What sets the price of any manufactured good? Thank you… I had the same question as Blammo. This brought forth a new wrinkle that double-barreled gun makers had to solve that a single-barrel pump or semi-auto doesn’t: how to advance the single trigger to fire the second barrel. Obviously, two of those would be $500. First, you can have a multi-gauge gun, as Dan has posted. If there were only a company with some heft and a distribution network in the US that made a gun of the quality of the mid-range Italian guns ($3000 to $10K), they could be a success. Now.” I get dragged away from the German pecksniffs and down an aisle to… Zoli shotguns. There’s one more issue between the SxS gun market and the O/U – the forearm. The result of all this is, of course, a ridiculously reliable action. It is an onerous task to choose the world’s best 20 shotguns. Oh, what a marvel of mechanical trinket is the Cosmi – a semi-auto that opens like a break-action shotgun. Fox sold many thousands of Sterlingworth guns, and Parker sold many thousands of Vulcan guns – which were very plain in appearance, but still well made. I really don’t understand why Beretta decided to mess with success. What $5K+ buys you is a shotgun through which you can shoot 25K to 100K rounds/year, get it serviced and checked, and then be back out on the competition circuit for the next year. Required fields are marked *. I used to have Fabarm Gamma 12 gauge O/U with multichokes but the ‘go to’ arrangement was 1/4 choke on the bottom barrel & 1/2 choke on the top. The Browning Superposed was already in this market, having been introduced in 1931. When I strike & polish a barrel, you can put your eye on one end and look up/down the barrel as you rotated it – either in the white or after blueing, and you see nothing. I’ve never needed additional parts on mine. Of course, it is a Century Arms gun, which means cheap. The 391 seemed like gilding an already well-done gun. You’ll go from a 12 to a 20 gauge, but for clay sports, you’re still able to throw 1 1/8 oz loads downrange out of a 20 gauge. whoever wrote that article needs to charge admission to get in his gun shop. Aside from cosmetic things, such as nice wood and engraved receivers, it would seem as though the guns themselves are not all that complex. They do sound awesome. It lasted about 4 months before it started firing both barrels at the same time. When it comes to guns, even most of the gun people are so prejudiced, so set on maintaining the ignorance and making the same mistakes over and over, that I’m just as happy making parts for old tractors and harvesters. ive always wondered why shotguns come across in video games as close quarter weaponary? Because I’ve never heard that. I doubt if most of them know a bearing from a housing. It is very plain compared to the Superposed product. When I’m shooting my antique SxS guns in trap competition, I usually have a TIG welding glove on my left hand to prevent burns. Worse yet is if the bronze recoil adjustment ring is removed/lost or broken – now the gun will seem like the most vicious-kicking shotgun you’ve shot in a while. You can make a shotgun out of platinum and it would be very expensive. Then there were the issues of trigger mechanisms in double-gun shotguns. Oh, and he’s Italian, and very charming (not just to, but especially to ladies), even in broken & accented English. I like mine – and I have plenty of shotguns from which to choose when I go to a range, whether semi-auto, pump, SxS or O/U. You lack knowledge of the double gun market. Perazzi guns have won 53 Olympic medals since – the most in the history of clay shooting. How do they get OOC with the bore? Remington owned this design, from the get-go. Briley tubes are also a way to allow you to shoot an old black powder gun with Damascus barrels with modern loads. I have 2 over/under 12 gauge shotguns. Dear Dyspetic: Thank you so much for this excellent article (and your follow-up posts)! You’d think from the prices that they’re asking ($3500 and well up), there wouldn’t be enough demand to start a whole new company making a product in a market already quite well served at those prices, and have sales and support so well established as they have in the US market. I have a funny story about Zoli shotguns. Remember, the high end guns are very durable, so are Browning and Beretta by the way, so a "lot" of people shooting them bought them at much cheaper prices...many are bought used. The better SxS or O/U shotguns also have barrels this good – because when you put a shotgun up to your eye, and you sight down a polished barrel, your eye is close enough to the bore line that you will see these defects in a polished barrel more than you will in a rifle barrel, especially when most rifles today are being outfitted with optical sights that are at least 1″ above the bore line. I am still having trouble with the exorbitant cost given that CNC machining is standard these days. You go buy yourself a set of Briley sub-gauge tubes: http://www.briley.com/c-238-tube-sets-and-tube-set-accessories.aspx. Put simply, these guns are for those avid shotgun enthusiasts that refuses to compromise on their equipment, and that means shooting a gun that’s been custom made to their measurements and specifications, and was entirely hand-fitted for utter reliability. Just because I don’t find them valuable does not mean that other people do not find them valuable. One of the reasons why I don’t use many power tools in gun finishing is that power tools can screw things up fast. Dyspeptic Gunsmith is an extremely clear writer and thinker. Not all of them are: in fact, some of the cheapest shotguns you can get are single-shot shotguns. The Perazzi MX8 has a long time reputation for strength and durability. This took skill to accomplish correctly. This might not be a market you wish to sink your money into, but it is there, just as there is a market for high-end European automobiles in the $100K+ range. That’s only .005 to .010 available to correct a problem. Barrel Specs: 1.500kg. All of this is done in order to give the best gun fit possible. That is the beauty of capitalism. These guns can be had with a huge variation in barrel lengths, but whichever you choose I recommend those with fixed chokes. I mean, you could make a Stoeger with harder material that would last longer than a few hundred rounds, double the price and still be well under the competition. They’ll often have chrome-lined barrels, with back-boring, long forcing cones and interchangeable chokes. Striking and polishing a rifle or shotgun barrel to get a polished finish that has no dips, waves, wrinkles or other defects when you sight down the barrel takes work. But whilst a Ferrari’s exorbitant price tag is readily validated by all manner of carbon fiber, aerodynamic accents, technological wizardry, and stunningly quantifiable performance, the matter of how Perazzi justifies their own five-figure price tags is somewhat less obvious. – at about $8K on up per gun. Which one? Want to jump up the price to $50K+? Good, affordable everyman budget guns. Here’s what too many American shooters today are stubborn to admit: There is a market for finer guns than the crap being shipped to Walmart. And we haven’t been babying it, either. However, by building their company off a business model that blends the most important benefits of ordering a bespoke gun (custom gun fitting and whatnot) with just enough of the production line ethos to keep prices at least somewhat reasonable, Perazzi should be commended for maintaining a price list that’s much closer to that of a Beretta DT10 or DT11 than they are to even the cheapest of Purdey, H&H, or Boss products. Shell Size: Shotgun shells are pretty damn big which is why shotguns are fairly limited in their capacity. Thanks too Dan. To each his own I suppose. They got caught between their declining quality and their “lifetime warranty” – warranty claims outstripped their ability to make a profit, and the product was ended. There’s no shortage of good semi-auto and pump guns in the market. This means that a double barrel shotgun can be configured for patterns at different ranges. “Miniskirt Principle. The trigger guard is plastic (last I looked), the finish on the barrel is bead-blasted, etc. Enjoyed the article very much, learned something new, and your detailed replies to comments have made this the best thread to read in months. It goes without saying that it also had surface imperfections as well – being covered up by a heavy bead blast job. Pud-simple. I’ve fixed several such barrels on rifles that looked like an asphalt road in Kansas in August. They always think “How can we make this more cheaply, and make it look more cheap and low-rent?” Even with an existing design, for which they need pay nothing and no patent or IP rights, because they originally owned the original design, Remington cannot conceive of how to make a gun that doesn’t look cheaper over time. Later, around WWII, many double-barreled gun makers started making guns with a single trigger and a selector switch to choose the first barrel to be fired. Similarly, the lack of “ears” that so typically denote the greener cross-bolt lockup system employed by Beretta’s DT10 and DT11 make the gun appear much smaller to the shooter’s eye, with the barrels and action all forming a nice, uninterrupted tapering line out to the horizon. Still, a lot of money. Yeah, but i can buy a single shot (with requisite 15# trigger) and beechwood stock from my uncle Joe Six-Pack for $50. Once you start joining two barrels together, you’ve signed up for a Job, NB the capital “J,” and it starts with the barrel profiles, then the rib profile. Today, the Model 32 design has been updated and refined, often nicely embellished and sold as the Krieghoff K80 Double-barrel shotguns have a significant advantage over single-barrel shotguns because you can have a different choke in each barrel. I might add, there is no shortage of better semi-auto gun models coming from off-shore as well. British “best” guns have one click. Both work very well. He sent it back and they sent him a new one. Well reasoned but one big question still lingers . I sell my excess to a market back east that sells to high end restaurants for big money. Why are side by side shotguns so damn expensive. Long enough to cover the subject. Using what’s known as a “try gun” (an action fitted to a stock that allows for massive adjustments in all manner of directions) and a trained eye, Perazzi’s representatives meet potential clients and tune and tweak for hours on end before they arrive at what they’ve determined to be the best dimensions. Oh well, I am a cheapskate and no one is forcing me to buy one. I just bought an H&R single shot for $100, then punched myself in the head so I’d see double. Honestly, the contrast of this article’s quality with normal TTAG content is blinding. There are still some parts available from Numrich and Browning, but they’re well enough made that you shouldn’t need much in the way of parts. Probably the best part is the light weight. The H&R Handi-rifle (aka NEF Single Shot) has very basic production values. Browning, an American brand, has been marketing O/U guns from the Superpose through the Citori for decades at good $2K+ prices – even tho the guns were made off-shore the whole time. I heard that someone is trying to restart the Darne’ gun manufacturing from France. What he’s describing is the cost to produce a shotgun, not the cost to buy one. Catastrophic failure of the trigger assembly. Hard to find these guns and what makes this one even more unique is it has type 4 forearm iron and barrel lug so any modern barrel could be fit to this gun. K-80 and Perazzi have screw on/off interchangeable stocks. Slapping a barrel on a belt grinder and then bead blasting instead of polishing is a cheap and sleazy way to finish a gun for the civilian market. You are so patient. Many SxS guns which are sold as sporting (hunting) guns will have not much wood in the forearm. There, in the booth, is Mr. Paolo Zoli, this gentleman: http://www.zoliusa.com/contacts/mr-zoli-welcomes-you/. Blinkered American management thinking is why they don’t. Another factor not mentioned is that fewer over-unders are sold, which means volume doesn’t bring down costs like pumps and semis. Find one with modified/full choking on the barrels and you’re off to the races. – nice walnut, but not really high-end wood Fudds would gladly sell out the 2A if it means they get to keep their shotguns and great grandiddy’s broke dick bolt action deer rifle that shoots minute of barn. Here’s the problem: There’s nowhere near as much material to use to recover from finishing errors on a shotgun. OK, then we have Perugini & Visini, Grulla, Fabbri – all from Italy, and a half-dozen more from the UK. Also for deer you can have one barrel loaded with buck, and the other with a slug. I hear lots of people who have never actually struck or polished a barrel say “Oh, you just put it on a barrel spinner and then you use a belt sander.”. The ability to have a more open choke for the first shot, and then a tighter one for the second is very useful for sporting clays. Discussion in 'Shotguns' started by scythefwd, May 2, 2011. The one I’ve handled just makes me marvel at the design. This is known as an “inertia trigger.”  The disadvantage of the inertia trigger is that in the event of a misfire (ie, the first barrel didn’t fire) or the shooter forgot to load the first barrel, there is no easy way to access the second barrel’s load. If you hear the second hammer strike its pin, you know you have an inertia trigger. The higher end shooters might rack up nearly or over 100K shells per year. The other alternative which I’ll present to you are insert tubes. Thanks for this article, and I hope to read more from you as you have time and inclination. What I fired a SxS shotgun in the same manner that ghetto gang bangers fire their pistols? Alternatives Anyone looking at a Perazzi might also cast an eye over guns by Kemen, Gamba, and the more expensive boxlock Berettas. Again, I saw dips/sags/ripples/waves/kinks in the barrel profile when you sight down the barrel. It looks smooth and perfect, from your eyeball to the other end. It’s all the same to them. Doing it correctly and completely makes the price go up rapidly, because it isn’t easily automated. Short enough to keep interest.”. At the end of the day, when a company can boast such an impressive roster of supporters and clients that they total more than half of an entire Olympic competitive field, they must be doing something right. And even more impressive, after all those rounds, it hasn’t changed one bit. You can literally stick just about any K-80 barrel on any K-80 receiver. However, that also means coming to terms with some seriously hefty price tags. Both being of Italian origin and having tempered their reputations in the heat of competition, the dualities these  brands share are too obvious to ignore. My wife is around guns all the time because of me, knows how to shoot pretty well, but guns are not a passion for her. If you hear nothing, then, using your fist or open hand, give the gun a good, firm strike on the butt of the gun. Today, you can see Model 32’s for sale, holding a nice value (especially for the embellished models). Or if none, under $1,500? Next question: How can Stoeger make them so cheaply? I also hope that Dyspeptic Gunsmith comes along to comment, but for 1.5K, the Browning Citori is a fairly decent gun for what you’re looking at (the amount of shooting and uses). As I’ve indicated also, a polished blued action/barrel will run up your cost a fair bit – the example I gave in the double gun thread a few days back was of the Beretta A400 (which is a semi-auto gun) polished/blued barrel for about $650, my cost. They’re a fixed-choke, mechanical trigger gun, with an integrated barrel selector/safety, with no to limited embellishment, starting in the used market for about $700, going up to $1500 or so. Oh, they try to tell you that they’re “gun guys,” but they’re not. eg, look at Beretta’s recent SxS gun – the 486 – starts at a list price of $5300. I wouldnt get rid of them for anything. Or are they complete crap? The Model 32 had some unique engineering advantages, and it is a very competently designed action. CZ Redhead Premier $1300 The H&R topper and Rossi single shots come to mind right away. What was the point? These guns don’t have much following because they’re sort of an “orphan” – with low embellishment, and therefore not much interest from collectors. My favorite semi-auto gun is a Beretta 390. I’m just trying to impart information. Stoeger guns are meant for very light duty shooting. More importantly, I support anyone who wants to manufacture or purchase a double-barrel shotgun at any price that both parties find agreeable. What did Remington do? 4. I’d be embarrassed and mortified to send a rifle barrel out of my shop that is that far out of concentricity with the bore. Now, when I do barrels, I don’t take shortcuts. An antonio zoli with 2 triggers, and a benelli with a single trigger. I shot it a little when I was a kid. PERAZZI MX8 SPORTER. I’d be interested in DP’s thoughts here, but three good options would be: Franchi Instinct $1200 I’m not angling for business, hence an anon handle to write this information under, etc. I’ll give you but one example: The Remington Model 32. That is why bird hunters love doubles. Try the trigger again. It wouldn’t matter if they’re making fidget spinners, lawnmower engines or p-traps for a sink. These best shotguns are at the apex of the gun world. For 50 years Perazzi has built prestigious game and competition guns that are a fusion between traditional gunsmithing, high technology and the selection of excellent raw materials. Seeing as shotguns are fitted with no legitimate aiming apparatus, the competitive trap or skeet shooter relies on a good gun fit and a consistent gun mount to locate the barrels consistently in relation to their eyes. Next step up you get into Brownings, Berettas, and then to higher end guns like Krieghoff, Kolar, and Perazzi. why are O/U or SxS shotguns so expensive? Perazzi offers 10 models within which several different models and engraving patterns are available. The Red Label shotguns are inexpensive in the quality entry level O/U shotguns. Because they’re damn reliable. Thanks, I had forgotten about inserts ( except for the 30-30 ones to to turn a shotgun into a rifle). At the SCI show, there are quite a number of “nice gun” makers being represented, with booths showing off their wares. Remington thought they had let this go on too long, and in 1973, they brought back an improved/COGS-reduced version, the 3200. “At least a farmer doesn’t think he’s qualified to tell the machinist how to turn out a part.”. Presto! Oh, and DGS… what are your thoughts on the cheap Spanish made doubles imported here back in the 50s and 60s? Buy Cheap Perazzi Shotguns However, I hope that this reviews about it Perazzi Shotguns will possibly be useful.And hope I am a section of assisting you to get a greater product. Seriously, why doesnt DG have his own regular columns like David Codrea and Liberte Austin? C-G’s guns have some interesting features that make them very attractive. That’s perfectly fine. Problem solved. Remington and Winchester could have owned a huge chunk of this market. I’ve pumped as much as 500+ rounds in a day through mine, and it never misses a beat. Many A5’s and M11’s are in need of a new recoil spring after decades of neglect and storage under compression. 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