Winchester 1300 and minishells

[748]

I inherited some mini shells, never fired any, never cared for them. I was watching some youtube on mini shells because I was at work and didn't have any work to do. I have a NEF break action 12 that can use them, so I put them in that guns stock shell holder and that's where they have been for the last few years. I saw a rumor that the 1300 will cycle minishells. So when I got home I got all 5 of my mini shells that I could find and loaded them in my 1300 and cycled them at kind of normal speed, loaded them back up cycled them slowly for dramatic effect, then then again but cycled them fast.
The cool thing about the mini shells is a gun that holds a politically correct four, 3 inch shells in the tube will hold something like 9 mini shells in the tube.
So my sawed off 14 inch barrel 1300 is now "high capacity" as soon as I can find more mini shells, thus giving my 1300 the evil feature it always lacked by design.
I always wondered why there was so much wasted space in modern light 2-3/4 shells, in some lower power shells around half the shells internal volume is wad.
My 1300 was made in the 1990s.

 

[Milkmaster]

I like the 1300. How short did you say the barrel is on it? Shouldn't be less than 18" to be legal unless you have a stamp for it!

 

[Jim Watson]

I always wondered why there was so much wasted space in modern light 2-3/4 shells, in some lower power shells around half the shells internal volume is wad.

Partly the difference between black and dense smokeless.
But even black powder shells have filler wads and cushion wads, you need something to reduce the pressure spike and avoid flattening shot.

 

[bannockburn]

748

Thanks for the info about the minishells. I have a 1300 but never thought about trying to run minishells through it.

 

[Sistema1927]

My 1300 runs well with the mini-shells. My Shockwave also does, but requires the Op-Sol adapter. And FYI, the KT KS7 does also, but it did, like most KT products, need an initial trip back to the "mother ship" prior to functioning with anything.

 

[MAKster]

I have used the Federal shorty shells in my Remington 870. Every 4 or 5 rounds I'll have a failure to feed. If I partially retract the slide and tilt or wiggle the gun I can then re-close the slide. That is ok when just shooting for fun but definitely not acceptable for self defense. The minis work great in a Mossberg 500 with the OPSol adapter.

 

[748]

I bought a box of 10 fed mini bird shot shells on clearance at Walmart today to test out capacity. Shouldn't be able to fit more than 15 in there.
I can always break them open and dump out the wimpy bird shot and put some number 4 or T shot in there.

 

[JT-AR-MG42]

Yeah, thanks for the info.
Posts like yours that share real world experiences (as opposed to internet lore)
are what makes this place the 'High Road'.
I'll try WM for some as well.

JT

 

[748]

I'm just wondering why we didn't see minishells become more popular for reduced power shells such as six pellets 00 buck shells, 1 ounce and sub 1 ounce shells before.
Did people just want to keep the 2-3/4 footprint out of tradition?

I loaded what I thought were some pretty mild 12 gauge 2-3/4 shells over the years. I still found shot that was still smashed.

 

[748]

The 1300 holds 7 roll crimp shells. Which is just enough to be banned in a few of the really retarded states.
The fold crimps 00 buck shells are a little longer, maybe by an 1/8 of an inch so might hold 6.