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Last week, I took my NEF 28 gauge along to the range just in case I got a chance to fire it. I was hoping one of the regular shotgunners would be there, and I could bum a few clay birds just to try it out. As I had hoped, a regular and his son showed up and after while I ambled over and asked if I could try my 28 gauge on a few of their birds. They said, "Sure, bring it on over" so I did and the son pulled the trap machine for me. I only fired about 10 rounds. I missed the first two, and quickly discovered that I have to get on the bird pretty fast with the 28 gauge as it doesn't have the reach of a 3 inch 12 gauge.
The young fellow who was pulling trap for me saw my box of Remington high brass target shells that had a price tag of $4.95 on it. He said, "Wow, you must have had those for a long time; they cost a lot more than that now."
I had enough fun with those 10 rounds that over the course of the past week, I thought about it several times. I decided that I would take one of my .410's out and burn up some of my .410 shells that I've hoarded over the years. Some of these have price tags of $2.50 a box on them; no sense in having my children sell them for $1 a box at gschwertley's post funeral garage sale.
Today, I drove my 66 Ford Fairlane out of its shelter for a trip to the range. I took with me my old (also 1966) Harrington & Richardson Topper shotgun in .410 bore. I got this shotgun for my 16th birthday. On the way to the range, I stopped at Big 5 and bought a carton of 90 White Flyer clay birds. When I got to the range, I was the only one there besides the rangemaster on duty and a range safety officer. Today, I used the automatic trap machine that throws the birds for you as it oscillates to random positions. It's controlled by a foot pedal. After taking off the cover, lugging and plugging the battery, and loading it, I was popping clay birds in no time. Shooting trap with a .410 is a bit more work than with a 12 gauge, but it's sure fun. I fired 100 rounds of .410. I can't recall when I fired that many at one time before. I was pretty good at busting birds.
My old H&R single shot .410 is made differently from the more contemporary New England Firearms guns. The older H&R's have slim, long tapered barrels. Back at the receiver, there is more contouring and machining of the metal. On the more newly-made NEF guns, the barrels all seem to have the same contour and diameter regardless of gauge. This results in the .410 barrels being rather massive and overly heavy. The breech end reminds me of a German railroad cannon. I suppose NEF does this for ease of manufacture, or possibly on advice of the legal department, or both.
One use I have put my old H&R .410 to in the past is to sink a floating dock in a lake in Iowa. Yes, this was in the first year that I owned it and I was 16 years old. We were visiting in Iowa, and the people had their own lake. They had built a floating dock supported by 55 gallon steel barrels. I decided it might be interesting to center .410 bore slugs in the centers of the drum heads. It was fun and interesting until I noticed that the dock had disappeared into the lake. Fortunately, we left the next day without anyone noticing that the dock had vanished.
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