Shotgun Chokes Newbie

[xsquidgator]

A few months ago I joined an outdoor range with weekly trap shooting. I liked it enough to trade in my Mossberg Maverick 88 - 12 ga 18" barreled, no choke HD shotgun for a turkey gun (H&R Pardner pump turkey gun in camo) I saw on clearance yesterday. My new shotgun has a turkey choke screwed in and a 22" barrel, so it meets the rules at the club (at least 22" barrel, I think for noise concerns) for trap shooting. My thinking was that this new shotgun will still be ok for HD (I have a number of 9mm/357 handguns plus a few rifles too) but mostly I'll use it every week or two for some recreational trap shooting. http://www.hr1871.com/Firearms/Shotguns/pardnerPump.aspx

The owner's manual was very vague about what was ok to shoot with it, basically no steel shot w/o a special choke, and no word at all about slugs. I called H&R this morning and they told me over the phone that Winchester chokes were compatible with it, no steel shot w/o special choke, and slugs ok only if "improved cylindrical choke" is used. The H&R price was I think $25 plus S&H for it, so I ordered a Winchester improved cyl choke from Bass Pro Shops for about $10 less.-

A couple of newbie questions, then, from you experienced shotgunners:
1) does what I was told sound reasonable and/or consistent with what you know to be true about safely shooting? For HD I have a couple of boxes of 00 or so buckshot, and an unopened box of rifled slug shells, and of course the trap shooting is all with some sort of generic birdshot that the club sells on trap nights.

2) For home defense, would the best thing be to put the cylindrical choke in, just in case I wanted to shoot slugs in a hurry? The only reason i ordered the cylindrical choke was to be able to shoot slugs, although I don't know when I'll be doing that except for fun at the range. If I was in a serious HD situation requiring slugs (I don't know what that would be either, since I live in the suburbs with houses all around) I'd be inclined to grab one of my rifles anyway. But, I suppose it'd be good to have the flexibility to do so.

3) If I left the cylindrical choke in, I could shoot I think pretty much any kind of 12 gauge shell safely. If I took it trap shooting, the buckshot pattern ought to spread waaay out compared to using a turkey choke, right? I wouldn't want to do that (that's part of why I traded in the Mossberg b/c the unchoked 18" barrel wasn't any good for hitting the clays at more than 20-30 yards) but it would only be an effectiveness issue, not a safety issue.

Does all this sound right? I've had two unchoked cylindrical bore shotguns previously plus a .410 and never had to worry about a choke before. Any advice for me on stuff I should know before taking this shotgun out for a spin?

 

[Starter52]

You seem to be on the right track. The cylinder choke is good for HD. Some folks just take the choke tubes out and go with the unchoked barrel for inside work.

What you said about shooting slugs at the range "for fun" made me smile. Those 12 gauge slugs are murder on the shoulder.

I've found that at the 16 yard trap line a modified choke works best for me. You might want to invest in a modified tube. A super-tight turkey choke is too tight for 16 yard trap, IMO.

Congratulations on your new purchase, and good shooting.

 

[kentucky_smith]

Don't shoot without a choke installed.

 

[xsquidgator]

Thanks for the advice, I'm glad to hear I'm not too far off base. There are threads on the inside of the barrel at the muzzle for the choke, so I figured if nothing else a choke would need to be installed to protect the threads. I'll look forward to shooting the slugs, didn't know they were supposed to be *that* recoil intensive! Shooting jugs of water for fun is the only use I can think of for the slugs now that I have a couple of milsurp rifles (SKS and a Mauser K98). At the time I bought them I was thinking it'd be nice to have a pseudo rifle in the only long gun I had (the 12 gauge). I live in a suburb and the only way I'd shoot a shotgun slug to protect my house would be if I was the only one in the neighborhood who hadn't evacuated. A slug would go through a bunch of houses here.