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Most reliable pump shotgun
- Thread starter Jarrett M
- Start date
I’m not a fan of the benelli pumps at all. The remington and mossberg are both plenty good. I have a mossberg I have hunted with since I got it at 12years old. I have a Revelation from my old man that is a rebranded Mossberg that some hardware stores sold in the 70’s that has hard use and still sends them although it looks like shit now.
I think the 500 is slicker than the 870 but I’m old and like semi-autos now.
One opinion-
I've had Model 12's & 870's, both have been very durable/dependable.
or there is this... I haven't read the article.
https://www.recoilweb.com/best-pump-action-shotgun-175578.html
I've had Model 12's & 870's, both have been very durable/dependable.
or there is this... I haven't read the article.
https://www.recoilweb.com/best-pump-action-shotgun-175578.html
I love my Mossberg 590A1.
I bought it as I believe in the military reliability tests it’s design went through.
I went to a one day shotgun class last year and watched Beretta 1301s fail here and there but my 590A1 kept chugging along. I was also able to shoot it faster than the 1301 shooters on one of the drills.
-Stan
I bought it as I believe in the military reliability tests it’s design went through.
I went to a one day shotgun class last year and watched Beretta 1301s fail here and there but my 590A1 kept chugging along. I was also able to shoot it faster than the 1301 shooters on one of the drills.
-Stan
What don’t you like about the benellis? I need a tactical shotgun and had just about decided on a supernova
Not sure about the pumps. But i love my benelli super eagle 2 for hunting. Wanting to get my hands on an M1014.
Wait, didn't we have this thread already?
It's the 3rd thread you've made about this lol
It's the 3rd thread you've made about this lol
Took a shotgun course. The instructor had an 870 with 10's of thousands of rounds through it (i cant remember the exact number). Never been cleaned. Ran great- reliable.
And if instructor is a duck hunter I can almost GUARANTEE he has also bragged about using it as a boat paddle.
870’s are fine guns. I’d pick one over a Mossturd or one of those abysmal spaghetti pumps any day of the week. But…. it must be cleaned and maintained just like any other tool.
Model 37 Ithaca all day every day.
All steel.
Bottom feed bottom eject.
Slam it & Bam it.
I'd go Mossberg out of those choices. Handled a Nova once and thought it felt cheap. Now, Im personally an 870 guy and have a few but there are issues with them. There was even a time the chambers were so rough, you'd have a hard time racking it after firing and have to mortar it to open it. A little chamber polishing and it's all good now, but it shouldn't have left the factory like that. That said, I turkey hunt with a Mossberg 500 410. Love that little shotgun. Just not a fan of the tang safety.
It may just come down to individual unit variance.
Limited practical perspective: I'm not a daily or weekly shotgun shooter and I haven't seen enough Nova or Supernova in the field, at any classes, or at any kind of clay sports to comment more. I think I've seen probably 2-3 malfunctions where it wasn't clearly user error (i.e. short stroke, shell in backwards, etc.) with the 500/590 elsewhere before. And one of those was ammo related.
From a theoretical perspective: Just seeing the design, parts, etc. of the Nova and Supernova - I don't see anything that makes me think they goofed on the gun. For the 500, militaries and people far more experienced and serious than me have evaluated and accepted the 500/590 around the world in the last few decades. The only nugget of doubt in my mind is I've never seen a 500/590 that seems to be THAT well made - but they all seem well made enough to work properly.
If we include out of production though - then yes, I'd take a Win 1897 or Ithaca 37 if it's still in good condition, parts aren't messed up, springs still work, etc.
Limited practical perspective: I'm not a daily or weekly shotgun shooter and I haven't seen enough Nova or Supernova in the field, at any classes, or at any kind of clay sports to comment more. I think I've seen probably 2-3 malfunctions where it wasn't clearly user error (i.e. short stroke, shell in backwards, etc.) with the 500/590 elsewhere before. And one of those was ammo related.
From a theoretical perspective: Just seeing the design, parts, etc. of the Nova and Supernova - I don't see anything that makes me think they goofed on the gun. For the 500, militaries and people far more experienced and serious than me have evaluated and accepted the 500/590 around the world in the last few decades. The only nugget of doubt in my mind is I've never seen a 500/590 that seems to be THAT well made - but they all seem well made enough to work properly.
If we include out of production though - then yes, I'd take a Win 1897 or Ithaca 37 if it's still in good condition, parts aren't messed up, springs still work, etc.
I shot skeet with an 870 for years. Very reliable. Action was smooth as glass and worked great for follow-up shots.
I've owned 4 shotguns and all were reliable. Remington, Winchester, Benelli.
Personally I would only go with a tang mounted safety at this point if it's to be used tactically. Moving with a shotgun/start & stop I don't like the crossbar style on the Rem for tactical usage. Also, the last base 870 I purchased roughly 15 years ago was so rough inside I sold it before even firing it.
Mechanically, I wouldn't worry about these very old designs when running standard shells if gun in maintenance. If the specific one you have is unreliable have a smith work it over but I doubt you'll have issues with standard shells.
Personally I would only go with a tang mounted safety at this point if it's to be used tactically. Moving with a shotgun/start & stop I don't like the crossbar style on the Rem for tactical usage. Also, the last base 870 I purchased roughly 15 years ago was so rough inside I sold it before even firing it.
Mechanically, I wouldn't worry about these very old designs when running standard shells if gun in maintenance. If the specific one you have is unreliable have a smith work it over but I doubt you'll have issues with standard shells.
From reading your post, and making the assumption that you no longer have the shotgun. If you do still own it, I would clean it real good. If cleaning it doesn’t work I’d look online on how to adjust the yolk.
Is that not the newer version without the removable barrel?+ one on a Ithaca Model 37.
Remington 870, Mossberg 500 & 835, and the Benelli Nova are all considered amongst the most reliable pump shotguns currently made.
I'm in the Mossberg camp for the loading gate arrangement and excellent aftermarket support. But if you are going to 3 gun, buy a 835 turkey. Two reasons. One, The short barrel that accepts chokes from the factory. Two, It has 590 style mag tube, so you can easily extend it.
I bought a 590a1 20" and love it now, but had to pay a good chunk to get the barrel threaded for chokes. I went with Brilley and they needed to mill off my bayo lug
. Maybe the 590a1 in 18.5" wouldn't have had the same issue.
I bought a 590a1 20" and love it now, but had to pay a good chunk to get the barrel threaded for chokes. I went with Brilley and they needed to mill off my bayo lug
. Maybe the 590a1 in 18.5" wouldn't have had the same issue.Attachments
This is the answer. All day, every day.
If you can't fix a broken/abused part from a previous owner on an Ithaca 37 to get it working, maybe guns aren't your game. Maybe we should have a spelling contest instead?
I had a benelli nova I bought for turkey hunting. Patterned it with different shells. Killed a few geese, and muskrat with it and raccoons. Took it out for a pheasant hunt, we started with a tower shoot ten spots around the tower bout ten birds per spot. Benelli started off good and once it got warm started having failure to feed and extract. To the point of holding onto the pump and slamming butt stock into the ground. Tried four different brands of shells and it did it with all of them. Sent it off to benelli they took it apart cleaned it shot it. Said nothing was wrong. When I got it back I took 25 of old nasty rusted shells that have been in the garage for years. It ate them all up. I do think something was wrong with the gun and they just didn’t want to admit it. I sold that gun and bought a Franchi Affinity 3 (yes I know cheaper m2) and love it.
Had a couple 500's , 590's since the mid 80's. Only had a Super Nova for maybe 12-13 years(?), but probably have more rounds through it as I used it pretty heavy a while for Heavy Metal 3 gun and shotgun matches, plus as a loaner gun for a lot of people. The term reliability was used... I don't recall ever having a malfunction of any kind with any of them honestly. Though one of the 500's did snap it;'s safety in two one cold hunting season, which is/was a pretty common problem. If you feed them crappy ammo (rusty or steel based Winchester stuff) anything will give you trouble.
The thing I dislike about the Nova is the fat receiver. In the woods like to carry them one handed grasping the receiver, even with my larger hands it's less than optimal with the Nova, so it didn't get used long as a turkey gun. I'd have no qualms with it sitting in a duck blind. So use plays a part in the equation.
The thing I dislike about the Nova is the fat receiver. In the woods like to carry them one handed grasping the receiver, even with my larger hands it's less than optimal with the Nova, so it didn't get used long as a turkey gun. I'd have no qualms with it sitting in a duck blind. So use plays a part in the equation.
My 590a1 came threaded for chokes from the factory. It's 20" as well.I'm in the Mossberg camp for the loading gate arrangement and excellent aftermarket support. But if you are going to 3 gun, buy a 835 turkey. Two reasons. One, The short barrel that accepts chokes from the factory. Two, It has 590 style mag tube, so you can easily extend it.
I bought a 590a1 20" and love it now, but had to pay a good chunk to get the barrel threaded for chokes. I went with Brilley and they needed to mill off my bayo lug
Did you ever clean it?
I've had plenty of 870s and novas over the years. No mossbergs.
All of them eventually had issues loading and ejecting when they got dirty enough. Once you have to mortar the slide, clean em up a little and they're good for another 500 shells. You guys act like pumps are supposed to run forever without a good cleaning.
When did they start doing that? I Think mine is a '12 or so...
Here is the model I bought. States Cylinder bore.
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I'm not sure when they started that. I bought mine in 2015. It has a metal trigger guard too. Some of them I've seen don't. I heard the 20" is harder to find because the police departments scooped a lot of those up
Man, I really miss having access to a skeet range. For some reason around here (WA state on the wet side) there are a lot of trap ranges but very few skeet, and none nearby.
I learned to shoot skeet in Michigan in the 90's, bought a used Mossberg 500 there and shot a couple hundred rounds every other Sunday afternoon for 4 years, never had an issue with it. I've still got that one along with a 90's era Maverick 88 that my son uses on his trap team; picked that one up about 20 years ago since they use the same barrels. Both have been reliable.
Barrel availability can be an important consideration. I've ended up with the whole range of barrels over the years, from rifled slug barrels to short ghost ring sighted tactical barrels to long trap/skeet barrels and several in between. The 500 is nice to be able to just drop in the right barrel for the application and go shooting. It's also pretty easy to find more barrels and chokes as well.
I'd put a 20 year old 870 in the same category, with the same strengths. But I'd be cautious about Remington quality in newer guns; they've made some decent stuff for sure but also some truly awful garbage.
I’ve got a ton of Beretta’s. In fact, every shotgun I own is a Beretta currently.
What I like about their current semis is that they are all gas operated, and unlike an 1100 Remington, they don;t stop working after a few hundred rounds because you didn’t clean them.
The recoils reduction on the A400/A300/1301 series is fantastic. All because of how the gas system works… (unlike the Benelli (sp) which are all recoil operated).
What I like about their current semis is that they are all gas operated, and unlike an 1100 Remington, they don;t stop working after a few hundred rounds because you didn’t clean them.
The recoils reduction on the A400/A300/1301 series is fantastic. All because of how the gas system works… (unlike the Benelli (sp) which are all recoil operated).
