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A combination gun is a shoulder held firearm that contains two barrels, a rifle barrel and a shotgun barrel, usually in an over and under configuration. A drilling (from the German drei for three) is a shoulder held firearm that contains three barrels, which may be a mixture of rifle and shotgun barrels. The following are typical drilling combinations:

• Two matching shotgun barrels and a rifle barrel
• Two matching rifle barrels and one shotgun barrel
• Two rifle barrels of different calibers (typically one rimfire and one centerfire) and one shotgun barrel
• Three matching shotgun barrels--this is the rarest combination, because it does not provide the utility of the rifle/shotgun drilling or combination gun

There are also some vierlings, from the German vier for four, that have 4 barrels, generally two shotgun and two rifle barrels.

Use

Drillings and combination guns have a long history in Europe, dating back to the early days of cartridge firearms, and they are most popular in Germany and Austria. These guns are almost exclusively hunting arms. The advantage of having a single firearm that can fire both rifle and shotgun cartridges is that a single gun can be used to hunt a very wide variety of game, from deer to game birds, and choose between the barrels in seconds.

Firing mechanisms

Like double barrelled shotguns and double rifles, combination guns and drillings are almost universally break open designs. Unlike double barrelled shotguns and double rifles, where single selective or double triggers are used to allow rapid firing of both barrels, combination guns and drillings generally have a selector that allows the user to choose which barrel will fire. Drillings with two shotgun barrels and one rifle barrel may have two triggers, one for each shotgun barrel, and a selector that will allow one trigger to fire the rifle barrel. Vierlings have two triggers, and selectors to switch each between shotgun and rifle.

Layouts

Combination guns are almost entirely over/under designs, usually with a rifle barrel over a shotgun barrel. This arrangement allows a wider field of view than a side-by-side or shotgun on top arrangement, since the thinner rifle barrel blocks less of the shooter's vision. Iron sights are used for aiming the rifle, the front sight is sufficient to point the shotgun. One of the more famous combination guns is the Springfield Armory M4 and M6 survival guns, an all metal folding combination gun in .22 Hornet over .410 bore.

Drillings cover a much broader range of shapes. Since drillings were generally made by small manufacturers, each maker would pick whichever layout they preferred. The most common layout was a side-by-side shotgun with a centerfire rifle barrel centered on the bottom. A similar arrangement of a side-by-side shotgun with a rifle barrel centered on top, generally a .22 caliber rimfire or .22 Hornet, was also fairly common.

Rarer were the drillings that used two rifle barrels and a single shotgun barrel. These were harder to make, since, like a double rifle, the rifle barrels must be very carefully regulated, that is, aligned during manufacture to shoot to the same point of aim at a given distance. This requires more precision than regulation of double barrelled shotgun barrels, which are used at shorter ranges with wide patterns of shot where a small misalignment won't be significant. If the rifle barrels were the same caliber, then the three barrels were generally arranged in a triangle, both rifle barrels on top, or one rifle and the shotgun barrel on top (this being known as a cross-eyed drilling). If the rifle barrels differed in caliber, generally the layout would be an over/under using the shotgun and a centerfire rifle barrel, with a rimfire rifle barrel mounted between and to one side. These configuration, with shotgun/centerfire/rimfire barrels, are the most desirable configuration for modern collectors.

The triple barrelled shotgun is the rarest configuration, and arguably is an odd variant of a double barrelled shotgun rather than a drilling, since it lacks the rifle/shotgun combination that all the other drillings have. The triple barreled shotgun is generally laid out like a side-by-side shotgun, with the third barrel centered and below the other two. They barrels are all the same gauge.

The vierling is almost always in the form of a side by side shotgun, with different caliber rifle barrels stacked vertically, ether both below the shotgun barrels, or one above and one below. Generally the vierling uses one large bore rifle cartridge and one smallbore.

References

• Blue Book of Gun Values, 13th Edition, S. P, Fjestad
• HEYM, modern maker of combination guns, drillings, and vierlings