Removing a poly-choke?

[steadyrock]

OK, here's the deal: For my 16th birthday (14 years ago), Grandpa gave me one of his old 12-gauge pump shotguns. It was a cheapie (as most of his guns were), a Western Field XNH-560. Gunparts.com cross-reference indicates this was a Mongomery Ward's branded gun and the actual gun was a Noble model 60. I have no idea when it was made or purchased, but it's old.

The gun has attached to the end a poly-choke, which is basically a muzzle brake looking device that screws in and out to set the choke pattern for different yardages. I want to know if this choke is removable, and if I can run the gun either without chokes or (preferably) have the muzzle end threaded to accept modern choke tubes. Here are some pictures of the choke; I apologize if they're not the greatest quality, I'm still improving at my gun photography.

Image of the end of the barrel plus the choke:


Close-up of the choke with the shroud removed; you can see the "petals" inside and that the choke has a pretty tight fit to the end of the barrel:


Close-up of the choke shroud; this is the part that turns to adjust the choke. It's a blurry picture (no macro setting on this ****** camera), but it has markings that read "MAGNUM", "MASTER SHOOTING", and yardage markings from 5 all the way up to 40 in 5-yard increments:



Does anybody know anything about these? I can't find a gunsmith that is willing to give it the time of day. I guess if all else fails I could just have the thing cut off and the muzzle threaded, but I'd much rather just remove it if I can. Any ideas? Many thanks.

[swifty]

The Poly-choke is usually soldered on. Heat from a torch should be hot enough to remove the choke. The barrel will probably have to be shortened if the barrel has been turned down to accept the current choke.

The barrel may or may not be able to accept internal choke tubes. Inside diameter and outside diameter will determine this.

I recommend leaving the choke alone.

[bohoki]

wow i cant believe you woudl want to remove it dont you unserstand that it is a combo muzzlebrake and choke

just dial it for cylnder choke and leave it

besides it looks badass

also you can put a bit of plumbing teflon tape on the threads to make it hold the open choke position better (sometimes the old ones had people really tighten it too much and fire it with hot loads and it gets a bit worn so its not as tight)

[TRAP55]

I recommend leaving the choke alone too. Take a look at your bolt slide. If it's bronze, I'd highly recommend lite target loads only.

[CHS]

For the price that you'd have to pay to get this thing removed and the barrel properly internally threaded for a tube choke system, you could probably buy a brand new remington 870 and a pack of chokes.

Leave it as is. It's a pretty cool system.

[Moonclip]

I'd not spend and $ modifying this gun if it is indeed a Nobel. Leave it as is.

[steadyrock]

Thanks guys, I'll leave it as is.

[Xerxes]

As stated the Poly Choke was a great idea and was very popular before the screw in chokes.

Only problem is a few people shot their hands off as they adjusted the poly while weapon was locked and loaded.

Also as you can see the choke was not as accurate in the setting and was approximate each time it was adjusted. They even had huge red danger tags hanging off the end of the barrels on the new shotguns with a picture of a little hand warning about adjusting it while the weapon was loaded.

If you want to remove it then just keep shooting it.

As stated the Poly was usually soldered since the barrels were made to thin to cut threads on for such a huge thing and be able to take the force from being a choke.

I think the majority of the shotguns from those days have lost there poly's. The solder connection was just not that robust.

I have seen one fall off and far worse was the time when one fell off on me.

I went duck hunting with a friend up in the delta. I was using a friends fathers shotgun that he really liked. I felt like I was set up because on my first shot with the thing the poly shot off the end of the shotgun and flew off into the water to never be seen again.

At first we laughed and laughed and laughed.

Later we thought about it and since it was an illegally borrowed shotgun and we were young (translation = no money since we were in college) this created friction between me and my friend as he wanted me to pay to have it fixed. We did go to a gun shop and had it priced at like $110 to replace for a shotgun that was selling for $180 new. My friend said I should pay for it since it broke while I borrowed it. I said I did nothing negligent and it would have fallen off for whoever shot it next so it was just worn out and end of life.

Needless to say we weren't much friends after that and never went duck hunting after that. I heard he got in a lot of trouble from his dad when he found out some weeks later that his poly was missing. My friend of course denied, denied, denied, and said is must have been lost the last time he went hunting. That did not work since the dad was good about cleaning firearms after use and knew the choke was not missing.

So if you want to ditch the poly, just keep shooting it till if falls off.