I have become more and more interested in the combative use of shotguns recently. I plan to take a shotgun course within the next year or two from someone along the lines of Dagga/HiTS or Givens (training budget is blown for this year).
I was wondering if anyone could point me at some good resources in the meantime. Seems like there is a lot of hokey shit out there about shotguns, and not a lot of instructors/resources who have much operational experience with shotguns.
Tom Givens has a good DVD that covers use of the shotgun.
Last edited by BobM; 07-27-2017 at 08:19 AM.
Just having read Art of the Rifle and internalizing the importance of immediately working the action of a repeating firearm after every shot was immensely helpful to me. Grabbing a pile of dummy shells* to work on loading both the magazine and chamber is also a leg-up. Buying ammo early so you can make sure whatever you bring works is to be advised. It also shows you what, if anything, needs to be loctited on your gun. The guy next to me on the fifty-yard slug line last weekend put me to shame with his groups using the same slugs. Until the rear sight on his 870 came loose. Another guy rolled in with sabot slugs and an un-zeroed smoothbore that another student and I luckily caught before loading up to loan him some of our extra slugs. If you can, try shooting some clays or whatever else one can think of to make a snap mount of the gun as practiced as possible. Can be done dry but livefire will let you know if it was well mounted or not with the quickness.
Ammunition management, manipulation, and mounting the gun from ready seem to be the universals in shotgun classes. They also get a lot of time devoted so someone with some practice under their belt can use that time to get existing technique dialed in tight rather than learning from scratch. The rest is variable and seems comparatively minor. So I'd suggest picking material that primarily focuses on that and it's hard to go wrong when starting with material from Tom Givens.
* With metal rims. The all-plastic shells get chewed quickly, hang up in mag tubes, and are even lighter to be a pain when unloading.
Edit: Seems minor but spend some time blindfolded with a shotgun shell in your hands, feeling it. While topping off a tube, it is nice to know shells by touch so you don't cram one in backward without noticing. I'll admit to noticing that I felt a star crimp while on the firing line in class and had to poke the shellstop in my Mossberg to puke it back out in a hurry. Was very glad I noticed and didn't try to chamber it.
Last edited by Hi-Point Aficionado; 07-27-2017 at 09:09 AM.
Chris from Lucky Gunner ammo has a few very good videos on combat shotgun on YouTube. Just search for his YT channel. All his videos are great.
The late Louis Awerbuck (God rest his soul) has an excellent book on basic shotgun skills.
They can be tough to find, but an excellent reference.
Anything written by Tom Given should already be in your library.
For general shotgun shooting, I highly recommend Bob Brister's book, "Shotgunning: The Art and the Science". It covers everything from gun fit to choke selection to the relationship between shot hardness and patterns. It is not a "tactical" manual, but it covers the hows and whys of shotgunning.
https://www.amazon.com/Shotgunning-A.../dp/1602393273
To confirm, is the Awerbuck publication which you are referring to "The Defensive Shotgun" in paperback from 1989?Originally Posted by SeriousStudent
Finally got a pair of Remington 870P SBS stamps back and will be seeking out a good shotgun course in the near future (hopefully it will be a HiTS course...).
tp
That is correct, I have attached a photo of the cover.
And good luck on the SBS stamps. I am waiting on my second, and hope it comes quickly.
I think we need an SBS photo thread.
Ask and you shall receive@LGChris is a member here. Perhaps he'll pop in and drop some links since I'm too lazy to dig them up tonight.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?lis...Y2rzonjrGg0wie
The guy from Lucky Gunner
In the same boat, and hoping to attend one of Tom's courses soon--in the meantime, some excellent resources mentioned above. The dummy rounds were invaluable for me--I have some from Brownells that are very good. What they are selling currently looks a little different but looks like a good option:
http://www.brownells.com/gunsmith-to...prod67708.aspx
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