Whats with 'Choke'

[Metapotent]

Someone explain to me exactly how the choke on a shotgun works. I have 2 shotguns, neither of which have a choke, but I shot my friends shotgun that had an adjustable choke at the tip of the barrel and it had 4 settings. What does 'full' mean? Does it mean that the group should be bigger or smaller?

 

[Chawbaccer]

A choke constricts the muzzle end of the barrel in order to squeeze the shot pattern into a smaller and more dense pattern.
In order of largest to smallest: cylinder, improved cylinder, modified, full.
Even if your gun doesn't have a removable choke, it will most likely have a choke swaged into the barrel. There should be a marking of some sort to indicate what it is.

 

[Dave McCracken]

Thr Search feature is your friend.....

 

[Master Blaster]

here is a link I found that explains chokes really well, and gets into patterning also.

http://www.trulockchokes.com/chokeinfo.asp

 

[oletymer]

I would suspect that both of your shotguns have a fixed choke unless they have are short cylinder bore barrels.

 

[RNB65]

All shotguns have a choke except for fixed choke guns with a cylinder bore.

Here's more info:

http://www.chuckhawks.com/shotgun_chokes.htm