blocks are 3 times easier
to build than break actions.Ed

I was haveing the double rifle falling block thought awhile back also. On gunbroker I saw a double Rolling block pistol in 44-40.(interesting but too much money)
So on the double falling block action, I was thinking that you would want two breach blocks with a web inbetween to keep the action from springing in the middle?
To keep things more slender you might be able to keep the web below the bore line. That would leave the breach wide open for loading both cartridges. Maybe have the web up to the bore line and contour for a funnel effect?

The French guy never did mention any details on how they regulated the double "drilling?"

The wife got me an almost complete H&A 12ga for christmas a couple years back. It needed an extractor and spring for the lever. I played with makeing a couple different flat springs to keep good tension even at the bottom of the lever stroke. If I hold the gun slightly to the side and push the lever down with open hand and let it go, the empties eject out the back about 8 feet. The guy who had the gun must have my body twin. The cast, drop and length are perfect for me. When I pull the gun up it snugs into my shoulder perfectly and the reciever groove and bead are pointing right where I look with no adjusting. I haven't had it to the trap club yet, but there is a turkey shoot comeing up. After getting the parts made I went with a friend to a spot in the woods to try some hand thrown pidgeons and was dusting almost 100%. Then we kicked around the brush and scared up a bunny that promptly died and was sacrificed on the propane alter with some hickory smoke BBQ sauce.

Lar-I think they regulated that two barrels in
in billet by angling the drilling
a little bit. If one billet with two holes
is used the barrels share same inner wall so narrower, no center wall in falling block
needed. Just one block, and sides a little
heavier.One lever, hammer, trigger.If sides say for double 12ga FH are as heavy as the sides
I plan on for the 4bore scaleup and heavy
breech block, it shouldn't spring.Ed

Right now I dropped the action I was trying to build previously and working on building a slide action double barrel rifle. It's not going anywhere really right now, just found out about needing a hip replacement surgery. It's a pump gun, however using a single billet as a reciever and hopefully chambered for the .500NE, later to be scaled up a touch to a 12 bore. A double falling block would be interesting but...just have to wonder, would this be of any advantage over a standard break-action double barrel rifle?

Metalsmith-The cost is advantage.I'm finding that with the right setup, and tools that
FB are 3 times easier to build than
break actions. And in a double your just making
them wider.I am talking about designing and
building from scratch. A different deal if I could get a big Tonolini 8ga that Al has been looking for, me too, and use it to monoblock
in heavy 12GA FH barrels.There someone has already made the action.We think the first
falling block scaled up action size will only
be a fraction of what others are charging.Ed

quote:

Originally posted by Lar45:
I was haveing the double rifle falling block thought awhile back also.

I read that Hagn was thinking of building a double FB. Not sure if he went through with it or not.
He's but a phone call away though.

Here is picture of first breech block
for the falling block scale up model
I have done. You can see the hammer and trigger
mounted in the back.Ed

Little brother 28GA FH..Will be testing
by summer.. Ed

My 1887 China-Copy came in yesterday. I think it's a rather nice looking gun. I spent a couple hours in the garage casting up a small pile of 12 ga slugs. I think it's going to be alot of fun.
I was looking at my Chinese 12ga hammer double coach gun and saw that it was made by Jing. Does anyone know if they were proofed anywhere close to the 1887 and 1897s made by Jing?

Glen-I don't think they'd be proofed as high as
the 87. Which proofing I think was done by importer and Coyote Cap here.At White labs.
Much higher testing than Chinese did, is
what I understand. The guys at Coyote have been
to factory so maybe they'd know what other
models were proofed at. Maybe ask them.
Back to 87--It is a real nice old-timey
looking gun. Even the kids like it as
Arnold used one like it in the movie.
Do you have a roll crimper in a loading set
or one for drill press.How heavy are the
slugs you're making? Ed

I have 1st scaleup model roughed out and
will have breech block fitted in it in
a while along with lever.Also at same time
am whittling a stock to stick on it
to check layout and looks.Will post pic
in a few days.Ed

Rocky MTN is making me some
3.25 in 28ga cases. They are good to 38k psi.
That will get 550 gr out at 2500 in
bolt action.A regular 28ga gun may get to
2000, depending on how heavy barrel is.
Get a NEF Ultra cut off leaving breech section
for monoblock and have 28ga rifled barrel
made and screwed or soldered in monoblock.
And being able to hold 38k to match brass,
That would get 2500 fps loads.Ed

I have the Lee 1oz 12ga mold and a Lyman 1oz hollow base that drops at 430gns. If I block the hollow base plug out some it drops a 532gn slug. I also have a Dixie .733" round ball mold that weighs 570gns. Maybe I could drop 2 in the case and crimp on a 3rd one? Kind of like the .410 OOO buck loads.
I have a home made adjustable 12ga mold with a SWC style nose. It drops bullets from around 600-2000gns. Some of the bigger ones were over 2" long. It's kind of rough, I was learning as I went for lathe boreing. I should be able to make a much better one now.
I have some different plastic cases and some Magtech 2.5" brass cases. I did find some old Russian copper washed steel cases that are about 2.7". I'll have to shoot a couple and see what type of primer they take.

Glenn-Please section one of the Magtechs.Reports show the base is real thin
balloon head like an older brand one I have here. If they are like that they're not
as safe with heavy slug loads as good plastic cases are, with proper thickness base.ED.

Tested AA2015- VV N130- Norma200- in plastic cases with small primers. They don't fire
dependably. Sqibs and misfires. Have
VV N110 ordered to test.Have had inquiries
about getting our cases shortened for strength
and they want to put in small primer.
They can be adapted with bushing. Ok but
must use 4759 or fast shotgun powders,
if they are used by themselves. Any slower powders, a fast shotgun starter powder
is needed. My testing shows RE-15 with 10gr
of Blue Dot starter is best of all we tested
in slower powders for shorter cases.Ed

Here is picture of the first falling block
model of aluminum, with a roughed out
stock to see how it looks. Action is a
rough model. It shoulders nice,
and lever is inlet into pistol grip,
so you can't get banged up
fingers with the big cartridges it is designed
for, like levers that stick down at the
guard.Ed

I got question about stock and recoil.
This is modern stock layout, Older styles can be used with
more drop at heel and straight grip or scant grip.
Comb is uphill a 1/4" at back from comb front.So
it won't hit the face. The front of comb can also
be whittled back and more curve added to top of
the grip, if a longer tang is wanted for the
tang mounted ladder sights.Being stock is mounted a
little lower from centerline, a action rear, compared
to bolt guns it is easier to get a comb
like this to minimize recoil to the face, and still
be down to where open or peep sights line up.Ed

Here is pic of action model with lever open
and the breech block down. Also the action
will have a slot in the rtop rear for a
top tang of whatever length you need.Can even add a long tang for tang sights.