Originally Posted by
TCinVA
Probably because designing a system that self feeds the wide variety of ammunition available for shotguns is expensive and difficult and even with more conventional shotgun design there's only a handful that actually work very well.
No, that's not it. The people who are making these things don't know much about defensive shotguns either.
The overriding goals here seem to be chasing capacity and a short OAL. The weight, the complication of loading, introducing significant offset...it sacrifices a number of things that make the shotgun good at close range to chase capacity and AR controls, neither of which are really a benefit to the defensive use of the shotgun.
Worse still, they achieve a short OAL while simultaneously making a length of pull that is entirely too long for even above average sized males, ensuring that the gun will kick the ass of most people who try to shoot it. You can see it in the videos hitting youtube:
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Everyone who you see shooting that thing is stretched out and getting their shit handed to them by the gun...which is what happens when the LOP is too long, you're stuck with pistol grips that force a locked wrist, and you generally don't know how to use shotguns well. (Which most don't)
If I had to guess, I'd say the S&W version here is going to be more durable and reliable than the finicky Kel-Tec. I've seen precisely one specimen make it through a class without problems. I recently had a client who loved his Kel-Tec in class even though it had to go off the line for like 30 minutes while another instructor tried to unfuck it to get it to work again. Which it did only sporadically. I hope that person buys the S&W and find that it at least works properly.
But if that turns out to be true, it's a good execution of a terrible idea.
This shotgun was designed to sell shotguns to people who don't know anything about shotguns. And shotguns are gaining ground as home defense weapons lately because everybody from Joe Biden to Dave Chapelle is telling people they're great. I have a feeling I know a lot more about comedy than Dave Chapelle knows about shotguns, and I'm reasonably sure I could plan a better exit from a two-decade war than Biden pulled off, but neither of those people know a goddamn thing about defensive shotgunnery. So, yes, I'm saying I'd be better at their job than they would be at mine...but people actually take the information seriously and companies need to sell things. So I expect to see even more ridiculous shotguns in the near future.
Maybe lever-action shotguns will be next, spurred on by all the people who don't have meaningful experience actually trying to run a lever gun seriously enough to find out that they are finicky as shit and kind of suck.
Combine widespread ignorance with bad information spewed by people who don't know anything and a hunger for novelty and this is the result.
Buying something like an 870 or a 1301, configuring it properly and learning how to use it is nowhere near as enticing, it would seem, as buying goofy shit. Still, there will be people who actually want a defensive tool and will seek out training and in the process will learn why goofy configurations suck. And then they'll buy an 870 or a 1301 and configure it properly. And they'll occasionally scream some wisdom into the void and maybe save a few people the bother.
And the rest...well...they'll be on youtube, facetweet, and instabook getting their shit rocked when they shoot a goofy shotgun.