shot gun question

[funinthesun]

I have a browning over under, its quite old ( maybe 15 - 20 yrs), but ive only had it for 6 months or so.

question is, should the safety automatically come on after you have broken the gun and then closed it again?

I cant recall if it has ever done this , but it doesnt at the moment, and two people have suggested that it should..

[J-Skid]

Yes, it should. My Dad's did the same thing.

[Harry Flashman]

Not necessarily.

If I remember, field guns (i.e. for game) often have an auto safety, but most clay guns don't?

My Beretta Sporting model (clay) has a safety that you need to engage manually, but the Field version for game use has one that engages automatically when you break the gun...

Edited by Harry Flashman on Friday 24th October 12:25

[jshell]

Harry Flashman said:

Not necessarily.

If I remember, field guns (i.e. for game) often have an auto safety, but most clay guns don't?

My Beretta Sporting model (clay) has a safety that you need to engage manually, but the sporting version for field use has one that engages automatically when you break the gun...

Yup, depends on the model, check with a gunsmith.

[funinthesun]

jshell said:

Harry Flashman said:

Not necessarily.

If I remember, field guns (i.e. for game) often have an auto safety, but most clay guns don't?

My Beretta Sporting model (clay) has a safety that you need to engage manually, but the sporting version for field use has one that engages automatically when you break the gun...

Yup, depends on the model, check with a gunsmith.

I am this afternoon - off to Avalon for a browse, fatherinlaw is getting bought one for christmas...

[Bee_Jay]

Harry Flashman said:

Not necessarily.

If I remember, field guns (i.e. for game) often have an auto safety, but most clay guns don't?

My Beretta Sporting model (clay) has a safety that you need to engage manually, but the Field version for game use has one that engages automatically when you break the gun...

Edited by Harry Flashman on Friday 24th October 12:25

What he said.

It's very simple to do yourself on some guns if you drop the action out.

My skeet gun has no auto-safety and the barrel selector fixed on bottom barrel. Lost too many points on Olympic by knocking it to top barrel when opening the gun and then firing the wrong barrel on singles...

Game guns tend to have auto-safeties.

Always seems strange to me to have a safety, it's either ready to fire or broken in my book no matter what you are doing, and if it's ready to fire it's pointed in a safe direction.

[hussar10a]

Harry Flashman said:

Not necessarily.

If I remember, field guns (i.e. for game) often have an auto safety, but most clay guns don't?

My Beretta Sporting model (clay) has a safety that you need to engage manually, but the Field version for game use has one that engages automatically when you break the gun...

Edited by Harry Flashman on Friday 24th October 12:25

I have field and sporting models of both, and this is exactly correct.

[funinthesun]

[quote=Bee_Jay
Always seems strange to me to have a safety, it's either ready to fire or broken in my book no matter what you are doing, and if it's ready to fire it's pointed in a safe direction.
[/quote]

not if you have a semi auto as well, that you cant break.... then it is a very good idea to have a safety...

[Jem0911]

As Harry said,
Field Model auto safe
Sporting Manual safe.
I was watching Richard Faulds shoot he still thumbs the safety before calling.

[Bee_Jay]

funinthesun said:

Bee_Jay said:

Always seems strange to me to have a safety, it's either ready to fire or broken in my book no matter what you are doing, and if it's ready to fire it's pointed in a safe direction.

not if you have a semi auto as well, that you cant break.... then it is a very good idea to have a safety...

Nope, breech open or not, same principle.

Only time breech is closed is when on-stand facing down-range or when sitting in your pigeon-hide...

ETA that a safety may make some sense on either type (breakable and semi-auto) in a walked-up-game or rough shooting scenario but in my experiences safeties tend to introduce complacency with regards to safety in the same way that crumple-zones and airbags do... (and so we come back to the big spike in the middle of the steering wheel thread...)

Edited by Bee_Jay on Friday 24th October 12:48

[Harry Flashman]

Jem0911 said:

As Harry said,
Field Model auto safe
Sporting Manual safe.
I was watching Richard Faulds shoot he still thumbs the safety before calling.

I do this too.

But also agree with previous poster - my gun is broken, unless it's already pointing in the right direction.

[funinthesun]

Bee_Jay said:

funinthesun said:

Bee_Jay said:

Always seems strange to me to have a safety, it's either ready to fire or broken in my book no matter what you are doing, and if it's ready to fire it's pointed in a safe direction.

not if you have a semi auto as well, that you cant break.... then it is a very good idea to have a safety...

Nope, breech open or not, same principle.

Only time breech is closed is when on-stand facing down-range or when sitting in your pigeon-hide...

ETA that a safety may make some sense on either type (breakable and semi-auto) in a walked-up-game or rough shooting scenario but in my experiences safeties tend to introduce complacency with regards to safety in the same way that crumple-zones and airbags do... (and so we come back to the big spike in the middle of the steering wheel thread...)

Edited by Bee_Jay on Friday 24th October 12:48

say about 50 / 50 clay and rough shooting over our land, and its pretty slippery this time of year, so safety is a good idea i think.. In my case anyway....

good to know the gun itself is probably all ok... goy mt eye on quite a nice little side b side though, if you havnt heard of avalon guns - quite a reasonble selection on their website..

http://www.avalon-guns.com/