Cyclinder choke on 18" barrel

E

econrecon

Inactive
As I look to buy a 18" or 20" barrel for my 870 Express, I find many of the 18 inch barrels are cylinder bore, and the 20" barrels generally come in modified or improved cylinder. Rather than buy both, I'm trying to find something that will be a good balance between ease of use in tighter areas and some degree of accuracy out to about 30 yards.

How much difference is there in the spread in your experience between an 18 inch clyinder bore and the slightly longer 20" with improved cylinder. Obviously the 20" will be more accurate, but using 00 buck, is it a really big difference?

Thanks,

EC
 
Why is it obvious that the 20" will be more accurate?

IC in 12 gauge is typically .010" constriction - that will aid greatly for your 30 yard shot
 
HuntandFish, thanks for the link. I appreciate useful input like yours, it helps in gaining knowledge.
 
Last edited:
Two inches of barrel, in and of itself, has no bearing - the difference in choke is what will do that. Now if you get your barrel threaded for chokes, you can change them to suit your purposes
 
I was looking at an 18" HD barrel with cylinder bore that looked good, but thought that between that particular 18" barrel and a 20" with improved choke, I'd get more accuracy with the 20" barrel since it has more choke. I'm not having luck finding 18" barrels with removable choke tubes or an improved/modified choke, ergo the thought that the 20" would be more accurate. And as the link that HuntAndFish helpfully provided, I can see that the load being used is of great significance as well.
 
RAG81202_12Gauge.jpg


W5246-9617.jpg



Un screw and replace with any rem choke ?

rem_19165.jpg



Tuneability ......
 
I agree with oneounceload that the 20" would not necessarily be more accurate. Depending on the load you are using you may get a bit more velocity...but 2"....it won't be much. Don't have much insight on that, but I would favor those 2" or not depending on how the gun handles more than performance. JMO.
 
Interesting. The barrel I was looking at is very similar to the one in the photo posted above by Noyes. If there will be only a negligible difference between the overall performance of the 18" cylinder bore and the 20" improved choke, then I'll personally go with the 18" for handling reasons.
 
The Remington Police model barrels come in 18" and they all have Improved Cylinder chokes.
Remington considers the Improved Cylinder to be ideal for use with buck shot and slugs and will give tighter patterns.

You can buy Police barrels many places, and as an added advantage, they have the old style magazine cap retention system. These will fit your Express gun without any changes.
 
I believe, however, that all new production police barrels come IC unless specifically ordered otherwise. I'm not sure what year Remington changed them from cyl to IC. I have an older but not old 870P that is marked CYL and a newer one that is IC.
 
Just get some Federal LE 00 Buck with the flight control wad...absolutely fantastic patterns!! I'm getting really tight patterns out of a cylinder bore 18" barrel. By really tight, I am talking 3 to 4 inches at 10 yards!!

An IC choke would produce tighter patterns (probably). I think ammo is more important...the difference between Cylinder and IC is not all that much.
 
For several years now most 18- 20" Remington barrels have come with fixed ImpCyl chokes. A few have choke tubes from the factory, a couple have fixed Mod chokes, a couple still have fixed CYL chokes. There are lots of used CYL choke 18- 20" barrels out there from years gone by.

These days it's possible with almost any shotgun barrel, no matter the choke, to choose pattern size by experimenting with the ammunition used. In general, the least expensive buckshot (S&B, Rio etc) will throw wide open patterns, the name brand run of the mill buckshot (Remington, Federal, Fiocchi, etc) will throw medium sized patterns and the premium buckshot (Hornady TAP, Federal Premium with FliteControl) will throw tight patterns.

The 18" CYL bore barrel on my favorite 870 will put Federal LE-127 (9 pellet 00 at 1325 FPS with FliteControl) into about 4" patterns at 25 yards (75 feet) all day long...

lpl
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top