The great American single shot shotgun. Just bought one.

I was with a buddy who was buying a Ruger .45 Blackhawk, and the place had this H&R Topper Model 88 for 99 bucks, which is about the going price. I looked at it, put it back, went to lunch, came back, and bought it. They must have given me some kind of good-guy discount, because after taxes and the $15 background check it was $106.



Nothing special, except I don't think any American makers are doing the basic single shot shotgun anymore. I know NEF took these over for a while, but I think they are out of the shotgun biz. They make the same gun as a rifle, but I think if you want a shotgun you've got to get a foreign made gun.

The colors on this one are nice.



It doesn't weigh much. I'm not sure I have the stones to touch off a 3" load in this thing.



I like to keep a shotgun by the back door. When we first moved in, my son-in-law said: There's a bear in the back yard.

I've lived in Montana, Idaho, and New Mexico so I've seen some bears. I was sure it would turn out to be a porcupine or a fat prairie dog, but I humored him and took a look. Sure enough, a big fat cinnamon colored black bear was hopping over the fence to the neighbor's yard. He ate some dog food, and kept working his way down the yards.

Back door duty has fallen to my kid's Stoeger 20 gauge coach gun, but having it loaded with just the safety on has always made me a little nervous. I'll replace it with this guy, hammer down on a buckshot load in the chamber and some slugs on the stock.



It seems sad that these guns have disappeared from the new gun shelves. It probably doesn't make much sense to keep making them, with reliable pumps available for just a few dollars more, but I'll miss them just the same.

sigp220.45 said:

I was with a buddy who was buying a Ruger .45 Blackhawk, and the place had this H&R Topper Model 88 for 99 bucks, which is about the going price. I looked at it, put it back, went to lunch, came back, and bought it. They must have given me some kind of good-guy discount, because after taxes and the $15 background check it was $106.

Nothing special, except I don't think any American makers are doing the basic single shot shotgun anymore. I know NEF took these over for a while, but I think they are out of the shotgun biz. They make the same gun as a rifle, but I think if you want a shotgun you've got to get a foreign made gun.

The colors on this one are nice.

It doesn't weigh much. I'm not sure I have the stones to touch off a 3" load in this thing.

I like to keep a shotgun by the back door. When we first moved in, my son-in-law said: There's a bear in the back yard.

I've lived in Montana, Idaho, and New Mexico so I've seen some bears. I was sure it would turn out to be a porcupine or a fat prairie dog, but I humored him and took a look. Sure enough, a big fat cinnamon colored black bear was hopping over the fence to the neighbor's yard. He ate some dog food, and kept working his way down the yards.

Back door duty has fallen to my kid's Stoeger 20 gauge coach gun, but having it loaded with just the safety on has always made me a little nervous. I'll replace it with this guy, hammer down on a buckshot load in the chamber and some slugs on the stock.

It seems sad that these guns have disappeared from the new gun shelves. It probably doesn't make much sense to keep making them, with reliable pumps available for just a few dollars more, but I'll miss them just the same.

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That was a good find! Henry makes single shotguns and rifles in the US but they cost a lot more than $99.


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gonerydin said:

That was a good find! Henry makes single shotguns and rifles in the US but they cost a lot more than $99.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Click to expand...

I didn’t know about the Henry. $448 for a single shot? Yipes!

First gun I ever bought!
Still have it.

Looks about new!

Should be a good sky buster w/some 3" goose loads.

If that ser# prefix is AY,,it was made in 1982,,,and that was the last year of the Harrington & Richardson Arms Co under that name.

'80,,AU
81,,AX
82,,AY
(they did'nt use letters V or W)

1983 started the NEF (New England Firearms/ H&R togetherance and an extra 2 letters were added to the prefix code in the ser#, plus they started their sequence with 'AX' again .
1983- AXAZ

First gun that I bought for my son. A 20 ga., when he was about 14, in 1985 I think. He still has it. I have a 410 that belonged to my Dad as well. AU prefix. Solid little guns.

Only shotgun my dad had and hunted with was a Winchester 37 16 guage. He was very good with it. I have a lot more shotguns now but this is last one I would let go.

I'm giving my son the .410 inherited from my grandfather. It probably dates from the 1920's; is marked Diamond Arms Co.

But I think it was made by Iver Johnson. Could be H&R.

Grandfather used it mainly on squirrels. I acquired some doves and ducks with it.

Today, I regard such a gun as the sort sold to primitive Indians in rural Brazil for subsistence hunting. Some have Rossi copies of the Winchester M-92, but the single-barrel shotgun is probably more common.

If Ray in Rio sees this,maybe he can tell us if hunting is still allowed by these people. I think Brazil otherwise bans hunting.

Brad, that gun has the blandest wood I've seen on a gun. But I guess it's a good choice for the need you expressed.

Heirloom!!

THE PILGRIM said:

First gun I ever bought!
Still have it.

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My version of this is a 20 ga. Stevens that belonged to my Dad, now safely in my safe. It's so old it doesn't have a serial number. Many fond memories of following my Dad through the mountains hunting squirrels. This would be my last gun to let go.

Texas Star said:

Brad, that gun has the blandest wood I've seen on a gun.

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They do, as they were/are cheap. Mine looks just like it. But the receiver looks cool!
Heres mine.

I picked up a Stevens 12 ga single shot last year. It has the plastic Tenite stock and forearm. It makes a good match to the Stevens .22/.410 that had belonged to my granddaddy.

Muley Gil said:

I picked up a Stevens 12 ga single shot last year. It has the plastic Tenite stock and forearm. It makes a good match to the Stevens .22/.410 that had belonged to my granddaddy.

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Would that have been an over and under you speak of? My Dad had one when I was a youngster. I don't know whatever happened to it unfortunately.

Santa bought me an Ithaca Model 66, 20 ga. one Christmas. My very first gun.

My son has it now.

Sig, have one just like your’s. It is my “mud room” gun, does double duty for rear and front yards. 20 gauge. I also have two single shot 16’s, both older than me, one a JC Higgins and a 37 winchester. Not tacticool by today’s standards, but will certainly get the job done.

They do not like Federal shells. Mine cost me a deer once. Firing pin a tad too short.

Wish I could find a nice 18" 20 gage over and under.............

Nice find. When I was a kid, my first shotgun was an H&R single shot .410. Killed my first "real bird", a pheasant, with it. Wish I still had it.

Larry

When I was 19 (1963), I went to an auction in a nearby town. There were 4 long guns secured together by twine through their trigger guards. I bid 5 bucks & won a Diamond Arms (St. Louis) 12 gauge (similar to H&R Topper), a U.S. Army .45-70 Springfield with the front of the forend missing, a Colt Lightning .22 (inoperable, but complete) and a Mannlicher M95 with a plugged barrel (had been "sporterized" at some point). Apparently, this lot was the junk guns that nobody else wanted. I would be afraid to shoot any of them, but they make nice wall hangers.

"..The colors on this one are nice.."

Those are Cyanide produced case hardening colors.

Done in molten Potassium Cyanide salts, leaving the part to 'soak' in the salts for a time. Then removed and quenched. The latter produces both the surface 'case' hardening and also the distinctive color trait of the cyanide process.

The rainbow effect of the cyanide colors is brought about during the quenching process by a slight but steady interuption as the part is being lowered into the quench. It's become sort of a trait in itself of the process at least in firearms mfg'r on large parts like frames.

Early use didn't include this in it's process and a simple dump quench produced the coloring pattern that was more similar to Bone/Charcoal colors. But the cyanide process colors are still easily distinguished apart from the bone/char process even then.

Parkers were bone/char case colored when they were made in Meriden. When Remington bought them and moved production to Ilion, they started case hardening them with Cyanide. Remington already was using the process for doing smaller parts.
The differences are easily seen if you are familiar with the processes and restoration & collectors can certainly spot the difference.
Same for AH Fox. Early on bone/char. Then a switch to Cyanide after WW1.
Fox had a company in NJ do theirs,,Fred Heinzelmann Co. in Carlstadt.
They are still in biz AFAIK and will still do cyanide case coloring to firearms frames and parts. Last one I had done by them was a few years ago, an AH Fox D grade restoration.

Outside of the heavy industrial world, almost no one uses the stuff for obvious reasons.
Still used in the European firearms industry for case hardening quite a bit though the Greenie movement is most likely not happy with that.
Third World is the wild west. Quite common for a number of uses as it used to be in earlier times in the US.
Like mercury, it's a good gold extraction soln. The dangers again are obvious to the handler and the environment.

In the late 70s and into the 80's I did some work with a small guns shop. He did his own hot bluing and mixed his own salts ect.
He decided that a small dose (1/4 cup or so) of potassium cyanide into the hot salt bluing soln during use would enable soft soldered assembled SxS bbls to be hot blued.
The hot salt process is known to weaken and eventually destroy the solder bond betw the ribs and bbls.
It had always been one of those urban legends that the cyanide would offer protection from that problem,,we didn't have urban legends then but this would have qualified.
Convinced of that,he went ahead with his plan.
I wouldn't go near that bluing room after that.

Those Toppers are classics. In this part of the country, the Winchester 37 is worshipped, especially if it is a red letter model.