Paradox;

As you might expect I have started on another DR project(a month or so ago). It will be a .30-30 or .30-40. I found a 20 gauge AyA Matador ejector gun for the donor action. The Matador does not have a third fastner, so I have now cut the slots in the action for a Purdey style third fastner, as well as started making the third fastner. To my mind a Purdey style third fastner should be fitted as the very last step of fitting barrels to an action. So it will be several months before I fit up the third fastner. A Purdey third fastner is activated by a slot in the bottom of the top lever. Of course since the Matador action did not have a third fastner, the barrels did not have a third fastner barrel extension. Although the barrels of the Matador are chopper lump, I would not have used them to build a monoblock for a rifle, as the extractor hole is much too large--taking away too much metal from the barrel walls. Therefore, I have machined a monobloc from a 2.5" diameter bar of 4140 alloy steel, which includes a rearward barrel extension that will be 7/32" wide. The barrel extension will also act as a top guide for the new extractors that I will build making it unnecessary to bore two holes in the monobloc for the extractors. I will limit the diameter of the single extractor hole between the barrels to 7mm, and make the extractors from high strength alloy steel to compensate for a small size diameter of their shaft.

The Matador 20-bore gun that I am using as a donor also has the Zanotti style rear extended barrel lumps and the extended Zanotti lump slot machined back into the bottom breech face of the action. Combined with the added Purdey style third fastner all of this will give the DR significant more barrel locking leverage than a typical 20-bore double gun.

The down side of using an AyA Matador action is that I have to make double triggers and safety slide components to convert it from single selective trigger to double trigger.

Kindest regards;
Steve Howell