Can you choke it?

[Sharps-Nut]

    I have an old shotgun that has been cut down to 24" and the pattern is terrible, like cylinder bore.  The gun is not worth the money of paying to have choke tubes installed, so this there any other cheaper or do it yourself method of adding some choke to the barrel.  Not a lot maybe between improve and mod, or just mod would be great.  This is just a barn dwelling rat killer but a little choke would help would improve my range.  Thanks for any help.  SN

[SHOOTALL]

try different ammo .
what type gun ?

[dukkillr]

Changing ammo won't help.  A cylinder bore is going to throw a bad pattern (or rather very wide) because it's a cylinder bore. 

It used to be popular to install these god-awful, ridiculous, stupid, cumbersome, polychokes onto cut barrels.  They were to be the death of many good guns because well meaning but ignorant owners thought they could increase the versatility of their gun.  In a situation like yours where you don't care about looks, balance, or sight line, that might be the answer, but I don't know if anyone still makes them.

[SHOOTALL]

i disagree you can improve or make worst your pattern by changing shells reguardless of choke or lack there of, besides you would have to check the bbl to know if any choke was involved as bbls change  often from forcing cone to muzzle . some are of better ( harder) shot which seems to pattern tighter also you can go to the non toxic shot to gain a tighter choke . get a true full choke most likely not but improve over what you have very possible.
He did not wish to have a choke installed as the cost was more than what the gun was worth .

[dukkillr]

Changing shells will make, at best, a minimal difference. 

What kind of gun is it?  Perhaps the cheapest alternative is a new barrel?  I suggested a poly-choke because they might be had substantially cheaper than threading a barrel for choke tubes.

Ultimately you can't get choke performance from a gun with no choke.

[Sharps-Nut]

  Thanks for the replies.  I talked to a tinkering friend last night and he has a friend that has the reamers to do jug choking.  Their combined brain power says it can be brought back to mod via this method.  I have not pinned him down on price but often we trade favors on services so it will likely be cheap or pro bono.  The gun is a jc higgins pump 12 ga as I left that out on the original post, beat up and rusty to boot.   I will post a follow up if anyone is interested in the results of jugggin it. Thanks for the replies and any other thoughts on the topic as it will be a few weeks before the tools get dropped off for the job.   The pipe cutter kills me dad did it to a 410 when I was kid, worked fairly well, but I wrote it off as I only have a small cutter.  Funny how many time people have tried the same things, great minds think alike?  Jug first, piper cutter second.     SN

[SHOOTALL]

you would still have to thread the bbl for a poly choke . And i don't expect you could get one for less than a screw in tube . And i agree the improvement would be slight unless you were lucky but given his limitations what else could he do ?
If he had a way to swedge the end of the bbl like Winchester did to choke the mod 37 A ( the cheap copy from Canada ) he could do that . I also ask what type gun , i would assume a single bbl as most any pump or auto would be worth a screw in choke . he also said pattern not patterns so again i assume a double is not in question .
one other option would be to create a jug choke in the bbl with a honeing tool or emery cloth on a dowel , this is often done to turkey shoot guns .
Dukkiler , if we keep it up we will have it worked out for him .

[SHOOTALL]

should have read befor re posting , good luck !

[squirrellluck]

Asked an old gunsmith about something similar once. He said years ago some folks would use a large pipe cutter. Remove the cutter add a wheel instead and run it around the barrel tightening slightly every few turns. Never seen it done but if it were possible I believe he could do it.

[SHOOTALL]

a ridgid #1-A  , cat # 32810
add an extra roller . alot of rental places will rent one to you .

[coyotejoe]

I do a little business of jug choking muzzleloaders. It is no problem with simple hand tools to get any degree of choke you may wish, from skeet to extra full by jug choking.. 
Swaged chokes also work just fine but the pipe cutter method is pretty crude. A great many shotguns have swaged chokes even though they don't look it. The barrels are bored cylinder and the outside is turned to leave a slight flair at the muzzle which is then swaged down parallel on the outside, leaving a tapered choke in the bore.
  But it must be one heck of a big barn if you need more than a cylinder bore to kill rats. I should think a trap load of #7 1/2 or #8 shot would be deadly to at least 25 yards from a cylinder bore.
  As to changing loads, that may indeed be all that is needed. If one is shooting #6 shot a change to #7 1/2 shot will put 56% more pellets in the load and thus 56% more pellets on target.  A cylinder bore with 7 1/2's will put more pellets on target than a full choke with 6's and give more margin for aiming error to boot.