Beretta 1301 Tactical

[TCinVA]

Funnily enough, my wife's relative familiarity with her sporting clays gun is what's leading me down this path, so it's similar to what you describe but with a different outcome.

the thing is, those weird little idiosyncrasies you described earlier (why won't the bolt cycle, or the shell drop, or the lifter move, or this other weird thing, o right I gotta press in this little nubbin that doesn't even look like a goddamn button... oh, wait, that did something but not what I wanted it to...) can be intimidating with the semi even for someone that's passably used to using one. My wife can happily load one in the ejection port, press the button, slide one in the gate, call "pull", press the trigger twice, safely get to the next station and repeat. it's when there's an anomalous problem in that sequence that it all goes to hell. And even within that process, it takes her a station or two to "get it" again.

Right. Hence the pump gun's continued relevance in the world of defense. It's easy to set up and it's easy to get into action. "Grab it, pump it, shoot it" is especially useful for people who aren't practicing how to use their semi-auto on a regular basis. Most people do not train regularly with a shotgun, especially those in uniform who actually have them available. So a simple procedure to get the gun into action is crucial. (Or, if you are a police administrator, a complicated procedure that virtually guarantees someone won't have confidence they can use it so they won't even reach for it and potentially hurt themselves or someone else with it is crucial)

The pump is also a little bit faster to get into action than the semi, even with an experienced and trained hand. The pump is just more efficient to run for the first shot as opposed to running the semi's bolt. There was enough confusion on storing them for ready that I did a couple of videos for the JDC facebook to show how to set up for "cruiser ready" (I sometimes call it closet ready or safe ready to make it more relatable to normal earth people) on both platforms:

https://www.facebook.com/62296488121...10033502673224

https://www.facebook.com/62296488121...91764901715823

In class I advise keeping the gun in a ready state that replicated "cruiser ready" with a pump gun as closely as possible. At home I keep my 1301 with a shell on the lifter so it is as simple as running the bolt and I'm ready to go. In Home Defense Shotgun *every* drill we run is run from cruiser ready, requiring setting the gun up for cruiser ready to make that possible. It's done deliberately so that people become familiar with the process. Some of the work in more advance courses is done from a chamber loaded state, but I still spend as much time as I practically can getting people to work from an empty chamber so they get reps charging the gun and setting it up for an empty chamber.

I only get so many supervised reps with clients so I try to get as much value out of that as I can by burning in as many reps as I can that will be close to what they're going to have to do in the worst case scenario in real defensive use.

[nalesq]

Funnily enough, my wife's relative familiarity with her sporting clays gun is what's leading me down this path, so it's similar to what you describe but with a different outcome.

the thing is, those weird little idiosyncrasies you described earlier (why won't the bolt cycle, or the shell drop, or the lifter move, or this other weird thing, o right I gotta press in this little nubbin that doesn't even look like a goddamn button... oh, wait, that did something but not what I wanted it to...) can be intimidating with the semi even for someone that's passably used to using one. My wife can happily load one in the ejection port, press the button, slide one in the gate, call "pull", press the trigger twice, safely get to the next station and repeat. it's when there's an anomalous problem in that sequence that it all goes to hell. And even within that process, it takes her a station or two to "get it" again.

I don’t understand why semiauto shotguns have to be so complicated to load and unload, compared to other semiauto weapons. Is it just so that one can run the bolt manually to eject the round in the chamber without putting another shell on the lifter? Why is that such a desirable feature given all the other user interface problems it causes?



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[rob_s]

I don’t understand why semiauto shotguns have to be so complicated to load and unload, compared to other semiauto weapons. Is it just so that one can run the bolt manually to eject the round in the chamber without putting another shell on the lifter? Why is that such a desirable feature given all the other user interface problems it causes?

First, I don't think comparing them to other semi-autos is the right comparison. Comparing them to pumps is.
Second, even if you are comparing them to other semi-autos, once you've gone AR... Yes it's not bad compared to an AK, hell it's even kind of similar I suppose with the charging handle on the starboard side, but it's not as ergonomic as an AR
Third, what seems to confuse people (even me!) is the "weird" amalgamation of buttons, some of which don't even look like buttons, the fact that pulling back on the bolt may or may not actually chamber a round...

In fact, typing that last line, it occurs to me that your question may have been more about "why have they designed these things in such a cockamamie way" not so much "what the hell is wrong with your wife".

[nalesq]

First, I don't think comparing them to other semi-autos is the right comparison. Comparing them to pumps is.
Second, even if you are comparing them to other semi-autos, once you've gone AR... Yes it's not bad compared to an AK, hell it's even kind of similar I suppose with the charging handle on the starboard side, but it's not as ergonomic as an AR
Third, what seems to confuse people (even me!) is the "weird" amalgamation of buttons, some of which don't even look like buttons, the fact that pulling back on the bolt may or may not actually chamber a round...

In fact, typing that last line, it occurs to me that your question may have been more about "why have they designed these things in such a cockamamie way" not so much "what the hell is wrong with your wife".

Yeah, I’m definitely coming from the perspective of “why have they designed these things in such a cockamamie way?” lol!


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[TCinVA]

I don’t understand why semiauto shotguns have to be so complicated to load and unload, compared to other semiauto weapons. Is it just so that one can run the bolt manually to eject the round in the chamber without putting another shell on the lifter?

On some guns, yes. It is. Some guns have a magazine cutoff so you can quickly take a shell out of the chamber allowing you to climb over a fence, get into a blind, or get up into a tree stand. Or to prevent a shell from ending up in the chamber if the gun receives enough of an impact for inertia to cycle the bolt. Some guns do not have this feature.

The Mossberg semi-autos, for instance, do not have a shell cuttoff. They will drop a shell on the lifter every time the bolt is cycled. Berettas and Benellis do have a shell cutoff.

To drop that shell on the lifter, you need to engage a shell release button...which is naturally in entirely different places on each gun. Beretta traditionally places theirs on the underside of the trigger plate behind the lifter. Benelli has theirs on the right side of the trigger plate up by the trigger guard.

And so even if you are a guy who handles a wide variety of shotguns on a regular basis and you teach this stuff when someone shows up with a semi-auto that you don't use regularly you have to borrow the gun from the client and play with it to figure out whether it has a magazine cutoff, where the controls are, etc.

This isn't a concern for most people because they stick with one brand of semi-auto shotgun and police mostly use pump guns.

[GJM]

With a Benelli or 1301, if you leave a round released on the carrier, with the safety off, it can hardly be simpler to get the shotgun into action.

If someone can't invest the time to learn to do that, they might be better off with pepper spray and an air horn.

[nalesq]

With a Benelli or 1301, if you leave a round released on the carrier, with the safety off, it can hardly be simpler to get the shotgun into action.

If someone can't invest the time to learn to do that, they might be better off with pepper spray and an air horn.

If the Benelli/1301 were the only weapon one had, besides maybe a revolver, I would agree. But it’s precisely that extra step of having to push some special button or another to release a shell onto the carrier before attempting to chamber a round that is so potentially confusing (and annoying to me), because virtually no other repeating firearm has such a thing.




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[nalesq]

Accidental duplicate post

[TCinVA]

If the Benelli/1301 were the only weapon one had, besides maybe a revolver, I would agree. But it’s precisely that extra step of having to push some special button or another to release a shell onto the carrier before attempting to chamber a round that is so potentially confusing (and annoying to me), because virtually no other repeating firearm has such a thing.




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That's why I teach people to have a shell on the lifter. That can be done in a zero stress environment so that under stress just running the bolt loads the gun for use. Since setting a gun up for storage should always be something we do carefully and deliberately in a no-stress environment it should be easily doable for most folks.

[Navin Johnson]

A shell on the lifter (ghost) makes it easier than a pump to use.

Yes one (she, he, they, them) must jack the bolt (which is slightly more complicated than just racking the slide as long as the slide is unlocked ahead of time) but then it's far more reliable and easier to operate than any pump.

Overall it is more complicated than a pump but many people shouldn't drive a car let alone own guns.....