Tried out my Remington 11-87

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wbwanzer

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Last week I got to try out my 'new to me' 11-87 in 20ga. (Have to mention up front that I'm new to the shotgun world.) I was not hunting or shooting orange flying objects. I bought the gun for home defense so I was just shooting at a target at roughly 20 feet. I loaded three shells of Remington 2 and 3/4, 7/8 oz. shot, 9 shot. They were called RXP Skeet loads. Those three fired as expected. I then loaded five more of the same shells. The first fired and then the bolt stayed open like it was out of ammo. The fired case extracked but a new one did not load. I pushed the carrier release to close the bolt but that did not load a shell. So I pulled the handle back and then pushed the carrier release again and then I was able to fire the remaining four shells.

I then loaded five Remington 2 and 3/4 Buckshot, 3 BK, 20 pellet shells that I assume would be good for home defense. They all fired as expected. By this time I was running out of time and had already blown some pretty good sized holes in the cardboard backstop. So I fired 13 shells total and had one failure to load.

I cleaned the gun prior to use being careful not to oil anything as the owners manual is specific about not over lubing. Just wiped down with a WD40 like lube to prevent rust.

So I like the shotgun, but am concerned about it's performance thus far since the intention was for home security. I'll shoot it some more the next time out to the range.

Any thoughts about the failure? Thanks.
 
My 1187 isn't big on light loads. Whenever I do sporting clays, I use 1 1/8 oz loads and don't have any issues (Less than 1 FTF/FTE/100 shells easily). 1 oz and lower will much more frequently hiccup as you described. Try a heavier skeet load and see if the issue persists

Edit: I should add - I've read some about 1187's loosening their tolerances up some after some breaking in, but I haven't yet tried stepping back down to <1 1/8 oz loads to see if reliability has improved with use. Also, this is in reference to 12 gauge
 
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11-87s are designed for 1-1/8 ounce and heavier loads. Says that in the literature and in the owner's manual. Some will run with lower, but don't bet heavily on that. Slugs or buck shouldn't be a problem.
 
buy a 100 round pack at wallyworld of 20ga target loads and run then thru it, even if you have to hand work the action. that should help get it running. i did that with two 12ga 11-87,s and they now work like a charm with any load from 2-3/4 low brass target to 3 inch mags. i do put a little frog lube on the magizine tube, it makes cleaning the fouling off the tube easier and lubes the tube. eastbank.
 
Heavier loads may help. MORE loads will definitely help. Run a case or two through it, betcha the problem goes away....
 
Heavier loads may help. MORE loads will definitely help. Run a case or two through it, betcha the problem goes away....

I will, but keep in mind this is not a new gun. I don't know how much it was used before I bought it, but it is used.
 
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