Anyone use Wilson Combat's Remington Steal?

psycho nut

New member
Long story short, I have a 20 gauge 870 that is in a box that I would very much like to have operational again. It's the receiver minus the tube, barrel, and trigger assembly. The wood was all broken and the tube bent enough to bust up the soldering, and the pump slide bent.

I heard about Wilson Combat's shotgun refurbish program sort of at random a while ago and finally decided to look into it. The shotgun they use for their before/after photographs is pretty banged up, but is basically just a super rough 12 gauge shotgun missing it's wood.

I really am just trying to find out how banged up they'll accept and if 20 gauge is supported.

I poked around a little on their site but didn't really see anything that answered my question and it's too late to call so I figured I'd see if anyone either knew about Wilson, or had any other ideas of how to get this thing put back together.
 
Assuming it is a LW 870 model, aside from having to have the magazine tube re-soldered into the receiver, you can buy all the parts you need and put it back together yourself much cheaper, if that matters to you. And you can buy either polished blue Wingmaster parts, or flat black, walnut or synthetic - whatever you want. Also, if the receiver is set up for 2-3/4" you could have the ejector and ejector spring changed over to 3". I have repaired several "run over with the truck" Remingtons through the years and the bent magazine tube is usually the biggest hurdle..
 
I had that done long ago when the Scattergun Technology brand name was purchased by WILSON and they started doing the work. IIRC I paid about $160.

Today they charge $229.95 for that same service and that as a minimum does not include shipping costs there - and I strongly suspect does not include return shipping.

So my recommendation is not to do it. Just too expensive. At least to me it is. If you have any mechanical or gunsmithing skills at all, much of that work can be done by yourself. Specially the swapping out of parts.

Regards,

Rob
 
The best bet for resoldering the magazine tube is Remington. They have all the jigs all set up. Also, there is a small block - I forget the correct name and it is not shown as a separate part - That is soldered on top of the mag tube in the receiver that the flat on the bottom of the barrel chamber fits against. That needs to be replaced, too. Everything else is is easily doable by anyone with moderate mechanical skills. Check where the stock bolt screws into the rear of the receiver. I have seen the rear of the receiver bent in a truck run over as well.
By the time you do everything you may be up past the cost of a used gun, but you will in effect have a practically new gun, if that matters to you.
 
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