Defensive 12ga with choke?

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Rail Driver

Rail Driver

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So here's my thinking... A defensive shotgun doesn't need an adjustable choke. Adjustable chokes are meant for hunting use, they make one gun fire different payloads with wider or tighter spread, at different ranges...

If a shotgun isn't going to be used for hunting, wouldn't an adjustable choke be superfluous?

What do you think, does a defensive shotgun need an adjustable choke? Why or why not?
 
A fixed CYL choke usually handles buckshot & slugs just fine.

My main complaint is though, most of the HD barrels do not come threaded for screw-in chokes so you can play around with different tubes and find out what choke actually does pattern best with your load.

IMO: There is also no reason to handicap a gun with a fixed CYL choke.

It could be used for blue-rock prectice with smaller shot, or Turkey hunting, if you could change choke tubes for the game at hand.

But then the manufactures couldn't sell you an extra Turkey barrel or Turkey gun with a threaded barrel just about like it, would they?

I see the logic of a fixed CYL on a police or military duty gun, cause cops & solders get bored real easy, and would probably lose a choke tube playing with it if it came out.

But for the rest of us, choke tubes make a lot more sense to me.

rc
 
Once upon a time it was necessary to have some amount of choke in even a short (18 - 21") barrel to get good patterns at longer range with the buckshot loads that were then available. Since most riot or security type shotguns had CYL bore barrels, installing choke tubes was the way many people chose to add choke to short barrels, though I have seem a couple that had PolyChokes installed before choke tubes became widely used.

Remington started making factory short barrels with fixed chokes several years ago. Now many of Remington's Police or smoothbore slug barrels with bead or rifle sights have fixed ImpCyl chokes. And Remington has made Police shotgun barrels with Mod or even Full fixed chokes. In fact I just missed getting a short bead sighted Remington full choke Police barrel from CDNN a couple of weeks ago (they sold out), and I have two 18.5" tritium rifle sight Police barrels with fixed Mod chokes.

Now, much of the time, all you have to do is choose your buckshot loads to adjust your pattern, if your barrel is a CYL or ImpCyl bore. Want tight patterns? Try a load with FliteControl wads. The 'standard' loads from any big-name manufacturer will usually give middle-sized patterns, and the cheap, soft lead pellet, unbuffered, unprotected by shot cup or sleeve buckshot loads (S&B, Rio Royal etc) will usually give wide open true scattergun patterns.
 
I see what you guys are saying as far as the purpose of a choke... I'm not unfamiliar with their uses and benefits in hunting situations.

I fail to see the purpose behind an adjustable choke in a purely defensive gun that will never see the field in a hunting situation considering Lee's mention of choosing the load based on needs.

All that said... Who wants a polychoke for a Saiga 12? I've pretty much decided that my needs are met with a cylinder bore and a decent muzzle brake. The Polychoke isn't necessary for my purposes, and the cash I can get out of it would be better spent on practice ammo.

As to practicing with smaller shot, it's good for trigger control but I prefer to train with the same defensive loads that I keep in my firearms.
 
I have owned several HD shotguns and never felt the need for an adjustable choke. My ammo of choice is FliteControl and most of the time the barrel on my gun is an 18 1/2" CYL bore with a bead sight. Sometimes, when I go to the range to shoot slugs, I change to an I/C bore barrel with rifle sights, because I think slugs pattern a little better with slight constriction.
 
It's not as if anyone is realistically going to be swapping chokes randomly on a defensive shotgun when it's in use for its intended purpose. But 'back when,' it was an advantage to be able to try several different chokes to get the pattern you wanted. Then you could stick with that choke while using the ammo that worked best through it.

Years ago I did a lot of experimenting with different loads and chokes, trying to eliminate the 'B' zone (see 'The Zone System' at http://www.frfrogspad.com/shotgun.htm )range band with buckshot. With a Mod choke and my then favorite load (old Estate SWAT 00), I could get the patterns I wanted out to 25 yards, which pretty well let me use buckshot that far out before shifting to slugs. And I could still shoot slugs through the Mod choke tube with no problems. See http://www.thehighroad.org/archive/index.php/t-165368.html for more... unfortunately the old laissezfirearm site has gone by the board.

Nowadays I don't spend the money to get choke tubes installed any more. Any of the loads with FliteControl wads I've tried so far will deliver the patterns I want at 25 yards out of a CYL bore. And I can adjust pattern size as needed just by changing loads.

One thing I discovered in messing around with the inside geometry of several shotgun barrels is that, with buckshot, an extended forcing cone seemed to help a lot in delivering good tight patterns further out...
 
Guess it depends on how big your home is (for home defense)

Longest shot I'd have to take is MAYBE 10 yards. Choke totally unnecessary.
 
Nothing stopping anybody from having a smith tap an 18" barrel for choke tubes.
Click to expand...
All I'm saying is, the manufacture could do for $10 extra bucks what it will cost me $125 or $250 to do later.

If you want an IC choke, leave the IC choke tube in the barrel.

If I want to go turkey hunting with mine this spring for more practice and familiarity with my HD gun, I could easily change tubes and use it without spending another two bills.

That's all I am saying.

rc
 
Would you want to turkey hunt with an 18" shotgun? Personally I would rather have a longer barrel.
 
$1,500 buck Benelli Turkey Guns come with short barrels.

Don't you watch the Turkey hunting shows on TV? :D

Anyway, an 18" with an extra full Turkey choke would shoot just as hard and far as a 30" with an extra Full Turkey choke.

I could see using a HD gun for a lot of dual-purpose roles if it had choke tubes.


rc
 
My 870 Express Turkey gun came with a 21" vent rib barrel... which was why I snatched it off the used rack, several years ago. Along with the vent rib, it was fitted with twin beads and RemChokes from the factory. Makes a great all-around shotgun just as it is.

As far as why I want to be able to reach out with a shotgun if necessary, we live on twenty-something acres out in the country. From the front door to the driveway gate is 51 yards... and a shotgun is likely to be the go-to long gun in the event of trouble here, though there is one AR-15 carbine kept handy also.
 
Inside most residences, the difference in spread with a given load and divers chokes is inconsequential.

However, the world being uncertain, we may have to use our HD shotguns outside, and there choke can make quite a difference.

I've advocated patterning at the longest distance possible in your home AND at 25 yards, just in case.


And like Lee, I think long cones are a great idea for tightening up things....
 
As a rule of thumb the tighter the choke and the larger the Buckshot the less useful and more problematic choke is.

A little choke is good for rifled slugs.

I've added Polychokes to both an original 20" 590 and a short 500. The ability to tweak the choke, especially on the fly when you aren't buying the only Buckshot on the shelf, 00 Buck, or the latest tactical solution, gives you a huge amount of flexibility such as optimizing your pattern from 15 yards to 45 meters if you know what you are doing.

All my many other defense barrels are Open Cylinder except for a Rem. 870 20" rifle sight barreled gun that wears a knurled Modified as its default (as I said it has rifle sights).
 
Indoors, choke is unimportant, unless you live in something the size of the Astrodome, as you're not likely to get much spread in a normal sized room or hallway.

Outdoors, where longer ranges might be encountered, full, so you can minimize the spread and get enough pellets on target to do sufficient damage. So really a full will do just fine inside or out.
 
Actually a full choke may well overcompress the shot in some loads, thereby causing larger patterns rather than smaller ones. With shotguns, sometimes its easy to generalize too much. Often the best answer to any shotgun related question starts with "It depends... ."

The only way to know for sure what a given barrel/choke will do with a given load at a given distance is ... pattern it.
 
i think the point to be made is that we would like the shotgun to be more versital. so if the shotgun is my backup duck gun with a 22 inch barrel and optional chokes it could also be my home defense gun. i would like to have a definite reason to shoot my home defense gun in the field.
 
"A defensive shotgun doesn't need an adjustable choke."

It took me a minute to realize you were talking about a true adjustable choke and not choke tubes. I've never had a gun with an adjustable choke and doubt that I ever will.

I know that some quality guns with fixed chokes throw better patterns than most choke tubes, but overall, I'll take a gun with choke tubes everytime. But not an adjustable choke because they throw the balance off (and look funky.)


"Would you want to turkey hunt with an 18" shotgun?"

Sure, why not? The gun will shoot like one with a longer barrel and the same choke. A buddy duck hunts with a short barrel 870. It's pretty handy in a brushed up duck boat. And most turkeys will sit still for you, so swing dynamics don't enter into it.


"With shotguns, sometimes its easy to generalize too much."

It's always too easy. You don't know how a gun will pattern an ammo load until you shoot it. It's sort of like picking ammo for a .22 rimfire.

John
 
True, but if one intended a shotgun for extended ranges outdoors, I would think that the shotgun and load were patterned. If the "overcompression" did occur, one could try different loads until a satisfactory load was found.
 
If it's a dedicated home defense shotgun I'd say adjustable chokes aren't necessary.

If it is a dual purpose shotgun (home and field) then I'd say adjustable chokes make sense.

In either situation, you need to know what is the furthese shot you can take in your speciifc weapon for home defense with the specific ammo.
 
When planning that "home defense" firearm, remember that homes have "outsides" as well as "insides". The moment you consider going to the aid of a neighbor, "outside" just became very important.

My first use of a shotgun around the house involved going to the aid of a neighbor hollering for help in the middle of the night.
 
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