Shotgun barrel length

[Doc7]

Hello,

I am a small person, and I have a Mossberg 500 20 gauge Bantam model which is a Yourh model with a short LOP. The gun is stunningly comfortable for me to shoot, I shot over 125 shells on Saturday at clays all morning and doves all afternoon and had a great time of it. I have found full size 12 gauges to cause me to want to quit shooting much earlier and I think a large part has to do with the LOP and how comfortable it is for me to actually use the firearm. I did add a large recoil pad to it to extend the LOP when I got it, but that was better than adding it to an existing longer stock in a full size gun for my stature.

So the Bantam model which I have owned now for 6 years probably (first gun I ever bought) has a 22" smooth barrel and a 22" rifles barrel with cantilevered scope mount (very accurate with Accutips!!).

After several (lol) misses at doves and clays I have begun reading Bob Brister's Art of Shotgunning and another shot gunning book written by a friend of his (forget title) with a passion - I read them years ago but with little or no retained knowledge and certainly no practice. I want to start shooting clays once or twice a month year round in the yard so I can hit some more doves and other moving game in the future.

Is the 22" barrel a significant disadvantage here and I should drop the $186 for a 26" barrel?

What else should I do to make sure that the Bantam 20 is the proper size and fit for me, besides saying it's very comfortable for me to shoot and other shotguns I've handled haven't been? Maybe I can post a photo of my mount?

I do plan on buying a Remington V3 in 12 when I get funds together, maybe 12 months from now at next years Dove Day rebates. That has a 26" barrel in the recommended model (people poorly review the balance of the 28").

 

[jaguarxk120]

For $186 you can buy a new gun and have the stock cut to fit you.

Or look for a used 870 Wingmaster and have that stock cut for fit.

 

[Sam1911]

There are a few good articles on this subject out there. The thing to remember is that a shotgun is not (much) like a rifle in that to be your most accurate with it you need to adapt it to you (not you to it!) in several important ways.

So read this: https://www.nrafamily.org/articles/2017/7/26/how-to-properly-fit-a-shotgun/
And this: http://blog.beretta.com/how-to-fit-your-shotgun-for-more-accurate-shooting
And this: http://www.gundogmag.com/training/fine-tuning-a-shotgun-to-fit-you/

The idea is that you do not smack the butt of the gun into your shoulder pocket, crane your neck down onto the stock somewhere, and then go pointing around to chase the bird or clay. That wastes time, puts you in a bad posture to handle the recoil, and makes your rear sight inconsistent.

Your rear sight? What rear sight? Your eye is the rear sight. And it needs to be in exactly the same place over the stock (front-to-rear, left-to-right, up-and-down) for every shot. And it needs to get there instantaneously, without effort, "naturally" when you see a bird flush or the target appears. So the stock has to be shaped to connect your shoulder, your cheek, your eye, and the sighting plane of the gun just right, right now.

So what can you do about all of that? Well...on an inexpensive pump gun, perhaps not much. The "best" way to get a precise fit is to go to a stock-maker who specializes and have him build one like a tailored suit, just for you.

But you can also use stock shims to do a lot of the same work in a less finished sort of way.
Read this! https://sites.google.com/site/hobbyhintstricksideas/Home/mossberg-500-fit-patterning

And you can add screw-on or glue-on cheek risers if needed, as well.

Good luck!

 

[cdb1]

Barrel length is pretty much personal preference. A 24-26" barrel might smooth your swing a little though. There are a number of shotguns out there that come in compact/youth models:
Browning Silver
Winchester SX3
Weatherby SA-08
Franchi Affinity
Remington 1187 I think
Two Tristar models that I'm aware of
Benelli Montefeltro and I believe the M2
Mossberg International SA-20
I'm sure I missed some
You could go that route or get a V3 and have the stock cut down.

The Silver and SX3 come with 26" barrels as opposed to the standard 24" barrels on most compacts.

 

[jmr40]

For shooting clays or passing shots on game such as waterfowl longer barrels help smooth out the swing and most people shoot better. Most serious shooters prefer 28" or even 30" on a repeater and 32" plus on a double.

For an all around shotgun for most hunting and an occasional clay shooting session I personally find 26" to be the ideal compromise on a repeater and 28" on a double. They are a lot handier in the woods but still offer enough weight for pass shooting.

Once you get below 26", maybe 24" you have a special purpose barrel. A lot of hunters after quail or other game that flush close to your feet and often in thick brush prefer really short barrels. But they aren't usually swinging on moving game. That type of hunting often involves game moving directly away in thick stuff. You poke the barrel into the brush and pull the trigger if something flies in front of the barrel. They are also popular with turkey or deer hunters where shotguns are used more like rifles.

 

[Sunray]

More likely the choke than the barrel length. Two inches isn't going to make any difference unless you can't get a 22" barrel with changeable chokes. You might find a used 26" barrel for less than $200. The $186 is the 'On sale' price too.
The only difference between a Youth model and a big kid's model is the LOP. LOP is personal and has nothing to do with age.
"...12 gauges to cause me to..." Goes away with a semi-auto.

 

[243winxb]

Is the 22" barrel a significant disadvantage here and I should drop the $186 for a 26" barrel?

I dont think the extra 4" of barrel will help.

Most misses are caused by stopping the swing of the gun, when pulling the trigger.

Lifting your head off the stock to see the target , is another sure way to miss.

 

[Doc7]

Last night I checked again and my barrel is a 24" barrel. Yes I have interchangeable chokes.

I did what I read and instead of "shouldering" the gun, I "cheeked" the gun and then mounted to my shoulder. Done rapidly while looking at a "target" in the upper corner of the room, I found it very repeatable that my eye was looking directly down the top of the rib with the bead centered. Additionally, there was almost exactly two finger widths between my nose and the back of my right hand thumb.

I believe this shotgun likely fits me well enough to try and develop a proper shotgun technique at the current time and not be investigating other things to buy. Will spend the money on a clay launcher and ammo!

 

[kudu]

Try mounting it with your eyes closed, when you open them you should be looking right down the rib if it fits well. If not it will give you an indication of where you might shim the stock to help line it up. Don't just do it once, do it multiple times, it should be repeatable at about the same position. Might not be a perfect way to check fit but it comes darn close.

 

[d2wing]

A good trained coach may help. Another thing is to pattern your shotgun and see where it hits relative to POA. I recently found out a Franchi I bought had a crooked choke and shot way low. A new choke fixed it. Practicing on clays will help you understand what sight picture you need and make your shooting more automatic. Also check that you are shooting with your dominate eye. For some practicing with a light on the barrel indoors may help.

 

[expat_alaska]

Try mounting it with your eyes closed, when you open them you should be looking right down the rib if it fits well. If not it will give you an indication of where you might shim the stock to help line it up. Don't just do it once, do it multiple times, it should be repeatable at about the same position. Might not be a perfect way to check fit but it comes darn close.

There are a few good articles on this subject out there. The thing to remember is that a shotgun is not (much) like a rifle in that to be your most accurate with it you need to adapt it to you (not you to it!) in several important ways.

The idea is that you do not smack the butt of the gun into your shoulder pocket, crane your neck down onto the stock somewhere, and then go pointing around to chase the bird or clay. That wastes time, puts you in a bad posture to handle the recoil, and makes your rear sight inconsistent.

Your rear sight? What rear sight? Your eye is the rear sight. And it needs to be in exactly the same place over the stock (front-to-rear, left-to-right, up-and-down) for every shot. And it needs to get there instantaneously, without effort, "naturally" when you see a bird flush or the target appears. So the stock has to be shaped to connect your shoulder, your cheek, your eye, and the sighting plane of the gun just right, right now.

And you can add screw-on or glue-on cheek risers if needed, as well.

Good luck!

I think the quotes above are very good ones but, as usual, I'll chime in with my own $.02.

In 1969, as a 16-year-old, I went to work in Elkhorn NE at Roberts' Shooting Park (on Roberts' Dairy Farm: It is now the site of a community college) for $1.50/hr. Most enjoyable job I ever had. I had a Rem 1100 12 gauge 28" mod choke field grade at the time, but became enamored with skeet and soon traded it straight across for a Rem 870 12 gauge 26" VR IC choke. My Dad had to buy it for me as of January 1969 one had to be 18 years old to legally own one.

My point of this post is that the 1100 had a 2 3/4" stock drop at the heel and the 870 had a 2 1/4" drop at the heel. I had problems with cheek weld with the 1100. Whenever the 870 was brought up to the shoulder I could see the entire top of the barrel. LOP was 14", but I was taught, as a right-handed shooter, to raise my right "chicken-wing" arm as to form a pocket for the butt of the gun, and to shoot with both eyes open. The dominant eye will take over and in my case the dominant eye was my right eye. I had a center bead in the middle of the VR as was the style back then but never used it. The rear sight is your eye and the muzzle is your front sight.

Just get in front of the bird adequately and you will have dinner.

Jim