Confused by need for new guns

Igotadose

This article states that Farmers might need new guns (shotguns, presumably, though not clear in the article) as the EU moves to restrict lead in bullets.

Umm, do Irish guns have lead barrels? I somehow doubt it. Now, if a new higher-powered shotgun shell with steel shot won't work in an old gun, just make a lower-powered shell. I really don't understand why you'd need a new gun, if the load changes, as long as the loads were not too powerful for the gun.

https://www.independent.ie/business/farming/forestry-enviro/environment/over-100000-guns-could-be-banned-under-new-eu-rules-38117388.html

dazed+confused

Most old guns are proofed for lead shot only and so can't be used with steel shot (which is much harder).

If the gun is in good condition and of reasonable value you could send it away to have it reproofed but this wouldn't be worth it for 90% of the guns that farmers carry in the back of the jeep.

I know an old gun could be 30-300yrs old so I'm deliberately not specifying how old as all guns and proof houses are different.

Nekarsulm

Lots of farmers have their fathers shot gun, or even their grand father's.
I know two lads have guns that are probably 1915 kind of age.
Heirlooms they would never willingly give up, that still do the job they were designed for, shoot a fox or dog attacking their sheep, or a rat or grey crow.
Most wouldn't fire half a dozen shots in 12 months.
Steel shot through one or those could leave you missing all the fingers on your left hand, or half your face or head.
Lead is soft and can compress as it travels through the barrel.
The last few inches of many gun barrels are smaller than the main lenght of the barrel, and the lead pellets are compressed as they pass through it.
A bit like squeezing the end of a garden hose, and making the water squirt out further.
Steel dosen't compress, so the chance is the barrel could split or burst.

Bigus

Could a substitute for lead be found , a high tech composite material , or even low tech copper or pewter ?

Nekarsulm

Bigus wrote: »

Could a substitute for lead be found , a high tech composite material , or even low tech copper or pewter ?

Lead is cheap, and incredibly plentiful in the earth.
Go out into a field with a metal detector and you will find some.
Steel shot is woefully bad ballistically , having only half the energy of lead at 40 yards range.
There is a metal called Bismuch that is an alternative.
Falls somewhere between steel and lead balistically, but the down side is that cartridges loaded with it are about 70% more expensive than lead , and you need bigger size pellets of it to equal a lead pellet.
Thus you have less pellets fitting into a cartridge, and a worse "pattern" leading to more likelihood of birds being injured instead of killed .
Now if I'm only shooting a couple of dozen cartridges a year, I could justify the price, but if I'm into clay pigeon target shooting, and shooting one or two hundred cartridges a week ( serious shooters would be shooting far more than this) the cost for a ballistically inferior product would be prohibitive.