I have an older Beretta over/under with some significant pitting in the beginning third of the inside of the top barrel. Will this have a significant effect on my patterns with 7.5 and 8 shot bird loads? Over the last few years I have missed a lot of shots that I would normally make. Thanks.

I too would like to blame my misses on my shotgun.....but that would be very unrealistic.....I miss because I don't point the gun in the right place when I pull the trigger.....

Take your gun to a range and pattern the barrels to prove to yourself that the culprit is not the gun.....or that it is if that's the case.......but you won't shoot better if you don't work on the real problem.......It's likely the person holding the gun.

I agree with Vapor, and now that you've lost confidence in your shot gun, you FORSURE need to spend some time pattering it!! Once you see, to "your" satisfaction that the shotgun is performing well, i think you'll start hitting with it again.

Drilling Man

It shouldn't hurt much.

However, are you sure its pitting and not leading? I've seen shotgun bores that looked really bad but after some scrubbing with bronze brushes or copper wool, looked new again.

I'm sure it's pitting. You can actually see the cavities. It's was stored for a year or so without cleaning. It's very likely that it's me. I haven't shot any skeet in a couple of years and I have only been getting out 1-3 days a year to do any bird hunting. Maybe one or two evenings after work I'll go dove hunting and I might hunt pheasants once a year. Shooting a big pheasant after a flush is not very good practice for hitting a little dove cruising by at 40mph. Oh well - there's nothing wrong with a clean miss. I don't have any birds to clean and I don't have to worry about a cripple.