An excited shooter was worried that the forcing cone area might be "damaged" by tough wads. Blaming plastic wads for impact is like blaming football shoulder pads for hard impacts. Hell, if wads can damage your forcing cone – imagine what shot might do? Also in the same breath is concern for older (re: 1970) forcing cones. Friend, the older shotguns were made far better than many of the newer shotguns we’ve seen.

Forcing cones have different "pitches" to them. "Pitch" as defined here, is the length of the forcing cone funnel in shifting from the wider chamber diameter to the narrower bore diameter. This can be done abruptly (cheaply) with a shorter reaming tool or over a longer length (higher quality product). Worry over older forcing cones may be misplaced worry. Older was often better, far better. In the 1920’s L C Smith shotguns could be ordered with a "taper bore" -- a continuous taper from chamber to choke. Tapered bores were an expensive manufacturing process, requiring a series of many reaming tools and lap polishing. And these were double-barreled shotguns!

Firing a shotshell load into an abrupt (short length) forcing cone is like firing the shell into a concrete curb. Poor little wad… never had a chance! And the shot! Miss-shaped, banged about and bouncing all over the place…Nuts…

Today, a shotgun manufacturer would quickly go broke messing with long tapered forcing cones. So with cheap consumer goods driving manufacturing of everything from clothes, to lawnmowers to shotguns, the current forcing cone mode from chamber diameter to barrel diameter - is a cheap and quick affair. As with triggers, buyers can’t see the forcing cones.

Would you like to see your forcing cones? You can. Use a softened candle and ram it into the area beyond the chambers. Heat the area with hot water and withdraw. Measure with micrometer.

Top-notch shotgunners seeking improved shotgun performance will ask gunsmiths to lengthen and polish forcing cones. This one single barrel improvement will greatly enhance shotgun performance, improving all aspects of scattergun performance, particularly long-range patterns.

Worried about FC damage…Tut. Finishing what should have been done at the factory is your only concern.

The Reloading Curmudgeon