did they film the military testing shotguns?

[bullseyebob47]

i think it was a 3,000 round test that only mossberg passed. i would love to see that.

 

[Slamfire]

The Government does a lot of comparison testing between commercial products. The test reports are always have a limited distribution, the typical distribution is Distribution B, which is a Distribution authorized to U.S. Government agencies only.

Even though the Government is funded by public taxpayer money, it is very sensitive to the damage that might be caused to business by the release of unfavorable information. Therefore, given that commercial products were tested, and compared, there are going to be “winners” and “losers”. If the list of “losers” and the problems that the “loser” products experienced were released to the public, this information would cause substantial economic harm to the “losers”. And, considering that the “loser’s” product could have been improved later, based on the test, given the irrational and hysterical nature of the public, perhaps it is to the best that this information is kept out of the public domain.

The DoD figured out long ago, basically in the 50’s, that the shooting public was not its friend. You can go through the vintage Gun’s Magazines on the web http://gunsmagazine.com/classic-guns-magazine-editions/ , which I have, and find hostile articles dealing with the introduction of the M14. I recall reading one, the author found out that some part, maybe the bolt, was in short supply, was gating delivery of the rifle. The whole article castigated the Army for incompetence, offered the “expert” author’s opinion that production of the M14 should stop immediately and (I think) conversion of Garands should start, as from the author’s opinion, the M14 was a mistake and of course, the shortage of this part could never be remedied. What is likely, by the time this idiot Gun writer’s article was in print, the bolt shortage at the manufacturer’s was over. For me, reading this stuff only confirmed the lack of gravitas in the utterances of gunwriters, and the small mindedness of gunwriters is something that can be validated no matter what century the article was written.

Anyway, there are some that can remember that the first Beretta 92 pistols had a slide breakage issue, this got out into the public and has been used for decades to defame what is, a very good pistol. So, keeping product failure information out of the hands of the public is without a doubt, a good thing.

 

[dfariswheel]

The shotgun test is a pass-fail test, not a competitive test to identify the BEST gun.
The test is nothing more than a minimum standard a gun has to meet, it has nothing to do with what is the best gun.

All a company has to do is submit a gun for the test and if the gun passes the test, then they can bid on the contract.

Since Remington and the other shotgun makers at the time could not produce a gun as cheap as Mossberg they would not be able to under bid Mossberg, so only Mossberg bothered to submitted a gun for testing.

If you know you can't beat another company's price, why bother spending all the money to submit a gun that you know you can't get the contract for.
All the Mossberg advertising that "Only Mossberg passed the grueling Government test....." was at best misleading advertising, if not unethical.
Only Mossberg submitted a gun.

 

[bullseyebob47]

where are you getting this info? link? i would like to read on that.

 

[Virginian]

Government; generally a sore subject. Understand that every branch of the government is dedicated to only one thing - maintaining or increasing the number of jobs in their department. They do not really even try to save money. They do not care about obtaining the best product. They just want to make 100% sure the process is time consuming, expensive, and will pass a slight unbiased test. A government request for bid is loaded with cost increasing clauses. Requiring manufacturers to spend a lot of money just to prepare and submit a bid. The last go round, only Mossberg submitted a bid package as the others obviously felt their time and resources would be better spent on other pursuits. This happenstance has nothing to do with the product quality of Mossberg or the others.
Remember, an elephant is a mouse built to Mil Specs.

 

[Fishbed77]

Since Remington and the other shotgun makers at the time could not produce a gun as cheap as Mossberg they would not be able to under bid Mossberg, so only Mossberg bothered to submitted a gun for testing.

This.^^^

Mossberg was the only shotgun to pass, because they were the only one to enter. Remington didn't even bother because they knew the 870 with its milled steel receiver would never undercut the price of a Mossberg with a cast aluminum receiver. The contract was not large enough for Remington (or any other manufacturer, for that matter) to redesign their shotguns to win. BTW, this is not a Mossberg/Remington love/hate comparison (both are great shotguns), just a matter of simple economics.

That said, I can't think of anything more uninteresting to watch than video of that test. It wasn't some spectacular torture test. It was a pass/fail test that just about any pump shotgun would have likely passed.

 

[Jim K]

Sometimes the testers don't even understand what they are testing. In a famous American Rifleman article c. 1940, the respected F.C. Ness wrote that the M1 (Garand) could never be accurate because a rod connected the muzzle to the receiver so that when the barrel heated up, it would bend like a bow!

Jim

 

[herrwalther]

Also any personnel involved in such tests for military equipment typically sign NDA or non-disclosure agreements. I have been fortunate enough to test some new toys a company has come up with. Some of them better than what the military currently use, some are huge steps backward. That is why testing is involved.

 

[jmr40]

i think it was a 3,000 round test that only mossberg passed. i would love to see that.

Passing a 3000 round test is not very difficult. The handgun trials in the late 1970's when the Beretta was chosen were around 15,000 rounds IIRC.

Military or any government contract does not go to the best product. They set minimum standards that the product must pass. Any company that passes the minimum standards is allowed to bid on the contract. The contract goes to the low bidder, not the best product. They can set the bar as low or high as they want. The bar was set pretty low here. The military never had any intention of using any shotgun as a front line weapon. They just wanted a few for limited use and the cheaper the better.

No other gun company chose to enter the trials because they all knew that any shotgun could meet the standards set and it was a simple matter of low bidder. No one else could compete with Mossberg for price.

It costs tons of money for a company just to enter the trials. They have to produce quite a few to give to the military for them to test. No reason to invest money when they know they have no chance at the contract.

 

[AI&P Tactical]

What the Wheel said is Correct. Remington did not submit a weapon for that bid. I did not read that. I heard that straight out of the mouth of the Senior Instructor of the LE training academy at the factory in Ilion as he was involved in the decision and he said they decided they did not want to cut production cost of the 870P to meet the bid requirement as that would put 870P's out there that would be substandard to their current models. As for the testing criteria I have no personal knowledge of that but what was posted makes perfect sence from what I do know about such testing.

 

[200Apples]

.
Here's wishing my .75-caliber brethren a Happy Thanksgiving.

The tone of the first post and the OP's subsequent desire to find a link substantiating the claim that Mossberg was the only gun that had arrived for testing... leads me to believe that the OP is a Mossberg fan.

I find it interesting to learn in general terms that the Mossberg 500 pump shotgun comes from blueprints purchased from Howa for it's Model 3000 for Smith & Wesson, which is an 870 clone.

So, on this fine Holiday, let us put aside our brand-loyalty differences and instead raise a glass to America's finest pump shotguns.

 

[lathedog]

You would have to read the specific selection criteria used for the contract solicitation to know what was being evaluated. If the criteria was performance based, then cost would not necessarily have any impact on the Contracting Officer's decision. The solicitation (or at least an announcement of intent to award a contract) is typically available to the public.

There are a million possible reasons why company "A" did not make an offer or proposal, or lost to company "B", or was unable to compete due to previously awarded task orders within an existing contract vehicle. Or company "B" was already under contract with unfulfilled quantities and there was no need for a new selection.

Offers and Proposals are usually submitted under signature of corporate officers with legal authority to enter into a contract. President, CEO, CFO. An example of an exception would be private individuals or sole owners of small companies.

Without a copy of the awarded contract or task order, and without the selection criteria from a solicitation, the rest is rumor and innuendo.

Anyway, that is my opinion on what may have happened, lacking factual documentation.

 

[dfariswheel]

find it interesting to learn in general terms that the Mossberg 500 pump shotgun comes from blueprints purchased from Howa for it's Model 3000 for Smith & Wesson, which is an 870 clone.

Sorry, that's incorrect.
The Mossberg Model 500 has nothing to do with the Howa.
Howa did make a close, but not exact copy of the Remington 870 as the S&W Model 3000.
After S&W dropped it, Mossberg picked it up and also sold it as the Mossberg Model 3000 for about a year or so before they too dropped it.
The Mossberg Model 500 is a totally different design that is nothing at all like the 870 design or the Howa made copy.

Gun Parts Corp sell Model 3000 parts under both the S&W and Mossberg names. If you get on the site you'll immediately see that the Mossberg Model 3000 is nothing at all like the Mossberg Model 500.

 

[200Apples]

.
Well, dagnabbit! See what reading between the lines gets me?

I sit corrected! and I thank you for the clarification.

 

[jaguarxk120]

Don't understand why someone would want a video of a shotgun test that was the lowest bidder?

 

[splithoof]

A major shooting school that I took a couple of shotgun courses from recently (Oct-Nov) uses 870's for those clients who for whatever reason do not bring their own weapon. The example I saw looked as though it had untold thousands and thousands of rounds through it over many years. The Mossberg is a very solid weapon, and should last forever too. It does though employ lesser cost manufacturing, enough that selling a contract for 100K items might not be worth it to Big Green. As such, if everything I read about the testing/bid process is factual, then all that advertising that Mossberg does relative to that seems dishonest.

 

[Fred Fuller]

Bob,

Watching a film of the tests (if you could find one of course) would be about as interesting as reading the specifications for the shotguns being tested. Far as I know there is no film, or if there is it isn't available to the public.

The written specifications you can find at http://www.everyspec.com/MIL-SPECS/MIL-SPECS-MIL-S/MIL-S-3443D_4589/ ...

 

[Willie Sutton]

"Without a copy of the awarded contract or task order, and without the selection criteria from a solicitation, the rest is rumor and innuendo. Anyway, that is my opinion on what may have happened, lacking factual documentation"


Spoken like someone who knows his ORCA from his DUNS, and his DODAC from his NAICS, never mind WAWF, DFAS, Ten thousand clerks in the Contracting Office singing "EIEIO", details of which can be learned about with a FOIA request submitted in blue ink, in triplicate, and by the way we only issue black pens, and we only accept bids for black pens from Skilcraft, and nobody there knows what color they are because they are all BLIND I tell you.. <sigh>.. it's all true. Really.

All of which is usually slang for "Pay me now, you bastards, you're two months late"


Low bidders win. And remember that the Contracting Officer is a buyer of widgets. He/she's not a shooter, and tomorrow will be buying a million dollars of toilet paper. It's just another NSN number to order. Cheap = Bought. Bid specifications can be tailored to make any product the only one that can be submitted. It's all in the specifications. Who writes those? You would be wrong if you said the end users. It's the shoe-clerks who run the military and they will have their way.



Willie "I speak fluent contractors jive" Sutton

.

 

[ElPasoWrangler]

Reminds me of the old Soviet Union Pravda report of the car tests. The report said the American car was next to last and the Russian car was second. Only problem was there were only two cars tested.

 

[Fred Fuller]

Willie,

If I had my own army, I'd hire you to teach my COR course

 

[Uniquedot]

i think it was a 3,000 round test that only mossberg passed. i would love to see that.

Bob, 3000 rounds is not much of an endurance test, but rather a couple months worth of target shooting. Many people (even reloaders) don't realize that most high end 1 -1/8 oz target loads produce the same maximum pressures as buckshot loads and the only difference in ejecta is the slower burning powders used in factory buckshot loads, but low recoil loads as well as some LEO loads use faster powders. You might want to look at what Mossberg say's about the tests the 590's endured. They don't say they were the only guns to pass the tests, but rather they were the only ones to meet the requirements of those to be submitted for testing. They go on to state "where 3000 rounds of buckshot were fired" some people read the statement wrong and that's how misinformation like this gets started. Only problems I've had outta this last mossberg I bought (besides the plastic safety) is that I find it desirable to break it down and wipe the aluminum powder from inside the frame with a rag dampened in oil every few hundred rounds, but as cheap as the things are it'll definitely outlast it's asking price.

 

[Slamfire]

Spoken like someone who knows his ORCA from his DUNS, and his DODAC from his NAICS, never mind WAWF, DFAS, Ten thousand clerks in the Contracting Office singing "EIEIO", details of which can be learned about with a FOIA request submitted in blue ink, in triplicate, and by the way we only issue black pens, and we only accept bids for black pens from Skilcraft, and nobody there knows what color they are because they are all BLIND I tell you.. <sigh>.. it's all true. Really

Decades ago, before there was such a thing as internet or DTS, I went to get my travel voucher settlement. The lady clerk was behind glass, she slide the book out and said “sign here”. So I signed in blue fountain pen ink and returned the book back through the hole in the glass. She looked at my signature and slide it back, saying “sign over that in black ink”. I asked “why?”, and she said “Regulations”. I asked “what regulations?” and she said “if you want your money you will sign over that in black ink”.


Having lost the skirmish and war, I used her “Skillcraft U.S Government” black ink ball point pen and got my money.

And how do the workers at the Chicago Lighthouse of the Blind get the numbers correctly aligned on the clock face?

 

[HOOfan_1]

Virginia's Government buys pens from the Virginia Industries for the Blind...they are absolute JUNK

 

[Willie Sutton]

"Having lost the skirmish and war, I used her “Skillcraft U.S Government” black ink ball point pen and got my money."


Wisdom expressed in it's finest way!


And Fred, I learned the jive the hard way and would be happy to teach it. Every lesson of "Oh, you inked the wrong square" was learned at a cost of another 30 day delay in payment. Oh well. But that late payment nonsense is one of the reasons we have $600 hammers. Vendors need to pay their bills too.


Willie

.

 

[BigG]

The Government does a lot of comparison testing between commercial products. The test reports are always have a limited distribution, the typical distribution is Distribution B, which is a Distribution authorized to U.S. Government agencies only.

Even though the Government is funded by public taxpayer money, it is very sensitive to the damage that might be caused to business by the release of unfavorable information. Therefore, given that commercial products were tested, and compared, there are going to be “winners” and “losers”. If the list of “losers” and the problems that the “loser” products experienced were released to the public, this information would cause substantial economic harm to the “losers”. And, considering that the “loser’s” product could have been improved later, based on the test, given the irrational and hysterical nature of the public, perhaps it is to the best that this information is kept out of the public domain.

The DoD figured out long ago, basically in the 50’s, that the shooting public was not its friend. You can go through the vintage Gun’s Magazines on the web http://gunsmagazine.com/classic-guns-magazine-editions/ , which I have, and find hostile articles dealing with the introduction of the M14. I recall reading one, the author found out that some part, maybe the bolt, was in short supply, was gating delivery of the rifle. The whole article castigated the Army for incompetence, offered the “expert” author’s opinion that production of the M14 should stop immediately and (I think) conversion of Garands should start, as from the author’s opinion, the M14 was a mistake and of course, the shortage of this part could never be remedied. What is likely, by the time this idiot Gun writer’s article was in print, the bolt shortage at the manufacturer’s was over. For me, reading this stuff only confirmed the lack of gravitas in the utterances of gunwriters, and the small mindedness of gunwriters is something that can be validated no matter what century the article was written.

Anyway, there are some that can remember that the first Beretta 92 pistols had a slide breakage issue, this got out into the public and has been used for decades to defame what is, a very good pistol. So, keeping product failure information out of the hands of the public is without a doubt, a good thing.

Agree with the comments on the small-mindedness of gunwriters but also thought that a writer with a monthly deadline has to write about something and the articles get pretty repetitive for most writers if you read their output.