Douglas Barrels - were they good barrels?

[Jay Gardner]

Just aquired a .54 Hawken style rifle built by Kenny Sutton in 1977. The rifle sports a 36" Douglas barrel. Were they good barrels?

 

[kanati]

They were considered a very good barrel at the time. Definitely a selling feature.

-Ron

 

[Melton Kidd]

Douglas had different grades of barrels. An air gaged target barrel was very good. Some of the others were sometimes not so good. I don,t remember how they were marked for grade. I only used the air gaged barrels for both muzzle loaders and center fire pistol. I still have one flint lock rifle from about 1980 with a target grade barrel and it is very accurate.

 

[Tumblernotch]

An excellent barrel. It's a shame that Douglas gave up making them. They still make top of the line centerfire barrels. The Douglas shop is only about 15 miles from me. A good friend of mine used to buy barrels that they rejected for sale to the general public because of cosmetic or minor rifling flaws and they shot as good as most on the market. I've been in the shop but it was years ago. I made a call a little over a year ago about a barrel on a rifle I was using and there were only two employees there who had worked there when they made ML barrels. But I got the information I needed. They were very helpful.

 

[B Shipman]

Douglas barrels were made from a cold drawn steel already in an octagon shape before they were drilled and reamed. If you try to drill a hole thru 42 in. you have run out. The difference in grade had nothing to do with the rifling quality but rather with how on center the bore was. They were standard and premium XX. Also Golden Age Arms [now defunct] had them made with a 1-48 twist instead if the standard 1-66. These performed better in many shooters opinions at the time. Duoglas barrels have won many a match at the national shoots at Freindship. In their day ,they were common and that was part of it. Like Green Mtn. barrels today. But they still had to hit the mark.

 

[Tumblernotch]

I'll have to disagree with part of that. My friend drew the line at off-center barrels. Some of the seconds he bought had slightly flawed rifling due to broken cutters and other mishaps during the rifling process. The others had minor cosmetic flaws such as dings, deep scratches, &c.

I don't remember how many different rates of twist Douglas used in their barrels, but the one I had (.50) was rifled in 1 in 4 feet. Even after I checked the rate myself, I called to confirm it, not believing they used that rate. Stan confirmed my finding and told me that 1 in 48" was common for that caliber and length of barrel. It shot good, although it needed better sights.

 

[Birddog6]

In their day they were the barrel to beat. With today's technology, I don't think they are any better if as good as a than today's Green Mountain barrel. But they are a good selling feature for a rifle.
:thumbsup:

 

[Mike Brooks]

I blew a 1" X .50 up many years ago. My fault, not the barrels....
I have a douglas on my 32-40 schuetzen, not quite built yet but I have high hopes that the barrel is a good one. :grin:

 

[Vaino]

My .45 cal. squirrel rifle built in 1978 has a standard Douglas 7/8"x42" bbl which is exremely accurate, easy loading and has minimal bore runout, causing no problem w/ the build or breeching. From day one, the bore was very "slick", perhaps from button rifling?....Fred

 

[Jay Gardner]

Thanks, all. I just checked the barrel and it is stampped (XX) so I presume it is one of their premium barrels. The rifle is exceptionally well built and saw a lot of action in the late 70's-early 80's at Friendship. I'll try to get some photos up later this week.

DG

 

[bob243]

Managed to find an unused XX about two years ago for my squirrel gun in a 13/16 36cal. Still working on the build, maybe get it done this winter.

Now I am on my next quest of finding a Green River :grin:

 

[RonT]

My 77' vintage Douglas barrel doesn't have any XX's, must be a second... 70 yds. off a bag.:wink:
R

 

[ohio ramrod]

I built my target rifle about then with the same barrel and it has over three thousand rounds through it and is still a top notch barrel.

 

[Birddog6]

My 77' vintage Douglas barrel doesn't have any XX's, must be a second... 70 yds. off a bag.:wink:
R

Looks to me like all you need to do is some load & combo work & tighten the group up. You are on the paper so you are 1/2 way there.
Shoot from a solid bench, sand bag on the rear at the buttplate & front sandbag under the entrypipe. This will eliminate allot of shooters error.

Work the loads & combos til you have a raged 1 hole group of 3 shots at 50 yards, then proceed out to 75 yards, same thing, then on out to 100 yds.

IMHO, a good charge & combo will shoot 1-2" groups consistently at 100 yards off sand bags & with iron sights.

Now if I could just see a 1" dot at 100 yards now....... :redface: The older I get the closer the target has to be. Pretty soon I will just use the rifle for a club ! :idunno: :grin:

 

[fatboy]

I have .36 cal Douglas flint. 42" long barrel if I recall been so long since I've had it out but it can do good if the crooked eye fool behind it can hold it steady enough