Quick question about "cut down" shotgun spread

[JoeJ615]

been looking for a home defense style shotgun for a while now and actually was considering either the maverick 88 or the IAC hawk 982 .. i was leaning toward the hawk mainly because it had a peep/ghost ring style sight, i have an opportunity to trade a bolt action .22 rifle i have for a Maverick 88 that the guy has cut down to 18.5" and he took off the bead and added fiber optic front sight and buckhorn style rear sights ... my question is how will the "cutting down" of the barrel effect the spread? i know the 88 comes with a "cylinder bore choke" and i just dont know enough about shotguns to say how the shade tree gun smithing may effect the performance with any given ammo from field shot to slugs, any input is greatly appreciated ty

[BryanP]

I don't know what kind of effect that will have, but some quick googling tells me that Mossberg 500 barrels will fit a Maverick 88, so worst case you can replace the barrel pretty easily.

[enfield]

Take it out and pattern it before buying. At in-the-home distances, I wouldn't expect barrel length or choke to matter a lot.

[Jonnin]

I studied this a while back. No legal shotgun barrel cut down has significant impact on spread at defense ranges. Chokes can change it up, but the barrels are too long to affect spread.

To get the nasty combat spread you need a dreadfully short and ILLEGAL barrel, talking like 3-5 inches.

[JoeJ615]

i dont know if testing first will be possible, i know barrel length effects spread im basically trying to figure out if a cut down 18.5" barrel should pattern about the same as a factory 18.5" barrel ... or if cutting it down might effect the "cylinder bore choke" .. i know any burrs on the inside of the barrel could effect it slightly and to look for that, as far as buying a new barrel for it i would be kinda screwing myself over since the rifle im trading is roughly the same price new as a new maverick 88

[Jonnin]

Yes, 18.5 will pattern the same assuming you cut it 90 degrees cleanly. If you cut it at an angle it will mess with the pattern somewhat, the steeper the angle, the weirder it will get.

Yes, cutting on a barrel messes up the choke. If its a threaded insert choke, it will now stick out or if you cut far enough, the threads will be *gone* and choke no longer fits. If the barrel is choked by shape, and you cut it, that is also *gone*.

As I said above: barrel length does NOT have any significant impact on spread if the gun is LEGAL. 18.5 or 20, its about the same until you get well past "normal operational distances". Longer barrels will be tighter at any given distance, but at self defense distances, you are talking a few milimeters of radius and within the margin of error from one shot to the next or brand of ammo variation etc.

Even if he messed up the choke, as a self defense gun, it should still be fine. Throw in some #3 or larger shot and some slugs, and it will do what you want it to do at "inside the house" distances.

Edited October 30, 2012 by Jonnin

[JoeJ615]

yeah i figured inside the house distances it would be negligible, but im wondering since the gun does have the rifle style sights i wanted if it will still be fairly effective at 50-80 yards or so, with say 00 or slugs

Edited October 30, 2012 by JoeJ615

[zgunbear]

yeah i figured inside the house distances it would be negligible, but im wondering since the gun does have the rifle style sights i wanted if it will still be fairly effective at 50-80 yards or so, with say 00 or slugs

I don't think it will. I keep a modified tube in my 870 and I get okay slug performace at 50 but buck will spread too much to be effective.

A cylinder bore is a straight 12 gauge barrel no real choke. So the pattern will spread even more. If you get it you may want to try a barrel with screw in chokes to see if you can get the performace you want.

At home defense distance out to about 10 yards you will have a fairly tight pattern. At 20-25 yards buck should spread out over a standard siloutte target.

If he cut it square and deburred it correctly it should be decent for home use.

The proof will be in the shooting every barrel patterns differently. When I was at Scattergun technologies I patterned some 870 barrels using the same receiver. All the barrels were supposed to be the same but the patterns were dramatically different.

[Jonnin]

We tried a 100 yard slug shot at a 3 gun match. Lots of guns from junk (mine) to pricy. Rifle sights, bead sights, red dots, little of everything. Very, very few shooters hit the target on the first shot. Average was 3-4 shots to score 1 hit at 100. You can do better than that with a gun set up for it but the gun you describe would be on par with these (home defense setups). 50 yards, maybe. 25, sure, easy. Past 50, though, you would as likely as not miss a kill shot at game (deer) with a slug unless you set the gun up FOR slugs. And as was said, past 25, buckshot will still be devestating but so spread out that you have no control where the rounds go. For either (buck or slugs), past 25 yards I would consider it potentially cruel for game (due to missing vitals / swift kill hits).

[Caster]

If you're gonna cut the barrel dow and remove the choke, google "Jug Choking" and try that. A brake cylinder hone will do the trick but it's time consuming.

Essentially you are making a small area larger than the bore so that the shot expands then the cylinder bore chokes it back down a again. Similar idea to back boring only a little more shade tree.