New shotgun stopped working

[anon99989]

I picked up my first shotgun (Remington 870) this last Friday. I took it into a country area and fired two shells (it worked flawlessly). Then I went home and put it in my closet, full magazine, empty chamber.

Today I took it and attempted to unload it. The first three shells came out fine. However, on the fourth shell, the slide started to lock at certain points and required a lot of force to move it. The shells weren't coming out of the magazine. I had to unscrew the mag cap to release the shells. I put it back on and tried to load a round but it wouldn't go all the way in. The slide still gets locked up at certain points.

Can someone tell me why the slide would just start locking up and the shells won't load? Is there a way to fix it myself or should I take it to a gunsmith?

 

[sm]

Welcome to THR!

Humm, if the gun was cleaned of factory preservative and lube, and lubed lightly afterwards - then my first thought is the shell latch(s) are hanging up.

I'd take it apart, make sure clean. That Preventative mixed with fired residue can be really sticky.

I could not tell from your post, if the shells were cycled into chamber and that chamber is not clean and dry, them hulls don't want to extract either.

Most "hangups" are due to dirty chambers, the plastic hulls leave a residue that can cause this.

Go to a safe area, and with finger off trigger once cleaned and lubed, load up and cycle the gun...just cycle the shells without firing them- Report back please.

 

[A Cleaner]

Snap Caps

While testing the cycling of the action have you considered using snap caps? I mention this in the interest of safety and also to prevent shell damage from repeated cyclings.

 

[Fred Fuller]

I have seen the disconnector get tangled up with the action bar before- instead of riding on its bottom side, it gets behind it and makes the action bar stick. It is highly unusual and usually happens when the gun is not reassembled correctly after field stripping.

A thorough cleaning is in order with any new gun, an 870 is no different. Read the owners manual, field strip it, clean it well and relubricate properly. Clean the chamber well also (a brand new bore brush usually does OK on that) and then try it. I sincerely recommend you NOT test the action with live ammo unless you are on the range and prepared to fire the gun.

If this fails, a trip back to the retailer/factory might be in order...

hth, sorry to hear you're having troubles with it,

lpl/nc