bayonet and light on tactical shotgun

[JShirley]

There are two characteristics to consider, flood and throw. Any light worth mounting will have a reasonably wide beam (flood) while still throwing the beam far enough to be useful.

Keeping the weapon safely and correctly at a low ready, correctly pointed in front of you (hopefully it's already obvious how important getting some decent training is), activating the light will throw a wide enough beam to see if anyone inside a regular household-sized room is a threat- without ever covering them with the muzzle of your weapon. The only time this will not be true, is if the potential threat is so close that your light beam has not had time to expand. If this is the case, you have no clue how to clear a room, because you have moved into a position right next to a blind spot, close enough to have your weapon grabbed and deny you the main advantage of a firearm (distance).

Training and experience- get 'em.

John

 

[Pete D.]

Quote:
man I had never thought about the weight...
The same thing is probably said by folks that want the longest magazine extension they can find... Once they have 9 rounds of 00 buck in their gun, then wonder why it's too nose heavy to shoulder.

Buy a simple shotgun.
Shoot thousands of shells.

Practice beats bolt-on crap every time.

Great post.
About answers......if someone asks a yes or no question and you give either one of the two possible answers, you have given a complete answer to the question.
The fact that you or I may have a more complete knowledge of a subject may lead us to add information or to ask for a qualification or a more specific question but if a person asks "can I put a bayonet on a shotgun?" there are only two possible answers. Anything else is the answer to a question that maybe should be asked in addition to the primary.
I sit frequently sit in discussions in which I will ask a yes/no question and then am answered lengthy explanations which I do not need and did not ask for. First, I want yes or no. After that, I may have other questions. ("Is there a downside to this idea? Is this legal for me to do? Is this cost effective?", etc.)
Pete

 

[Sam1911]

("Is there a downside to this idea? Is this legal for me to do? Is this cost effective?", etc.)

Well... one of those three would be utterly absurd -- even unethical -- NOT to answer as an immediate follow-up to your "complete" answer.

"Hey, can I cut down the barrel of my Mossberg to 14"? Answer: Yes!

Now if someone gave that "complete" answer and did not follow it up with the rest of the "fluff" the OP "did not need and did not ask for" (in your words) -- e.g.: doing so without proper paperwork will get you 10 years in jail -- I'd probably issue them an infraction for giving legally misleading advice.

As to the rest of it -- will this modification be cost-effective, or practical -- that is our prerogative, as peers giving freely of their advice and experience, to volunteer.

The cool thing about a forum like this is, as long as you are polite about your responses, you are utterly free to accept, discard, or not even read all that other volunteered information.

 

[JNewell]

Bayonets and shotguns, outside (and maybe even inside) the military supply environment strike me as useless at best. First, you completely change the length (not to mention weight and balance) of the gun, totally negating any benefit from the shorter barrel. Second, if you stick or foul something with the bayonet, there's a good chance you're going to damage the gun. Very few shotguns would make it through a real bayonet exercise without at least a misoriented barrel, maybe worse.

If some young GI manages to bend or break a shotgun, there's a supply chain to put another one in his hands (if his SGT has left either one intact ). That's not necessarily true for the average gunowner.

 

[ArmedLiberal]

There are two characteristics to consider, flood and throw. Any light worth mounting will have a reasonably wide beam (flood) while still throwing the beam far enough to be useful.

Keeping the weapon safely and correctly at a low ready, correctly pointed in front of you (hopefully it's already obvious how important getting some decent training is), activating the light will throw a wide enough beam to see if anyone inside a regular household-sized room is a threat- without ever covering them with the muzzle of your weapon. The only time this will not be true, is if the potential threat is so close that your light beam has not had time to expand. If this is the case, you have no clue how to clear a room, because you have moved into a position right next to a blind spot, close enough to have your weapon grabbed and deny you the main advantage of a firearm (distance).

Training and experience- get 'em.

John

Wouldn't it be simpler to just turn on the living room light?


Also, I'm figuring that that bayonet is going to go a long way towards making up for my tactical ignorance. Unless of course my house is invaded by Ninja's or Chuck Norris, in which case my tactical goose is well and truly cooked even if I did have 18 classes and certificates from Front Sight.


Also, it's a well known statistic that at least 94% of home invaders are not willing to grab a shotgun held by a hostile homeowner under any circumstances.

 

[Sergeant Sabre]

I have issues with mounted flashlights because they require pointing the gun at an unknown target in order to use the light.

Would some friendly stranger enter your home at night? Makes perfect sense to me to cover them with the muzzle while you evaluate their intentions.

Also, just because you have a weapon light, doesn't mean you must use it. You can still use a hand-held light to identify whatever "unknown" targets enter your house at night. The weapon light is just another tool in the bag.

 

[au01st]

Wouldn't it be simpler to just turn on the living room light?


Also, it's a well known statistic that at least 94% of home invaders are not willing to grab a shotgun held by a hostile homeowner under any circumstances.

The light switch for my living room is on the opposite side of the entrance from my bedroom, so that is no good for me.


Where did that 94% stat come from? Not arguing, just curious.

 

[ArmedLiberal]

Would some friendly stranger enter your home at night? Makes perfect sense to me to cover them with the muzzle while you evaluate their intentions.

Also, just because you have a weapon light, doesn't mean you must use it. You can still use a hand-held light to identify whatever "unknown" targets enter your house at night. The weapon light is just another tool in the bag.

Are you saying you cannot imagine any way that someone you would not want to shoot might come to be in your living room.

OK, how's this? My son has a terrible fight with his girlfriend of 8 years, goes to a bar and gets stupid drunk. (He has very little experience drinking). At three in the morning he drives to my house thinking that he can break in and sleep on my couch cause he doesn't want to wake me. (Remember I said Stupid drunk) I wake up to a lamp breaking in the living room and grab my shotgun.

Do I turn on the living room light? Do I call out "Who's there?" Do I fire up my tactical flashlight and point it and my shotgun muzzle at the unknown shadow in my living room?


This is a wonderful argument, we could go on for days and I can see some of the advantages of the tactical shotgun flashlight. I choose not to have one.

 

[ArmedLiberal]

The light switch for my living room is on the opposite side of the entrance from my bedroom, so that is no good for me.


Where did that 94% stat come from? Not arguing, just curious.

Haven't you heard that 68% of all statistics quoted in internet arguments are made up on the spot?

 

[2WheelsGood]

Do I fire up my tactical flashlight and point it and my shotgun muzzle at the unknown shadow in my living room?

Couldn't you have one mounted to the gun AND one in your hand? When you realize it's not your drunk son, what do you do? Hold the light with one hand and the shotgun with the other? It would make more sense to drop the light so you could still use two hands on the shotgun at which point having one on the gun could be a lifesaver.

If you can't tell, I'm always looking for reasons to buy new flashlights.

 

[ArmedLiberal]

I had an idea the last time this sort of thread popped up.

Imagine a flashlight ball, you could roll it down the hall or across a room and it would illuminate in all directions. A twenty sided solid, like a D20 dice, an Icosahedron with a flashlight in each face. Make it about 3" diameter, include a position sensor inside with a bit of microchip to turn it on when it stops rolling, toss about four of them into your living room and bingo! Your bad guy is illuminated.

 

[JShirley]

The US Army recently has only used bayonet training for aggression training. Which is why every attack was coupled with KILL!.

It makes sense to always ID potential threats. Which is why mounted lights are a good idea on HD firearms.

 

[Sergeant Sabre]

Do I fire up my tactical flashlight and point it and my shotgun muzzle at the unknown shadow in my living room?

I would. Then I would see it was my son and put it down.

Then I would wonder why my three year-old son was drinking and how he got ahold of the car. How did he even reach the pedals? And who in the world is this girlfriend he had an argument with? He's only three, for goodness sake, he shouldn't even like girls yet...

 

[Girodin]

This is a wonderful argument, we could go on for days and I can see some of the advantages of the tactical shotgun flashlight. I choose not to have one.

You have opined at length. What training do you have in the defensive use of shotguns (or firearms generally), lights, room clearing, etc? Thanks.

 

[JNewell]

Also, I'm figuring that that bayonet is going to go a long way towards making up for my tactical ignorance.

Can you explain that? I have always been taught that good training can make up for bad equipment, but that no amount of the best equipment makes up for inadequate training. My trainers may have been wrong but they all thought and taught the same basic principles, of which this was at or near the top.

 

[BullfrogKen]

^^^

Agreed.

 

[zhyla]

I had an idea the last time this sort of thread popped up.

Imagine a flashlight ball, you could roll it down the hall or across a room and it would illuminate in all directions. A twenty sided solid, like a D20 dice, an Icosahedron with a flashlight in each face. Make it about 3" diameter, include a position sensor inside with a bit of microchip to turn it on when it stops rolling, toss about four of them into your living room and bingo! Your bad guy is illuminated.

I had the same idea not long ago. I called it a light grenade. Might be worth trying out. The less-ninja of us can just flip on a light.

 

[au01st]

en't you heard that 68% of all statistics quoted in internet arguments are made up on the spot?

Quite aware, but I'm still new around here and still not sure who the witty folks are, yet.

 

[JShirley]

This has probably already been pointed out, but a bayonet will add length. Greater OAL when manuevering through a house is a disadvantage.

Pros for adding a bayonet for HD: looks cool (to some).

Cons: adds weight and length, dubious legality.

Lights are a more involved question. Yes, it's better to have lights in the area than use a weapon light for illumination, but there can be power outages/attacks and sundry other issues. Since I've actually taken the time to practice a little instead of just arguing about it online, I know I can use a weapon light to see if someone across a medium or larger room is holding a weapon without ever covering them with the muzzle.

 

[evan price]

The precursers to the combat shotguns were the blunderbus, and a number of these came with spring-loaded bayonets. I doubt anyone ever actually used the things, but they would have added a certain emphasis to the already enormous bore facing you.

The blunderbus was typically a single shot, black powder, muzzle loading firearm. You only got one shot. What you would do is blast whomever was first in line and then go hands-on for the next one. That's what the spring-loaded bayo was for on that gun.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evr_tP9cJWY

 

[ArmedLiberal]

Yes Girodin, it's true I have opined. Here in this thread and many other places too. Opining is one of my favorite things actually.

My shotgun training consists primarily of shooting Diet Pepsi cans flying through the air in the Nevada desert with my trusty Mossberg and cheap bird shot. Sometimes I shoot them on the ground after I've missed. A couple of times I've shot large pieces of paper at an indoor range to see how much buckshot spreads.

I have had no personal instruction in room clearing, etc., but I am highly proficient at turning on flashlights and using them to light up things in the dark. My initial flashlight training was while camping with the Boy Scouts almost forty years ago. We called it "flashlight tag."

No one has ever shot at me, and I've never contemplated shooting someone. Once around the age of twenty or so I had two cops point shotguns at me from about ten feet away while shouting, "Don't move!!" I didn't move and they arrested me for riding a freight train without paying the railroad for the fare. I thought they were pretty reasonable and professional about it, they were searching for a couple of cop shooters. I have felt in more danger being swept at the firing range than from those two cops with their shotguns locked on my head.

I had the rules of firearm safety explained to me by my father at about the age of 8. I believed him. I choose not to point my firearm at an unknown man shaped target in order to illuminate him with my tactically mounted flashlight. If I am investigating suspicious sounds in my house in the night my first tactic of choice will be to turn on the room lights. If someone is clearly not trying to kill me I'm probably not going to try and kill them. It is my sincere prayer never to be involved in combat with firearms or weapons of any sort in all my life. I suspect that killing a man might be emotionally traumatic.

I like guns. I like learning about them and their history and how they work. I love to tear them down to the last screw, clean and oil real good and put them back together.

I proclaim my Constitutional right to arm myself and for all law abiding people to arm themselves. I advocate teaching gun safety and marksmanship in public schools. When we are done slaying all the gun control dragons I expect that all of the arms borne by the modern soldier in combat will be available to all law abiding citizens.

I advocate the use of firearms for self defense and the protection of innocent life.

How about you Girodin? Do you have opinions about the correct tactical use of shotguns with flashlights attached? Do you too have a bayonet on your shotgun? What training do you have in the defensive use of shotguns (or firearms generally), lights, room clearing, etc?

I would be genuinely interested to hear.

 

[ArmedLiberal]

Quite aware, but I'm still new around here and still not sure who the witty folks are, yet.

Me, I'm witty, I'm witty as hell.

 

[ArmedLiberal]

Quote:
Also, I'm figuring that that bayonet is going to go a long way towards making up for my tactical ignorance.​

Can you explain that? I have always been taught that good training can make up for bad equipment, but that no amount of the best equipment makes up for inadequate training. My trainers may have been wrong but they all thought and taught the same basic principles, of which this was at or near the top.​

I've had no training, if I did it would probably be worse than your training anyway. I use a bayonet on my shotgun cause I really like it. It pleases me like a new BB gun on Christmas morning. It's a good bayonet but I'm not sure if you would consider it "the best equipment."

I just visualized me sneaking up to a corner in the hallway and having the bad guy try and grab my tactically poorly positioned shotgun and grabbing the bayonet instead. Probably not the best plan in the real world, but it seemed witty when I wrote it.

I guess it wasn't really that witty.

 

[BullfrogKen]

I've had considerable training across a broad spectrum, including the pugil sticks training from the Marines.


Given a choice between a light and a bayonet, I'd chose the light every time. I have a 590, and a bayonet that'll fit it somewhere around here in a box. Even with that training, my plan doesn't include a bayonet. At all.


In fact, my personal plan doesn't even include my 590. I have a double barrel I like much, much better for inside the house.

 

[stanger04]

I'm gonna spitball here but hey if the guy wants a knife on his gun, let him go for it, like everything else there are gains and losses.

If weight is an issue what about one of those little pistol knives? Seriously, you have the knife, not much weight, and since the blade is so tiny court might not be an issue.

Time you buy a rail kit and the knife it's still less than a bayonet. I don't know I'm trying to think out side the box, I might need to be put back in though.

I'm not familiar with which way the blade faces on the shotgun mounts but if I used one I'd want the blade up. No training needed in home jab and continue a forward motion while pulling up.