The Mossberg® 590® ShockwaveTM is one of the hottest new firearms to hit the market in 2017. That’s not at all surprising, since the Shockwave offers shooters a compact, 14-inch-barreled 12-gauge reminiscent of the legendary Witness Protection Shotgun of the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS) but with no NFA (National Firearms Act) restrictions, as confirmed in… Read more »
Firearms myths abound: a hit by a .45 will tear off an arm, J-Frame revolvers are the perfect guns for women (despite the fact that it’s one of the hardest platforms to become proficient with), polymer frame guns are always more reliable and the list goes on. More myths probably surround the shotgun than any… Read more »
What if you could have a shotgun built from the ground up as a fighting shotgun, shorter than most while weighing within a few ounces, and with a total capacity of 17 shells? The SRM Arms 1216 makes this a reality.
I’ve had the good fortune to train with some of the great instructors, most of whom come from Gunsite lineage—Chuck Taylor, Clint Smith, Bill Jeans, Pat Rogers, Bill Murphy, and Louis Awerbuck. Bill Murphy ran the 260 Shotgun class at Gunsite, and Louis taught “the gauge” through his company, Yavapai Firearms Academy.
The Winchester Model 1897 was designed by John Moses Browning. Though all Browning designs were not successful, the majority were, and the 97 is no exception. This shotgun has all the earmarks of a classic firearm and is not only a war dog, but a long-serving law dog as well.
There you are, out washing the car on a beautiful sunny afternoon. Above the noise of the kids playing and the wife humming to herself as she prunes her roses, you detect an unnatural, unfamiliar and eerie sound. Looking up from your Turtle Wax, you peer over the hood of the car and spot a veritable army of the undead staggering up your driveway.
Remington 870s tend to catch my eye. A couple of weeks ago I was in the Class III/LE Dealer’s shop that caters heavily to law enforcement here in St. Louis. I noticed that he had taken a group of Remington 870 Police Magnum shotguns in trade. I’m always interested in 870 tactical models, so I had a look at them and found they displayed some interesting features.
Shotguns have been used as combat weapons since the matchlock. The fighting shotgun reached a pinnacle in the “trench gun” of the early 20th century—an 18-inch barreled Model ’97 or Model 12 with a bayonet, spraying buckshot into groups of enemy soldiers at close range. United States soldiers used shotguns in World War II, Korea, Vietnam and they are still being used in the Middle East today.
The Russian Saiga shotgun has taken the U.S market by storm as of late, due to its magazine-fed capability, AK-47 conversion looks, and reliability. After-market conversion parts abound and blanket the Internet. Clyde Woods, Sales and Marketing Director for importer Russian American Armory Company, stated sales are at an all-time high: “The 12-gauge Saiga is so popular we just cannot get enough of them into the country.”
Without question, the Remington 870 shotgun has ridden in more police cruisers than any other scattergun in history. Its rugged design and legendary reliability make it a popular choice for departments and agencies. But even a good thing can be improved upon.
