I was at the range tonight, trying to see how well this shotgun feeds with the side saddle installed and full. The light, target loads didn't have enough power to cycle the action, even with the rounds removed. I then switched to buckshot. I fired 5 rounds of PMC 00 buck without problems. I then loaded up with #4 buck and had a catastrophic falure. The screw that holds the side saddle on, sheared off and fell to the floor. The empty had ejected, but the new round was still in the carrier. I cycled the action to chamber the new round and I noticed that the barrel was not fully in the receiver. I then tried to eject the round and it would not budge.
After several attempts, I finally got the live round out and put the thing away until I got home. That is when things got interesting and I discovered the full extent of what happened.
First, I removed the forend. I noticed that there was a metal ring with a flat spot that looked rusted and nasty. It didn't occur to me what I was looking at quite yet. I hit it with some oil and steel wool to try to clean up the contact surface a bit. I then noticed a similar pad on the bottom of the barrel and it looked equally nasty and again for cleaned before I realized what I was looking at.
Those parts were, of course, supposed to be silver soldered together. Its the barrel attachment ring. I felt like an idiot for not recognizing this immediately, but was horrified to realize that the gun had essentially falled apart.
So the question becomes, how and why did this happen and what do I do now?
