Found an original Browning Auto-5 Manual...

[Rook]

Found an original Browning Auto-5 Manual at an antique store a couple of days ago. Pretty neat. Somebody bought a 16 ga. back on September 15th, 1967 for $199.95 from Rich's. I guess that was Rich's department store. They were around from 1867 until 2005 when they changed the name to Macy's.

It has the box checked for LTWT. I guess the light weight was the Sweet 16 and not the standard.

There are instructions in it that I didn't know about that I can use for my two Browning's. I have a Sweet 16 made in 1954 and the other one is an Auto-5 20 ga. 3" Mag. made in 1972.

I didn't know you could adjust the recoil on the guns for Heavy and light loads by adjusting the position of the friction ring. I inherited the guns 20 years ago and have never really messed with them.

 

[Rick Courtright]

I didn't know you could adjust the recoil on the guns for Heavy and light loads by adjusting the position of the friction ring. I inherited the guns 20 years ago and have never really messed with them.

Hi,

Don't feel alone there, Rook! I have no idea how many people brought old A-5s to our range for a round of trap or skeet before bird seasons opened up, only to find they didn't work with light target loads. "But it worked last year for ducks!" was a common comment.

We'd send 'em across the parking lot to the shop where my boss would give the gun a quick look-see, probably wipe some crud off the mag tube, show 'em how to flip the rings between light and heavy loads (once in a while he'd have to replace a missing ring), and send 'em back to our side, where life was good again!

Rick C

 

[WAYNO]

That is a great find.

Now I've got to change this up a little bit, since you specifically said Macy's took over Rich's.

There used to be a world class department store in downtown Portland, Meier and Franks, long before Portland became little Beirut. This store had ten sales floors, including a toy department that would rival Duncan's on Home Alone Part II. It also had a world class gun department. If I wanted to buy a British double rifle, and the ammunition to go with it, that's where I would have gone to buy one. And you betcha everything was expensive.

The gun department went away when guns became evil. Eventually Macy's bought this store, reduced the sales floors to only three, and recently they announced the store was closing altogether.

Macy's and other high end stores should stop and think. I would never step foot in such a store when it caters only to the clothing needs of women and metro-males, where in the old days, with decent mens toy departments, I enjoyed going to such places. And maybe while I was there I'd buy a pair of jeans or a hunting coat.

These places are sinking themselves.

WAYNO.

 

[golferboy426]

Great find!! I also have a 1954 ( year of my birth) Sweet 16. It came with a vent rib barrel and a modified choke which was far too tight for my hunting over my pointing Brittany. I bought a barrel with a deluxe poly choke and used it for the last 2 seasons .

 

[redhawker]

Used to have a 12 ga. 3 inch A-5 I used for goose hunting back in the days before steel shot. It was a beautiful gun but it never did function right. And yes, I knew about the rings. I messed with them over and over trying to get it to work right and even had gunsmiths check it and they couldn't figure it out. It was essentially a single shot gun or, if I was quick enough to pull the Operating Handle and cycle a new shell in, I could get a second shot out of it.

 

[mhblaw]

I still have a 12 ga. A-5 Magnum purchased new in 1961. Only times it wouldn't work was when it got real cold. As redhawker did, I retired it for an 870 when steel shot became required for waterfowl.

 

[GD1656]

Only gun i ever put on layaway --a magnum 12 A-5--i worked a side job to pay it off .Shot deer and ducks with it off an airboat .The old timers all had them,said it "kills on one end and wounds on the other" Nothing is built like an A5 .

 

[fiasconva]

Thanks for the illustrations. Shotgun World has the info but the illustrations are so bad you can't see them. Now I know how to check my old A5. You dun gud!

 

[ElToro]

Nice. I have the manual for mine that my grandpa bought new back in about 1971. Took into on one hunt and then put it away. I was the next to inherit it. Have several other A5. They can be found cheap usually and run forever.

For reference the "light" version was becuse if had 2 big hole drilled in the solid wood stock. Save a few ounces. The receivers are all the same ( except for guage or magnum of. Course) Don't shoot steel in your Belgian barrel. Got a later Japanese barrel if you want to shoot steel. Nice sweet 16.

 

[golferboy426]

The receivers are all the same ( except for guage or magnum of. Course) Don't shoot steel in your Belgian barrel. Got a later Japanese barrel if you want to shoot steel. Nice sweet 16.

The receivers are different. The sweet 16 for sure and the light 12 IIRC each have cutouts on the bottom on each side where the shells are loaded into the magazine The barrels also have extra holes in the barrel ring

 

[Colonialgirl]

There used to be a world class department store in downtown Portland, Meier and Franks,

Yeah, My Mom worked there for a while in 1957-58 as a sales person.

 

[SAJohn]

Here is my 12 ga. Belgium A-5 with a shortened barrel and rib with the rings set for buck shot. It will definitely destroy anything in front of it. As mentioned above, it does not do a lot of good to the person behind it even with the added recoil pad..



This is my first line of home defense. It sits, fully charged, next to my bed.

Just in case not all of you know why John Browning designed this first successful semi-auto shotgun with the moving barrel, barrel springs, and adjustable spring tension rings it was because the shotgun shells of that time were so weak that the brass heads would often break off of the shells without the support of the recoiling barrel.

Here is a link to Stevespages for the Auto-5 complete manual:
http://stevespages.com/pdf/browning_auto5.pdf