Shotgun for HD

Ok, I am looking to purchase a shotgun for home defense. I'm looking for something in the sub $300 category. I am thinking 12 or 20 ga. Something I could have at the house for HD but also take out every once in a while and have some fun wasting a few shells.
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No single right answer, I have a Mossberg and a Winchester both loaded one pump the other semi-auto. one 12 gauge the other 20 gauge leaning against the wall by my bedroom door both available, if needed. Bad guy really won't care what the bore is, he will only see a hole big enough to drive a semi-truck into. He won't care what the action is only what comes out of the barrel and how much it is going to hurt.

For your multi-purpose use, (both of mine double as deer and turkey guns besides HD), I would stick with a straight stock moderate length barrel. magnum loads not required for in house distances so 2 3/4" shells of whatever slug or shot you decide on will be more than sufficient. More important is stock fit of the gun to you. You don't want to be trying to wrestle a to long stock into position at dark thirty at night and then take a beating because you are not wearing a shooting jacket when y9u get out of bed. It's also another reason you don't need magnum class shells in your gun.

Find a gun fun to shoot that you can hit your intended target with. If its fun you are more likely to take it out and play with it more often. The more you play with it the more familiar you get with the gun. This helps more than you can imagine when things go bump in the dark and your adrenaline starts pumping by the gallon. This is why I do not recommend a particular make or model or even gauge. What works for me may be completely wrong for you or your neighbor or your wife. Get what feels right for you.

Best bet if you don't have a shooting buddy with a variety of shotguns to play around with is to go to a local skeet/trap range and talk to the old timers there. Most like to talk about guns for some strange reason and if you are serious and respectful some will let you try what they have. I do not recommend a trap gun for HD but I bet you will find these guys are hunters, ex military, some will be cops. They will all have different degrees of experience which will do you a lot of good.
 
A decent pump shotgun would serve you well enough. A Remington 870 Express or Mossberg 500 seem to be the most popular choices and would be my first choices if they could be found within your budget (my personal HD shotgun is a Remington 870 Express Magnum with a 20" smoothbore slug barrel that I bought very lightly used for $150), but I wouldn't feel bad about a NEF Pardner Pump or Maverick 88 either.

The only caveat I would include in the above advice is that I would look for a gun with a 20" barrel or shorter since longer barrels are somewhat unwieldly inside a house or apartment. You can frequently find good deals on guns with 28" field barrels on the used racks or the shelves of pawn shops and they may be worthy of consideration if you're mechanically inclined enough to shorten them.

As far as ammunition goes, I personally like either very coarse birdshot (i.e. BB or larger) or fine buckshot (#1 or smaller). My 12ga loading of choice is Remington 3" #4 Buck.
 
Or you could find an old JC Higgins 12ga for cheap and turn it into your HD gun and buy an under $300 hunting/ skeet 12ga later on. I've seen old JC Higgins shotguns for as low as $75.
 
As others have said, 870 Express is probably the most cost effective solution for shotgun home defense with reliable track record and options for aftermarket.

for something you won't shoot very often to understand its reliability, you should find the popular solution.
 
C'mon now doesn't this KSG look tempting? You can save up another 600 or so beans and wait a few months... How can you possiblly pass this baby up?

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http://www.keltecweapons.com/news/preview-kel-tec-shotgun-ksg/

AND here is an article about SG home defense ammo. Old school conventional wisdom was 00 Buck unless you're worried about over-penetration in which case use #4. But there is a convincing argument from Randy Wakeman here for #1 and #0 Buck:

http://www.chuckhawks.com/home_defense_shotgun_ammo.htm

Here is some interesting info on shotgun wounds at various distances:

http://firearmsid.com/A_distshotpatt.htm

Some pictorials of shot patterns at more than HD range with different chokes and ammo:

http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot45.htm

Also some pattern testing at 7 yards and 15 yards. I don’t know what the layout in your house is like but typical HD distances at 15 – 20 feet, hallways / stairways may vary. In my old house the distance from the formal living room to the family room (where all the home electronics were) was about 35’. It used to be that you could expect buckshot pattern to open up approximately one inch for every yard away from the muzzle. When it exits the muzzle it's almost one inch in diameter. So at 10 feet it might be a 3 1/2" to 4" inch pattern. But cup / no cup, and different performance loads (flight control) change that.

So anyway these links should give you some idea of what your shot pattern would be. When you get your KSG you’ll have to shoot some patterns with it to see (he he he).


http://www.shotgunworld.com/bbs/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=191407&start=0

http://www.shotgunworld.com/bbs/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=239195

http://www.myscienceproject.org/shooting.html
 

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I'm surprised that that Delta force shop even sells "The 12 Gauge Boundary Security System." There have already been many cases involving similar setups (like wiring a shotgun to the door to shoot an intruder), and the people who have rigged these things up have lost in court.


Kato v Briney

The primary issue was whether an owner could protect personal property in an unoccupied boarded-up farmhouse against trespassers and thieves by a spring gun capable of inflicting death or serious injury. The court affirmed, holding that the law did not permit spring guns to be used in such instances.

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081118193958AADwsKn

I'm sure we already all know this, I was just surprised that they sell such a contraption.
 
It does....

BTW, there's a Gibson Les Paul Studio within my reach. Not as great an ax as the old 58 ES335 I used to use, but for just here in the house it'll do.

Same with shotguns. Get a decent one, and build your chops....
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I am a Gibson man myself. :D

I own a '08 Les Paul Studio, '74 Les Paul Custom and a '98 Flying V. Also have a tele thrown in for good measure.

Thanks to everyone for all the suggestions. After thinking about it, I would like something I could go shoot skeet with every once in a while too, so I guess a standard SG rather than a tactical one would be a better choice for that.
 
In part. I played that ES335 so well because I played it so much. I had the fingerboard replaced and it was refretted twice.

That's applicable here. That fine Gibson was bone stock, but it sang in my hands.

A bone stock shotgun can do the same. Ever play a great solo that just seemed to come out without much thought? It's like that, and like that, only happens after a good bit of work.

Shotgunning is loud Zen. It takes work to happen, and then it just happens.

So, go get a GP shotgun and shoot the heck out of it. Call it Woodshedding if you wish. Then, if something hinky your way comes, you're prepared and you've had a good time getting there....
 
Guys like Dave McC and others have spent a lot of time trying to dispell the myth that shotguns are pray and spray firearms , and what do we hear from the purveyours of The Back-Up but,"The shotgun provides a wide spray."
 
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People actually do that, rig a shot gun to go of if you come through the door, WOW! I saw Dale Gribble do that on "King of the Hill", but that was a cartoon:D
 
It's hard to beat the Remington 870. And the Ithaca M37 Defense Gun is awesome too. I've got a Remington tactical and will be adding an Ithaca real soon - the 8-shot wood stock model.
 
Ok, I am looking to purchase a shotgun for home defense. I'm looking for something in the sub $300 category. I am thinking 12 or 20 ga. Something I could have at the house for HD but also take out every once in a while and have some fun wasting a few shells.

Spam,Spam,Spam
 
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