Home Forums Hunting & Shooting AR and Tactical Rifles Tactical shotgun discussion

If one is “stuck” with a cylinder bore shotgun, fear not, Federal 00 with flight control wads was made for cylinder choke. We shot it in a few shotguns and even IC tended to open the patterns up.

Hornady’s version tended to like a little choke on it.

I'll say this in generalistic material. the cheaper The buckshot the more it favored the open cylinder. the more refined it might lean toward modified and some buckshot more specialized such as the Federal full choke was even better.
is what I experienced with my shotgun after installing choke tubes and buying I think it was 13 different chokes. and some of these were specialized"buckshot" choke tubes

I bought a Benelli Nova "Tactical" back in 2008, it has an 18.5-inch barrel with sights, and I have made no other changes. It stays propped up in the corner closet loaded with # 4 buckshot.

No issues with the gun, no muss no fuss; I put a couple of boxes of buckshot through it every year and used it for a class in 2017.

They are still reasonably priced and there is a variety of aftermarket accessories available.

There are lots of choices out there these days.

StarchedCover

I will throw this in just because no one else has mentioned it...MagPul makes a forend {at least for the 870} that accepts their M-LOK light mount. This is a rail that will accept any rail type light. I have a Surefire on mine. It is positioned so that it illuminates the front sight or bead and makes shooting the shotgun a whole lot more effective in low light or nighttime conditions. This is more for self or home defense than it is for just plain old tacti-cool fun shooting, but if you use your shotgun for both, it really is an almost necessity. If it's dark out and you can't see the sight or bead the gun is not worth much.......M

Edit: if you shoot right-handed then you want the mount on the left side of the gun. You will activate the light with your forend hand.

Mine is just a Remington 11-87 youth 20 gauge. Loaded with a stout shell with BB shot in it.

My "defensive" shotgun doubles as my predator and spring snow goose shotgun. It started as a Mossberg 930 "tactical" which meant it had a matte finish, 24" barrel, black synthetic stock with a short rail on the forend, a largish front bead and a simple rear sight bolted onto the vent rib. It wears a Streamlight pistol weapon light with pressure activated switch. I added a 5 round magazine extension bringing capacity to 9+1. I load 6 in the mag for defensive or predator purposes as all that weight can get heavy. It also wears a side saddle she'll holder with 5 Brenneke slugs as well as a butt cuff with 5 00 buckshot.

I bought it used at a price I wouldn't be too disappointed with if the gun was a dog like many that came after the Model 1000. I don't know how many rounds were put through it initially but I'm over 3000 so far. The gun has been utterly reliable through several snow goose hunts in about any weather and ground condition possible; two "tactical" classes with several hundred rounds of buckshot and slugs (both standard and reduced recoil), a year of skeet and sporting clays use to gain familiarity and trust in the gun, and miscellaneous hunting and target shooting. All I've done with the gun has been to replace the recoil spring after I bought it. It looks like I have another couple thousand rounds to go before needing to replace it again.

I've got a Benelli M1S90 that filled that role before I switched to a carbine. I used it in a couple defensive shotgun classes and my 1st couple 3gun matches (not well suited for that):



It stayed in a V-Line long gun vault loaded with #1 Buck and wore an Insight light. It has Grs, which are good for slugs out to 100yds are slow, but I find them slower up close than just a large fiber optic bead. My 3Gun shotgun wears a simple FO front, is fast and I don't (normally) have issue hitting at 50yds with slugs.

I like the pistol grip stock on the M1S90 as it makes it easier to work one-handed, opening doors etc.

I switched to an AR15 when we moved out to the country as I'm way more likely to have to engage a coyote than I am an intruder.