Home Forums Birds & Dogs Shotguns lubing an 870 shotgun

I bought a new Remington 870 and without cleaning or oiling, shot 50+ rounds through it.

After about 40 rounds the action started sticking closed on a fired shell.

With a hard tug, and a lot of wiggling of the fore end, it would eject the empty.

Cleaned the chamber and barrel, and oiled the slide bars.

Haven't test fired it yet.

Are there any other parts that need oiled?

Do I need to pull the barrel to get at the action for lubing?

As you can tell..I don't know much about shotguns!


Thanks! Virgil B.

No but it makes it easier to clean the bore and chamber. Make sure you got any residual preservative or packing grease and oil out. You could also have a build up of plastic from the shot shells in the chamber. Solvent on a tornado brush or bore brush wrapped with 0000 steel wool should take care of that.

Your owners manual should have most of the maintenance info you need. If you don't have one Remington will send you one free or you can print it off their web site.

many people solve this problem by polishing the chamber. check out youtube for how to

Overkill, 43Shooter pretty much nailed it. The residue from the shells I think is a lube they use in manufacturing so shells go easily through the machinery. I've only seen it in trapshooting situations, hot barrel and lots of rounds. More likely the factory preservative in the chamber turned gummy.

I've seen shotguns stuck so hard a strong man couldn't open the action. The trick is to run a range rod down the barrel and pop the shell while trying to open the action. Opens like magic. See, the extractor is forcing the hull against the side of the chamber for more friction. A pop on the base of the shell straightens it out.

Now polishing may be the thing where the chamber has a little rust. Usually 000 steel wool is enough.

Modern shotguns like the 870 do best with a minimum of lubrication. Modern steel requires almost none, the excess just picks up carbon and dirt. Makes a nice sludge which will bugger things up. Keep it clean and get thyself a chamber brush.

This is both sad and humorous that Remington can no longer make an 870 that works and keeps doing so with little more than a wipe down. They used to and they are out there to be easily found.

50 rounds and it is sticking and it isn't because of lubricant on the shell. Nor the barrel getting hot from 50 rounds.

Have an old Wingmaster that I can't wouldn't know how many rounds have gone down the barrel. Beat up trap gun when I bought it, used it myself for trap for a few years and also used it in the field and for sporting clays. I've got at least 10,000 rounds out of it and who knows how many from the previous owners.


The barrel hasn't had an inside wipe in years. Feed it and it works.

The only thing it doesn't like all that well is some of the new Spanish shell offerings. Especially those made with steel instead of brass in that the steel doesn't spring back enough in the chamber to allow easy ejection. Feed it Remington, Winchester or Federal cases and it just keep running smooth.

Best suggestion, trade it in on and old 870 and enjoy trouble free shooting with minimal maintenance.

battue has this right... I have a bunch of older 870's, they function fine.. Bought a new trap gun about 94.. It has only gotten smoother with use..

This Dec. we spent some time in AZ.. Shot trap a couple days.. There were a couple young guys there with an 870 express.. A new one.. They were having the same trouble you describe.. I couldn't believe it, but it was true..
Sad..

Hazen,

Damn few shotguns will take a licking and keep on giving like the older 870s. And as you know, they will do it and ask for little attention.

One of the world's finest workhorse pump shotguns turned into something that needs to be scrubbed and dotted over after a easy days use to make it work is more than humorous.

Good idea to lube your action bars yet you should check each bar for friction wear they are wearing evenly. I had to straighten more than one bar on a Rem 870 to assure the bar was straight and not binding on the back stroke. Also lube the around the barrel extension that fits into the barrel. This area is a friction point, the the top of the Rem 870 receiver is thin so lubing this area eliminates unnecessary wear.

Doc

And another:

Hey battue,

So your best advice is tough sh*t? No wonder there's not much activity in this section.

Now I haven't been fond of what Remington has put out for some years but the same basic design is there. Let's get the guy's shotgun working.

It is not tough sh*t, the point is Remington has slipped in quality... A new gun should not have difficult extracting factory ammo.. The guys I saw were shooting Wal Mart specials as was I..
The had to jerk the slide to extract the shell, every so often, they had a rod to knock the stuck shell out.. You should not have to do this with a new gun.. I have had dozens of new and used shotguns.. Nothing like this happened with any of them.. I think his only chance is to get Remington to do something..

Ok, let's get it working. Well I can tell you it isn't because of the shells being over lubricated or it getting too hot after 50 rounds. The truth is you used to be able to slap an 870 together, oil it up a little and then go shoot it. Oil it up a little every so often and do the same for years of heavy use.

When there are what???? Millions???? Examples out there that were made right, and one doesn't have to tinker with them to get or keep them running, I did the OP a favor in sending him in that direction.

The shotgun is new and doesn't work like it should. Take it back to the dealer and let them screw with something that doesn't and get yourself one that will. And the sure bet is an older used 870 that was made better from the start.

If you equate the truth to tough sh*t and the reason there is little activity here then I can't help the OP or the forum. But if it makes you feel good to diddle around and think you are helping either, have at it.

First, I didn't say it was the lube on the shell thing. Don't believe it is though I've seen something like that instructing 4-H trap with heavily used club guns.

I have seen various model pumps including 870's exhibit the symptoms the OP describes, gradually increasing difficulty opening the action after firing until the kid couldn't do it anymore and the coach had difficulty. If you consider the surface area of the hull being held in contact with a sticky chamber it doesn't take much. In all instances a THOROUGH cleaning of the chamber up to the spinning steel wool trick fixed it. Occasionally it was surface rust and a true polish fixed it. It's a place to start, quick and easy.

IMHO all new firearms should be field stripped and cleaned before use as a matter of course. You don't know what the manufacturer used as a preservative. It may not lubricate well, it may thicken in the cold, it may have oxidized sticky sitting on the dealer's shelf a long time. You just don't know.

(Yes, I'm having a particularly crabby day.)

From what I've seen:

If I was buying a new Rem870 it would be a Wingmaster. From what I've seen they are still held to a high standard. However, I wouldn't be buying new, in that I would find a nice older one for less money along with them being the best of the example. Win-win.

I don't think they sell all that many new Wingmasters.

I wouldn't touch a Rem 870 express. Quality isn't there and they have a reputation of rusting if they are in the closet two rooms apart from the bathroom shower.

Agreed. Had the rust problem with a club 1100 from handling I supposed. Best I could do was steel wool and go over it with Oxpho Blue to kill whatever bits of rust remained in that blasted finish. But eventually it would come back. Oddly the identical 1100 next to it in the safe had no problem. Not the same production run but close. Never did figure that one out, best guess was slightly different specs for that batch of steel.

As stated, I cleaned the barrel/action.

I used a 12 ga. "mop", solvent and lots of elbow grease.

The chamber looks mirror clean, and feels smooth.

Haven't had a chance to test fire it yet, but am thinking getting the factory "junk" out of the chamber should help.

Thanks for the pointers!

Virgil B.

Back in the mid 1970's, during a dove hunt, I had the ejector break on a 16 gauge Remington 58, semi automatic. The gunsmith that replaced it said it was a common problem and was caused by the plastic buildup from the barrel getting hot. Advised me to get a brush that would fit the chamber and take the barrel off and brush it out every once in a while. I did that and never had another problem, and I shot that gun a lot at dove and quail. Have 2 barrels for it, a full choke and an improved for the quail. miles

Well, I've shot and more than once between 300-500 in a day, and within a couple hours on a couple Beretta's autos and never had a problem.

Have shot a little over thousand in a day and worked at it, also with no problems. Have run the Beratta autos over 5000 with nothing more than a oil spray into the action and sometimes an oil rag wipe down on the tube.

Same thing with O/U's and the ejectors kept kicking them out with no problem. Heated the metal fore end release on a Krieghoff and Perazzi hot enough you wanted to set it down and hot enough to turn the inside edge of the forend dark.

Same with an old 870 Wingmaster, but never in that quantity. But the chamber on that shotgun hasn't been brushed or scrubbed in years other than a finger oil wipe on occasion.

Ammo a mixture of Winchester's, Remington's, Federal's, Rio's, Cleavers and a bunch of others.

Certain gunsmiths have also mentioned things I don't necessarily buy but will admit a clean chamber certainly wont hurt anything.

Could have just been the shells that I had. I know that I had a batch of Super X one time that would pull the brass but leave the plastic, in the barrel. Different gun and it only happened on the one batch, 3 or 4 boxes that I bought, and not every shell, but a lot. Of course I shied away from Super X for a while. miles

There are two other possible issues.

One is many of the new shotguns have chrome lined chambers with are much smoother and tend to prevent the issue. But, that doesn't explain that the older 870's don't have the problem. I doubt if the OP's chamber is chromed, nor that it was cut to the same quality of the old ones.

The second is the shell rim. Some of the off brands are made to work primarily in O/U and SxS and the rims are not necessary American standard dimensions. Although I haven't had a problem with Rio, Cleaver, and a few others.

I don't doubt a chamber rub will help the OP and hope it does, but it shouldn't be a 50 rounds problem. Would also be interesting to know if it happens with good Winchester, Remington, Federal shells with rims up to American specs.



Addition: As far as Smiths go, I had a Krieghoff that would get light primer hits with Winchester shells which wouldn't go off. Didn't happen with Remington. Smith was at the shoot and he told me Krieghoffs were made to shoot with Remington shells and that is all I should use. Yea right....

Must have been odd that other K-Gun users were not having problems with Winchester shells.