Pistol grip on a shotgun.

Under situations in which a PGO might be appropriate...

2) Patrol car guns. Some police cruisers can't comfortably accommodate a stocked scattergun.

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Even so, I have never seen a PGO patrol shotgun, despite working, on and off, with circa two-dozen agencies besides my own, each of them storing scatterguns in cramped cruisers.

Not one PGO gun. There's a message, there.

Awww come on the pgo serve's it's use's.it fit's nicely under a duster or long jacket

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It does, but I would consider the real estate market elsewhere before I took to packing a PGO shotgun on a daily basis.

it's deadly at close range you cant miss at close range,

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Of course you can. If you can't, you're not running the course fast enough, or against moving targets.

The problem is that everyone who shoots a PGO gun thinks they shoot it pretty well, and thinks they're pretty fast. Depending on who they are, they darned well may be. However, how fast they are, how accurate they are, with the PGO aren't the only questions. The better question is, are you quicker and more accurate with the PGO, as opposed to a fully-stocked shotgun? And, the answer to that question, assuming similar practice with each, is almost always a resounding "no".

When the bullets start flying, you cannot be quick enough or accurate enough. You want to be as fast and accurate as possible. I cannot do that with a PGO, and I submit to you that neither can the vast, overwhelmingly, mindbogglingly large majority of people. The human body just doesn't work that way.
Mike

An advantage of the full-stock-pistol-grip is the ability to fire the shotgun with one arm, if necessary. That can't be done with a conventional full stock.

Funny.
That PGO-only 870 has rifle sights.

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Yeah, I was not going to say anything, but since you brought it up...

Coronach,

Referring to an earlier time for me...which still applies today...
Full Stocked Shotguns were Dept Issue.

UC LEOs did not use the same make and model of firearms as Dept Issue.
For Instance, UC might use Ruger Series Six as the Dept used Model 10, 19s.
Since most Depts issued 870s, Ithaca 37s were often used by UC LEO.
PGO is what a few of my closest LEOs used, but these gals and gals did have a special task they were doing.
Full stocked, I mean wood-n-blue, instead of "Police" looking Ithaca 37s was preferred, still a PGO might be used for special tasks.

JC Higgins is another pump gun used. I mean who is going to make a person as being a "cop" with a JC Higgins?

Lady UC "needed a shotgun. So a 20 ga was bought used [trade in for a 870 or something] and left in the gun rack of a truck...
She, impressing her new found "friends" stole my shotgun from my truck.

Machine shop, saw, 20" barrel, and good to go...funny how that stock was a bit shorter than most JC Higgins ....
All pre arranged.
She pretended to get in the truck through the vent window [smoker's window] with a coat hanger ,nah, door unlocked.

We fitted the stock beforehand, even had a mark for 20"...
Serious work, still when downtime came, we laughed at some this stuff that went on.

No amount of forum discussion makes much impact when someone is set on a pistol grip only stock for a shotgun.

My view is that you should buy a used one and try it. Get it out of your system. If you are one of the very few who likes them then you are set. If however you can't tolerate the recoil, lack of control and poor accuracy sell it to the next person who wants to find out for himself.

My pistol grip only last four weeks before I found a new buyer.

Quite honestly, I've had fun with both the shotguns I pictured in the second thread posting. For the PGO 870, notice I replaced the forearm with a pistol grip forearm. That helps spread the recoil between both hands. It's not my first choice, but, within its limitations, it's quite effective.

Gewehr98
That PGO-only 870 has rifle sights.

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And this one does also.

BTW the story behind this picture was, I fell on the ice and hurt my right shoulder.
At the time this picture was taken I could not shoulder a long gun because of the pain and limited movement in my shoulder.
I wanted to run a bunch of slugs through the 12ga at 100 yards for sighting in and practice on a silhouette target.
At the time I still had the butt stock on the 870 but as I said I couldn't get the stock to my shoulder, much less shoot it.

So I used the PG Ithaca and had a fun and interesting afternoon of shooting.


Now this brings up an interesting point.
I'm a couple months from turning the big 70 and my joints don't take kindly to much punishment any more.
So I wonder, how is it that an old fart, with a bad shoulder and weak joints, can enjoy handling a slug shooting PG 12ga if the kick is really as bad as some folks claim it is.

.410 slugs.

WE call it "lobbing slugs" .
While really a lot of fun, there are some serious things one can learn from all this.
Most times we use Single shot .410s, even Youth Models.

Serious Part , is we have some folks with Physical Limits, Doctors Orders, and such that do use .410 slugs as part of defensive means.
Seriously because they have undergone Neck, Back, Shoulder, and Detached Retina surgeries.

1100s and 870s for instance

Years ago someone had a PGO .410. We used it to demonstrate the difference in PGO and Full Stock.
Even with mild target loads one could understand the difference a stock makes.


28 gauge Slugs
See Ballistic Products for one source of information and components.
My Mentors were doing 28 gauge slugs before I was born in '55.
Just the simple round ball are fun, and will fell deer, and go through vehicle windshields and doors!
.550 [what 28 ga is] is not that "far" from .54 caliber that History proves works with Buffalo, Elk, Deer and Wars were fought with.

Older, joints, aches, pains, heck even younger and recovering from injury...
28 ga allows one to shoot a very effective gauge with less felt recoil.

Even when I was a kid, folks with bad joints and all- folks would use a 28 gauge slug to fell deer with a 870, Single shot...whatever.

I have turned into my Mentors and I am only 'fitty-two'.
When was a brat "fitty-two" sounded "old". 70 was "really old", heck I am a brat, I did not know better.

So yeah, I don't care for a lot of the newfangled, bling-bling, awesome crap.
I, like Mentors, have seen too many things come and go in the name of Wallet Flushes.


Ninety percent of what the fishing industry manufactures is to catch
fisher-persons and not fish. -anon

PGO-style shotguns have uses, but there is a small, finite range of uses.

No PGO shotgun for me. If you REALLY want to know why, I'll 'splain it to ya how I got to be called "Rocky Raccoon" for a coupla weeks..

All you challengers out there who want to compete against a PGO with a regular stock.....What's the point?

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I've wondered the same thing. It's like someone challenging people to bring their airweight J frames to compete against their 6" 686.

I bought a mossberg 500 'persuader' model with 20" cylinder bore a few years back. It came with a pistol grip in the box, but a normal stock attached.

I didn't know what I was doing at the time, just wanted something for home defense. We went out to a friends ranch and played around a bit, shot some slugs (that's good fun!), buckshot, birdshot...whatever I could find to buy that said 12 gauge on it. ;-)

Anyhow, I mentioned it came with a pistol grip. We ended up putting it on, and I tell ya, we all learned a lesson in the recoil of 00 buckshot that afternoon. A very large friend (6'3", 260 lbs... very muscular) shot 7 rounds from the hip in quick succession, he was on target by about the 4th round or so and only a few made it to a 24" or so square at about 15-20 feet. but, he had a good time. I tried to shoot it by the bead sight, that was a mistake! You've gotta have a stock against your shoulder, no matter how big of boy you think you are. I'm not a small guy and I still ended up hitting myself in the shoulder with the pistol grip. It stung, but it wasn't terrible.

That's when I did something real smart. I put one round in, chambered it, and held with two hands like I was in an action movie or something. It doesn't work like I thought. I dropped the gun due to recoil and said "mommy". good fun, we all laughed...but that was in my youth...now, I realize how stupid it was.

I put the regular stock back on and never used the pistol grip again. Like I said, it was stupid, but there's no words that can describe the experience. Not that I'm suggesting you buy a cheapo pistol grip and try it or anything....

I have two PGO shotguns. One is a 1300 with Duke Nukem style double pistol grips, sidesaddle, light and "tactical sling." The other is a cut-down Mossberg 5500. Both are for fun, and both accomplish that mission.

That said, I keep both loaded in a couple very tight spots in my house. At in-house ranges, I am certain I can effectively hit, even if I elected (in some ever-so-unlikely case) to fire from the hip. Full power loads are no problem to me, either form the hip or at shoulder level, and the dang things are just handy. Is the shotgun by my bed a PGO? Nope, and never will be. But for storing in a closet, drawer, cabinet, etc, a PGO can be nice.

Get a PGO if you can afford a toy with a very limited (but still potentially life saving) practical role.

Did I mention that both of those guns are sweet looking and would intimidate the hell out of an unwelcome guest? Yeah.

The picture Leadhead posted is a Canadian manufacturer who worked hard and got a legal ruling saying that a shotgun with a pistol grip and a short barrel from the manufacturer is legal at any size. http://www.canadiangunnutz.com/forum/showthread.php?t=155147 http://www.dlaskarms.com/

And I think it's implied, or perhaps I just infer, but the notion I get is that if you are hiking or fishing and want to carry something for protection, that's a wonderful option. People in Alaska have submitted posts here where they carry shorty M4gerys on 3 point slings while hiking. Same idea aiui.

ATW, it's called put up or shut up. Speaking for myself, I get mighty tired oif Net Ninjas thumping their chests and boasting about prowess which only exists in their fantasies.

Maybe 40 current and former members of this BB have seen me shoot. I've nothing to hide and no Caca Del Toro to spread.

I've been shooting a long time, nigh 50 years. I've taught for more than 20.

I know what can be done with a PGO shotgun and what cannot.

And I know very well that real world knowledge beats Hollywood inspired fantasies when life itself balances on a knife edge.

PGO shotguns DO have some slight utility for folks with extreme space concerns, like bush pilots and armored car guards. For GP use, a shotgun with a stock is a much better tool.

Anyone disagreeing is welcome to come prove me wrong.....

A question for M2 Carbine (and anyone else with experience,)

Is the "chicken head" style PG (as in post #17,) any more comfortable to shoot than the more common angled versions? How do the two compare?

(I saw a short barreled 870 with a chicken head grip a while back and it struck my fancy. Only sort of PGO shotgun I've glanced twice at.)

i would like to see pistol grips for shotgun only.Can anyone capture?I would like to see it!

All you challengers out there who want to compete against a PGO with a regular stock.....What's the point?

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I've wondered the same thing. It's like someone challenging people to bring their airweight J frames to compete against their 6" 686.

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Not quite, but the comparison does have some merit.

The GENERAL contention of the PGO crowd is that the PGO shotgun is just as useful/fast/deadly/whatever as the fully-stocked shotgun, and is much more compact. If so, one should be able to compare the PGO shottie to a fully-stocked shottie in a straight up test. So, yes, it would be just like comparing a 686 with a j-frame airweight, since the owner of the Airweight is saying that it is just as capable as the 686. You cannot say that a PGO shotgun "is just as good" as a fully stocked shotgun and then cry foul when the two are placed in direct comparison.

Now, with all due respect to Dave McC, a heads-up shoot between him with a fully-stocked gun and a PGO-enthusiast with a PGO gun is not exactly fair. It would be hard to separate the advantage/disadvantage conferred from the equipment choice from the advantage/disadvantage conferred by the shooter's skill. In other words, Dave McC has been shooting shotguns a long time, and could probably wipe the floor with a lot of us, regardless of what gun either shooter was using. Conversely, if he ran into a Tom Knapp, he would probably lose, regardless of what weapon either shooter was using.

The only way to do a fair comparison would be to take shooters who were randomly assigned to shoot PGOs vs stocked guns, and see who shoots which better, and probably to allow the shooters differing levels of training/experience with the guns they are assigned. That's a lot of work to resolve a minor dispute. I'm not going to do it, unless I find the winning Powerball ticket in the gutter.

Mike

I like it on mine.

The GENERAL contention of the PGO crowd is that the PGO shotgun is just as useful/fast/deadly/whatever as the fully-stocked shotgun, and is much more compact.

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I think maybe you beat all those guys into submission long ago, because I didn't see anything like that here What can be reliably argued is that a PGO shotgun you brought along is more effective than a full-stock 28" that you left in the house. The debate should be comparing PGO to super-shorty M4gerys and .454 casull pistols.

A question for M2 Carbine (and anyone else with experience,)

Is the "chicken head" style PG (as in post #17,) any more comfortable to shoot than the more common angled versions? How do the two compare?

(I saw a short barreled 870 with a chicken head grip a while back and it struck my fancy. Only sort of PGO shotgun I've glanced twice at.)

Click to expand...

I like the speedfeed "witness protection" grip because it feels just like a regular stock but with the butt removed.



I usually just shoot for fun with trap loads but slugs are not bad if you tension the gun with both arms.

My 16" barrel has rifle sights on it and I can aim when firing slugs without punching myself in the face....

proud2deviate
A question for M2 Carbine (and anyone else with experience,)

Is the "chicken head" style PG (as in post #17,) any more comfortable to shoot than the more common angled versions? How do the two compare?

(I saw a short barreled 870 with a chicken head grip a while back and it struck my fancy. Only sort of PGO shotgun I've glanced twice at.)

Click to expand...

What works for me is trying to keep your wrist in line with your forearm. The more my wrist is twisted up or down the harder the recoil seems to be on me.

So the more vertical the grip, the higher I tend to hold the gun.
I mostly hold that Ithaca about armpit high, but it can be held from belt high to eye level.

I hold the birds head grip belt high. That grip is right restricting (for me) in that I can't raise it to armpit height before my wrist is twisted downward as far as it goes.
I can slid my hand back so the back of the grip is in the palm of my hand. Then I can raise the gun to eye level but it doesn't feel like a way I want to shoot the gun. I'll probably try it one day though.

I just got a grip that's about halfway between the vertical grip and the birds head grip. I haven't had time to shoot a bunch with it but it may be better that the other two.

Other than aiming and plinking with slugs at 100 yards I mostly just point shoot.
With a little practice it's pretty easy to point shoot and hit during the day and using a laser/light in low light or darkness the rig is deadly accurate.

From the hip. #4 & 00 buckshot shot from 17 yards. Slugs in the small target and in the BG's jeans shot from 26 yards.


Shot from across the room distance of 20 feet.
#4 buckshot and slug.

Mike, the playing field is far from level. Me shooting a standard shotgun will wipe the floor with Joe PGO and his toy. And, if we swapped shotguns, he might just beat me, though probably by a lesser margin.

PGOs are just that much of a disadvantage.

standard issue.....

back in the day.....we had two or three in the small arms locker on board 637 class submarines (can't remember how many for sure, though I used to inventory the locker every duty day).

They were "fun" to shoot at the range......make a lot of noise and thoroughly pepper targets at 20'.

If you have to repell borders....i.e. run around a submarine (though hatches, up and down ladders) seeking out bad guys....they're just the ticket.

high pressure steam and air spewing out of a ruptured pipe can hurt a body very badly, so high powered rifles were not a good idea in an over sized cigar tube jamb-packed with high energy mechanical systems.

We saved the M-14's for shark watch during swim call and polar bear watch while visiting santa....but that's another story.

For me, the PGO was fun to play with using VERY LIGHTloads. How I got to be called "Rocky Racoon" was by forgetting I had put in a Serious Load in the magtube, somebody tossed one of those ferocious deadly "Clays".

I attempted to wingshoot said "Clay" with the 3" Buckshot load....BOOM! "OW! Quit it!. OH, ******** that HURTS!", Foggy screamed, although not very audibly through a severely mooshed and profusely bleeding [but NOT broken] nose, complete with 'Fat Lips'. And spectacles landed about 10 feet away.

http://www.lymanproducts.com/store/page92.html

these may provide a little better grip over the standard plastic grip. I have a Mossy 500 defender i am thinking about getting a set for, it came with the PG.