M14 Forum

Lionseye

I'm looking at picking up a Winchester 1300 with a rifle sighted, 22 inch smooth bore Deer Slug barrel and wood furniture. Looks all original as far as I can tell and it's in good condition. Plastic trigger guard. It's had some use, but otherwise not heavily worn, misabused or rusted. The bore's fairly clean and not overly worn. I've never owned one before or have much experience with them and was wondering what you all thought. The parts market worries me a little since there not made anymore and my normal parts suppliers online seem to have a lot of out of stock parts. I'm a lefty too and lefty safeties seem hard to find. The price is a $150, and it woud be used as a home defense shotgun and occasional hunting gun. For the price, I'm thinking it's worth it and a $150 is real cheap to me for any firearm.

What do you all think of them?

It's basically like these,

Swamp Rat

I have the defender version and it is a great shotgun. As far as slug guns for defense they are gtg just remember that if you shoot buck through a rifled barrel the pattern will open up.

Lionseye

It's a cylinder/smooth bore so it should be good for 00 Buck and slug. No choke though so the pattern should be as wide as a football field by 50 yards with 00 Buck, but I'd use slug for hunting with it. Nothing would be stopping me from adding another barrel on either. The 22 inch is a bit long for indoor defense, but I wouldn't grab it for that before a pistol for regular bumps in the night or an AR for louder bumps. It would be handy for outside problems like a dangerous stray dog or dangerous stray dirtbag. I'm currently shotgunless since selling off my 870 defense a while back and have been wanting to pickup another for that use. Hunting with this one would just be a plus.

hammer 1

My brother has a winchester 1300, we were stuck with slug guns for deer until only about 4 or 5 years ago. Loaded with what it likes, it was suprisingly accurate. For 150 bucks in good shape its worth it, I still have 2 slug guns, A rem 870 with rifled barrel, and an old ithaca 37 smoothbore. The ithaca was one of those secrets of the smoothbore world. The bore was a little under size, so you could get really good groups.

Lionseye

I was wondering whether you've either seen or had any parts breakage. I was reading the extractor are a weak spot and would like to know if any other parts are, especially since parts are hard to come by now it's seems.

I believe it's a fair quality firearm just like Winchester rifles are, but every quality firearm has parts that break. Even for a $150, I still need to be able to support it and keep it running or it becomes a $150 club.

It looks like Winchester made an optics (Weaver) rail and ring set for it and I looked at the mounting holes it has on the top of the receiver. Are there any better optics mounts you all know of for it too?

hammer 1

Lionseye, I called my brother, and he confirmed that he never had a problem with it. That is well over a decade, probably closer to 15 that hes had it. Hope it helps.

Lionseye

It does Hammer 1, thanks alot.

I'm going to get it. I think I'll be able to support it well enough and I've been missing having a shotgun around.

dprice3844444

you can have the barrel threaded for replaceable chokes,including a rifled choke for shooting slugs

Lionseye

That's an interesting idea for the smoothbore. I've always liked barrel mounted iron sights like these, but most companies put them only on rifled shotgun barrels it seems. Thanks.

Zardoz

The 1300 is my favorite shotgun. The action is really slick, and can be VERY quickly cycled, should the need arise. The only problem with them is that spare barrels and/or other parts can be a little tough to locate these days.