I have a 12 ga Weatherby Olympian O/U with 2&34 in chambers. It has 32 barrels and I would like to get a little more bang out of it for a waterfowl gun.It is in excellent conition. My question is--is it feasable to bore it out to 3 in and extend the forcing cones? Would this be risky in terms of weakening it?

To say what everyone else has thought, this seems to be a hands on question for a good 'smith. Hopefully some one has recomendation in your area.

If it has fixed chokes, Weatherby doesn't recommend steel shot.

I'd suggest trying some exotic non-toxic loads (ITX, tungsten, etc) to increase your reach.

for what its worth, the job is rechambering, not reboring

Why not ask Weatherby?.
good Luck!

Years ago I bought into the chamber lengthening/longer forcing cone frenzy, bought some reamers and did it to a couple of guns.
In the years since I have come to realize that longer forcing cones may or may not make a difference and lengthening the chambers on a gun just takes away metal where you need it most, just ahead of the existing chamber, right about where your leading hand is.

If you need a 3" gun then buy a 3" gun, or a 3-1/2" gun, that's good for use with steel shot.

quote:

Originally posted by phill pittman:
I have a 12 ga Weatherby Olympian O/U with 2&34 in chambers. It has 32 barrels and I would like to get a little more bang out of it for a waterfowl gun.It is in excellent conition. My question is--is it feasable to bore it out to 3 in and extend the forcing cones? Would this be risky in terms of weakening it?

First off, extending forcing cones is NOT a "may or may not" issue. I've done plenty over the years to form a solid opinion of the results. Lenghtening forcing cones do WORK in every instance if they are done correctly.

Secondly, you will have to let the gunsmith who will potentially be doing the work check the barrel to see what you may be giving up in wall thickness and where. Among other concerns, he will need to take into consideration the location of the barrel/block joint (aka suture line) as that will be a big concern when removing material.

Thanks everyone for their input. I think the best solution for me comes from Recoil Rob, that being to just go to another gun with a 3 in. chamber.

There are other ways to achieve what is, in actual fact, your goal. That is more pellets in your killing circle at longer range.

Here in Britain in past times people used to use a low velocity load.

By using a shorter height driving wad and/or a roll crimp you can certainly increase the shot capacity of a standard 2 3/4" cartridge.

To compensate for this increased shot capacity (and increase in the weight of shot fired) then the powder charge is reduced. Hence the idea of a low velocity load.

This will do two things: i) Increase your shot load and ii) by being low velocity give a tighter pattern.

The only problem I can foresee is that you don't handload or that you may be using steel shot that will be handicapped by the lowering of its velocity.

Here in Europe we have now 2 3/4" Magnum loads. It may be a solution to just have the gun re-proofed for these? Which would involve no chamber alteration.