SLOT SHOOTING.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XL, Issue 1825, 11 May 1918, Page 4

SLOT SHOOTING.

A new kind of shotgun lias the end of its muzzle broadened out and flattened'into a slot together, and make the sportsman’s aim more accurate at long range. The “Popular Science Monthly” for January, in describing the new gun, calls attention to its usefulness, both in war and sport; the principle may be applied to artillery as well as- to the rifle fire. To quote from the article in question: “From the time that British sportsmen learned (hat hittinc flying things was possible, there has been 100 years of endeavour to make a shotgun tire its shot charges more, compactly, to tend that the density of the 1 'pattern” is sufficient to icnsure hits even at long range. Now comes an inventor with a device to make a shotgun spread its charge even more than the normal 'cylinder’ barrel, and not only to make it spread, but to produce a spread of a certain shape, so as to increase the chances of a hit. for war usage, the inventor has produced for his shotgun a muzzle flattened horizontally as the gun is held by more than a slot of a width equal to the diameter of the buckshot to he used; and, of course, running horizontally as the gun is held by its user. Th result, claims the inventor, is a 'pattern,’ made with 12 buckshot, 14in. high by 8 ft. wide at a distance of 30 yards. In other words, at this range the gun shoots a horizontal line of round bullets, not one of which is higher or lower .than 7in. from the average, all travelling in ‘a line of skirmishers’ 'Bft. wide. Were men charging a trench at intervals of one yard, which is not now true, three or four of them would be hit by a bullet each. The device can also be applied to cannon, the load being changed to a charge of loose leaden bullets, and the muzzle flattened out to allow them to pass out in a horizontal line only. For game shooting what is needed is a little lever for quickly changing the horizontal to a vertical one. Where the crossing quail or duck would have to run the gauntlet of a shot charge spread out, say, 15ft. from east to west, the walkedup game, rising suddenly, or the soaring duck, would .call for a vertical position of the flattened muzzle.”