Who's our resident shotgun expert?

by John Meeker, Wednesday, January 02, 2013, 06:18 (4289 days ago) @ Paul

"All are excellent firearms and quality does match price on these, note that camo and synthetic also affect price. In SC in prefer AA Sporting Clay #7 1/2 or Heavy #9"

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I'd say for him to go for the 525 in 12ga. Far & away the best gun & value & not overpriced for what it is, as some of the others on his list are, IMO. A 525 is simply a European Miroku [Japanese] Browning Citori, generally w/better wood, dimensions and that uses [or did] the original 'Invector ' chokes rather than the later 'Invector + ' chokes. The dif being that the std. 'Invector' choked guns have slightly heavier bbls., a good thing, IMHO. Some friends & I imported a number of such guns some years ago from [Andrew] Litts in Wales for just that reason, 20ga. guns w/30" bbls. to use for personal high volume shooting in S.A. before the Argentineans got to be such picks [added what amounted to a 'personal gun use permit fee' of $40 per & extra paperwork hassle & departure taxes, among other things] about bringing your own guns to use. Oh, and NO ports were on the European 525 bbl.'s either, since all of the "Brownings" sold in the US at that time had shorter and 100% factory ported bbls. Anyway the 525 is a very well made O/U that for any purpose is a fine gun by any standard; one of the world's best from a design & function perspective, closely following the original design that FN made as the original superposed Browning had designed, but with better steels and in some ways fit, because of the CNC matching technology in use today. I'd personally also say that the modern Miroku bbls. are better made than the original FN's, if for no other reason than they do NOT have the ribs soft soldered to the bbl.'s, as the original & modern custom shop FN made guns do and therefore don't shoot loose. Having a rib come loose in the field in a 'hot corner' & then have to spend $400~$750 to have it put back on an FN & the bbls. reblacked/blued is no fun. BTW, Winchester 101 ribs sometimes come loose too. I presently have one being refit by Andrew MacFarlane, an English expat gun builder friend and it is still gonna cost me a pretty penny,

In some remote spot or in the field an O/U will continue to function much longer than anything else; even if an ejector fails one can shoot it as an extractor gun & should one bbl. fail to function for whatever reason, the selective trigger lets the operator shoot the other one. In a defensive situation or over some years of neglect, that may be important. A 12ga, loaded with an once [28 grams] of anything, shot size wise, is superior to a pistol/revolver inside 20 yards 100% of the time and I don't care how big the caliber is. You know that, but your friend may not. A 12ga. within a few feet can cut a 4x4 piece of wood in half .. w/one shot! Quite powerful & convincing medicine, when needed. A 525's purpose as a sporting weapon would have almost zero challenge, while some of the other models listed that can fire more than three rounds could become subject to rather stricter rules , regulation or even confiscation.

Never give a politician the benefit of the doubt.