New "Old School" Mossberg 500 & 590

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DHart

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After years of loving my 500 and 590 with hollow, black plastic furniture and a 14.25" length of pull (LOP),

Mossberg500A185.jpg

Mossberg590Stock.jpg

I decided that I wanted a quicker snap to the shoulder with no butt-catching on my shirt/coat when the gun
is on it's way up to the shoulder. I also much prefer the look and the feel of solid wood on a gun vs. hollow plastic.

SO... I found a Bantam buttstock (gives a 12.75" LOP) and a ribbed wood forearm, refinished them in a red mahogany
oil finish, and here's how they look. I'm going to do a second set so each of these guns can be so-equipped. I'm so
happy to be rid of the plastic furniture!

500_Bantam_R.jpg

500_Bantam_L.jpg

590_Bantam3.jpg

The guns now snap quickly to the shoulder with the butt coming nowhere near catching on my chest
or shoulder on it's way up. And the wood feels so solid and nice to the touch. I've loved these shotguns
as long as I've had them, but I like 'em even more now, if that's possible! :eek: These guns have
earned the privilege of receiving nice oil-finished wood furniture!

One look at the action bars and mag tube on my 500 shows that this is a well-loved/appreciated shotgun!
And now, I like it more than ever! My old Persuader is new, all over again! ;)

(I still prefer the 18.5" Persuader over my newer 20" 590, even if the 590 does have a 3-shot capacity
advantage. There's just something about this little 18.5" gun that is a TOTAL winner!) :D
 
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That is amazing. I have a regular M500 with wood stocks, and they feel nice and solid. The oil refinish looks nice too, but the stock finish is a nice honey satin which I don't mind either.
 
dak0ta... I don't mind the stock honey finish, but I really do prefer the darker mahogany oil finish.

Here's how the factory finish buttstock looked before I refinished it.

Moss500A_Wood.jpg

Surprisingly, the same piece of wood! I liked it OK then. But even more now.
The refinish brought out more character in the wood. It's not exactly a gorgeous piece of wood,
but the character comes out much more with the refinish.

I did not like the Bantam length forearm, nor the shape of the current-design forearm. That's why I went
with the old, discontinued ribbed wood forearm with standard length action arms.
 
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Round off the top corner of the recoil pad a little bit with sandpaper and then wax it, and it will never snag again. Did that to a duck gun 30 years ago and became an instant believer.
Wood always looks warmer.
 
One thing to try for the rubber recoil pads is electrical tape. Wrap a couple of rounds of tape around the pad making sure to make it align well with the pad and keep the nice profile of the gun. I've heard it makes the pad slide very nicely to the shoulder and doesn't snag, but you still have the butt end exposed to grip wherever you plant the shotgun on your shoulder.
 
Nice job, thanks for posting.

S'funny, darn near all the handguns here at Casa McC have plastic grips but all the long arms wear lumber.
 
'nother funny thing...I'll bet in most cases the lumber is more durable. In the early days when syn-stocks were solid, that probably wasn't true (though the synthetics of those days were heavy as all get-out), but many of today's syn-stocks seem to be likely to be less durable than a well-grained piece of walnut or birch. Certainly they are less esthetically appealing.
 
Gun really wanted to go outside... just didn't feel quite right on red velvet...

This is probably a more fitting setting for this fine working gun. As you can see on the action arms and the mag tube,
this 500 is a well-loved and trusty companion! ;) She just freakin runs like a hose.

500_Out_R.jpg

500_Out_L.jpg
 
As an aside, I tried the "youth" buttstocks on my 870s. Didn't work at all! Here's why. On the Remington youth stocks, they get the shorter LOP by taking an inch off the back of the stock. Since the comb is at an angle, that effectively moves the comb height up. With bead sights on the factory 870 stocks, I'm already almost too close to the comb for comfortable shooting with the "adult" stock. The youth stock turns out to be (for me) no-go. I think I am a minority, probably a small minority, on this issue. I much prefer the way shorter stocks handle (for background, I am 6-5 and wear 36" sleeves), but the factory Remington youth stocks (and SpeedFeed, which are made to the same dimensions) don't work well for me. :(
 
Very nice! Just did the same thing (minus refinishing the wood) on my 590A1. LOP is about perfect (slugs don't knock my teeth out now) & it now looks right. Love the look of wood on parkerized guns.
 
Dave McCracken wrote
Nice wear marks. More shotguns with pics posted here and elsewhere should have such....
Click to expand...

Hi Dave... it's just so much fun creating those wear marks, isn't it! :)

This 500 has earned the new wood furniture... but in retrospect, I wouldn't make the gun earn it first. I should have done this years ago. Oh well... better now than never! haha :D

I just today picked up a new-to-me barely ever used Winchester 1300 Defender (with wood furniture). Sweet gun! I can give my 500 a little rest for awhile as I get to know this 1300. I put about 16 rounds of 00 Buck and about 20 rounds of birdshot through the 1300 this afternoon and I'm really impressed. It IS a SpeedPump for sure!
 
Amen, D. Wear marks are fun to make.

The 1300 does cycle fast. A good hand can make one sound like full auto. Enjoy....
 
Funny thing... the Win 1300 Defender is really a nice gun and I can run it pretty fast... but somehow I get the feeling that it won't be winning my heart away from my 500. The 500 just feels amazing. Time and use will tell.
 
My first shotgun, maaaaany years ago, was a 1200 (still have it, btw). I remember reading a comment in one of the gun-zines back then, when the post-'64 trauma was still very recent and fresh, about how "grown men cry when they hear a Model 1200 lock up." Well, the fact is that nearly all shotguns sound like that now - the only exceptions would probably be the 870 and the BPS (and maybe a 37?). Winchester sold quite a lot of 1200 and 1300 guns, and in fairness they were only very recently discontinued, so that's a run of more than 45 years, which isn't bad, but doesn't equal the 870, either.

It was and is a good design, but people don't seem to have bonded with it in the same way (or numbers) that they have with other shotguns.
 
JNewell... I agree. The 1200/1300 is a really fine gun. I'm very happy to have snagged these two on GB:

pix3413736953.gif

pix3936644109.jpg

The reason I wanted two 1300's is this: one to keep with full wood furniture, the other to keep with a Speedfeed Birdshead pistol grip (shaped like the neck of a standard shotgun stock, but without the butt).

Speedfeed_Pistol_Grip.jpg

The Birdshead PGO one would be used on occasions where I wanted the smallest possible form factor just for close-range use. And having two complete guns provides a backup supply of parts if needed. I like redundancy. Each gun was a little over $300, so that felt like a reasonable cost to achieve this objective.

As for the bonding... three things that will take some getting used to before complete "bonding" is the thicker forearm (on the wood version anyway), small action release, and feel of the inertia-action. The wood forearm feels a bit too beefy. But that can be gotten used to. The action button is a bit small for ease of use, but again, one can accomodate. And I can see it will take some shooting to get accustomed to the inertia-based action. Generally, I'm really impressed with it. It's a great idea and a great design, but just feels a little different. Having an eight-shot capacity in an 18.5" form factor is sweet!

As with all guns, whichever gun an individual has grown accustomed to over time sets the user's experience "mold" into which any new gun must try to "fit" and that's where time and use comes in to work that part out - if it is to succeed. I'm looking forward to getting my "mold" wrapped around these wonderful 1300's! Too bad they're not made anymore. But wonderful that there are so many around. I think they'll be readily obtainable through my forseeable shooting future.

Similar issues for me with the 870. Very awkward to have to completely move my firing hand to actuate the slide release. And I'm not crazy about having to reach back behind the trigger guard to reach the safety. But you work around these things and make yourself get accustomed to them.

All in all... I think Mossberg rules the roost when it comes to ergonomics/ease of controls operation.
 
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