S&H 2 Bore Blackpowder Express
There is ‘big bore’ and then there is the 2 bore. Schroeder & Hetzendorfer make a cartridge called the S&H 2 Bore Blackpowder Express.
These photos are amazing
.700 nitro express next to 2 bore and 3500 grain bronze solid
.500 S&W, .45-70, .700 Nitro Express, 2 bore
The caliber equivalent of 2 bore (’bore’ is generally interchangeable with ‘gauge’ in regard to caliber) is 1.326″ or 33.68mm! The bronze solid bullet weights 3500 grain / 1/2 pound / 226.80 grams!
While technically fired from a rifle these are more like massive shotgun slugs: a heavy projectile at a low velocity. The 2500 grain bronze solid leaves the barrel at 1500 ft/s and with 17487 ft·lb of energy.
Apart from the nerve destroying recoil, heavy rifle, heavy ammo and expense these big bullets slow down dramatically after entering the game and hitting bone. A problem when hunting elephant.
They even come bigger than this. The 1 bore has a caliber of 1.67″. The A Guage/Bore, about 2″, was used for punt guns.
More info at Schroeder & Hetzendorfer.
ACE has an interesting article on the 4 bore.
UPDATE
Jay Schroeder emailed me the pricing for for the brass and bullets:
Cartridge Cases are $495.00 per 10 pack shipped.
Copper FN Solids are $295.00 per 10 pack shipped.
All components are USA made by Americans from American material.
Although it may seem expensive, you are probably not going to purchase more than one set of brass.
Awesome pictures. Do you happen to know if anyone manufactures a 2-bore rifle?
I found a photo of a 2-bore, luckily along with normal scale rifles-
http://crypticsubterranean.blogspot.com/2008/02/2-bore.html
Forget the videos of the guys shooting the .577 Tyrannosaur, I want to see the 2-bore in action!
Jay, great find! Wow, that is one big rifle! I did not find any information on people making the 2 bore. I guess that any made now are fully custom jobs.
The english explorer Sir Samuel Baker was keen on the 2 bore:
I love that last line “It was difficult to say which was staggered the more severely, the elephant or myself.”
(h/t sam)
Great stuff. That guy obviously viewed shooting as a contact sport!
Sir Samuel Baker’s rifle “Baby” was technically closer to a 3 bore. It was rifle #1526 made at Holland & Holland, London in 1869 London.
[...] The Firearm Blog Kynoch [...]
Yes, there is a currently-made 2-bore rifle, which I have made for the Royal Armouries as an exhibition piece. It fires 3,500-grain slugs with twenty or twenty-four drams of powder, and can be seen in action on the website of the Shooting Times magazine in England. Cartridges are one hundred dollars each, and the price of the rifle will be governed mainly by the features desired, but will be measured in the tens of thousands of dollars. Using the famous Taylor Knockout values, which give a much better indication of killing power than just kinetic energy, the.600 gives 161, but the 2-bore gives over 700, so it is effectively like firing four .600s simultaneously.
@ Giles Whittome:
Hi Giles, any chance you can email me some photos of the 2-bore to post on the blog. My email address is on the top of the left sidebar.
Best Regards,
Steve
If i ever go hunting in Africa that is gonna be my choice gun.That will anhialate anything in its path.
You should add a .357 Magnum and a .22 to that comparison photo. As I actually know how big those two rounds are.
I’d like to see comparison to 12ga 2.75″ shotgun, 40mm M79/M203 launcher grenade, and 40mm Mk. 19 launcher grenade. I suspect that the Mk 19 40mm grenade cartridge would be less punishing to the shooter if someone made a rifle chambered for it.
As if a massive two bore is not impressive enough, Samuel White Baker, in one of his several books about his explorations in Africa “The Nile Tributaries of Abyssinia and The Sword Hunters of the Hamran Arabs” also mentions that he some of the projectiles that he carried for this gun that were rather similar to “grenades”. These projectiles contained, in addition, a bursting charge of black powder (with a cap at the front end) that would fire the black powder charge inside the projectile on entering the body of the target animal (usually an elephant).
An additional interesting fact contained in this book is what may be the first mention (in print) of the “Al-Quida”.
This book also contains an interesting account of elephant hunting by The Hamran Arabs, who would pursue an elephant on hoseback, and then as the elephant began to slow, they would dismount (during the chase) and slash the achilles tendon of the elephants rear leg with a large sharp sword (Elephant are unable to run, or even to walk, on three legs, so an elephant with one leg disabled is essentially “pinned”.
Sam, very interesting. Do you know of any diagrams from back in the day showing these explosive rounds?