Monday, July 16, 2007

Boomsticks: k-BLAMMMM!

Back when I was working at the gun shop in Georgia, I had a cartridge collection prominently displayed on the shelf behind the counter. Folks were always bringing things in to add to it, and the star was a 4 Bore cartridge, which made even the mighty .50 BMG look a little spindly by comparison.

That is, it was the star, until a guy brought in what looked like a brass-based paper towel tube. It was labeled "0 Gauge", and was the shell from a breechloading punt gun from back in the days of market hunting. You could have dropped the 4 Bore and the .50 BMG down in there, added a .600 Nitro Express and a .458 Win Mag for good measure, and rattled them around like beans in a maraca.

Xavier has video of a sidehammer punt gun being fired.

Wow.

14 comments:

  1. Hey, since you're a font of obscure firearm knowledge:

    I recall reading a few years ago on the web about a fellow that made a muzzleloading rifle from a 30mm GAU-8 cannon barrel.

    Have you ever seen that article, and if you have could you point us to it?

    Best regards,
    NMM1AFan

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  2. I thought punt guns were used in hunting dirt dragons.

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  3. And I thought punt guns were chambered for firing footballs when you have too much yardage to make up on fourth down.

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  4. http://www.cultural-baggage.com/tutruth/The%20Tennessee%20Pot%20Cave.pdf

    Have your heard anything about this guy growing pot in his cave under his house? Great setup but now it will be autioned off by the DEA types.

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  5. No, can't say as I'd heard anything about that.

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  6. I know its so completely off topic...

    But yeah I did hear about that cave. The guy built this place up and sold tons (as in literal metric tons) of weed. The cops knew this guy was dirty, but didnt know how he was getting the pot.

    The thing that got them the warrant was the fact that the house was using something like 20x more power than normal.

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  7. I was wondering what the hell that thing was!

    I'm thinking LARGE game, like a battleship or something...



    tweaker

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  8. Punt guns, yeah. Check out Tremors 4. Michael Gross is in the old West and uses a Punt Gun to kill the underground monsters.

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  9. Tam -
    Thanks for the link to the story of one man's four-bore. A truly great tale!

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  10. You can still buy new 4 bores - Butch Searcy makes SXS boxlocks in that size.. A might pricey at $85,000.. Kreiger sells .950 groove barrels, NEI makes a 3500 grain mold(that's 8 ounces folks!), and I'm still trying to track down a source for brass... I'm planning on building one eventually, just gotta machine a falling block action..

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  11. just gotta machine a falling block action...

    I don't wanna be under that block when it falls.

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  12. A single barrel 4 bore? It's your shoulder...

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  13. Who said anything about shoulder fired? I was thinking a return to battery setup, probably built like small scale howitzer.

    Besides, it would have to get in line to destroy my shoulder - I still haven't gotten around to building a .550 RNS magnum yet. :)

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  14. Amazingly, still legal in England, at least until New Labor finds out that twenty or so people are still doing it.

    Fours were the traditional transition "punt and shoulder" gauge. They were so heavy that weight was more the problem than recoil. I once owned a muzzleloading example.

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