[hillbilly]

I had read and re-read accounts on the Internet about Winchester 1300 Home Defenders being able to cycle those Aquila Mini-shells.

Well, this week, I saw it in person.

I stopped by my favorite gun shop....John's Guns in Fort Smith, if anyone is interested.

I found a good-looking, used Winchester Home Defender on the rack. I told John (that's why it's called "John's Guns") what I had read about that shotgun and the minishells, and he asked that I hand him the Defender, and box of those Aquila minishells off the ammo shelf.

He loaded up four shells in the magazine, and then racked the slide as fast as he could.

Four smooth, rapid, flawless chamberings and four smooth, rapid, flawless ejections.

I was convinced.

Using one minishell as a measuring device showed the Winnie could hold at least 11 minishells in the magazine.

The mind boggles.....an 11-shot HD shotgun.

Yee-haw, indeed.

hillbilly

[mattw]

I did some research on the mini-shells a while ago because I was interested in them also. I am not sure I would trust them for HD, sure would be fun for plinking though.. especially the birdshot.

[Dave McCracken]

The buzz is they don't work in some pumps, like 870s, and the patterns are less than good. Denny Hansen of this BB and SWAT MAgazine tried some, out of all his shotguns only one cycled them satisfactorily, IIRC.

You'd be better off is you use standard ammo and learn how to load fast and sure. Corriea here has a technique he uses in 3 gun for loading two at a time. Check the archives.