Adding a slug barrel to a Wingmaster

I am with Butcherbill .... I had a scoped H&R Ultra Slug Hunter .... and probably spent over CAD $300.- and in order to find a sabot that shoots well out of that gun. The best I ever got was around a 4 inch group at 100 meters.

And that is around the sort of group size I get from my smoothbores with Federal Truball slugs. So, I decided to go smoothbore ....

Smoothbores are just a more versatile setup ... and they are accurate enough within 100 meters.


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Best I could get was 3.25” @ 50m iirc, this was with Hornady SST sabots. 100m groups were 6-7” easily with them. Fed and two different Win sabots were even worse, 10-12” 100m groups.

For the price of 12g sabots and that accuracy I’ll stick to .308 or .303Brit, my no.4 sporter shoots way better than any result I got with a sabot. I’m sure my 12g smooth bore would shoot better at 100m, it does at 50m for sure.
 
I hunt a shotgun only area and would not carry a shotgun anywhere a rifle was legal. Limited choices for sabot slugs and the prices are getting ridic at $6 per shot.
 
Butcherbill said:
I’ve had it on the 870 express mag it came with as well as a DA Grizzly 870 clone, I figure it’s picky with ammo. Would like to shoot some REM accutips through it but they haven’t been all that easy to find, not am I in an MU that I’m only allowed to shoot slugs for certain open seasons. Not a big deal but I’d like to find a load it’s shoots well, would be a fun bear gun.
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Worth a shot, I know that rifles are a lot easier to get an accurate load than shotguns.

Another option, if you have an extra receiver, is to have the barrel "pinned" to the receiver. You can have the gun drilled and tapped together to so that you have a repeatable connection between the receiver and the barrel, then drill and tap the receiver for an optic. I was going to go this route but my gunsmith said I should hold off until I get a chance to shoot this slug gun, he has not seen too many issues with the cantilever barrels on the 870s.

One annoying thing though now is that Remington in its new iteration has not released anymore 20ga cantilever barrels, so my wifes 870 combo has a side saddle and rifled sights with irons, not ideal.
 
Fox said:
Worth a shot, I know that rifles are a lot easier to get an accurate load than shotguns.

Another option, if you have an extra receiver, is to have the barrel "pinned" to the receiver. You can have the gun drilled and tapped together to so that you have a repeatable connection between the receiver and the barrel, then drill and tap the receiver for an optic. I was going to go this route but my gunsmith said I should hold off until I get a chance to shoot this slug gun, he has not seen too many issues with the cantilever barrels on the 870s.

One annoying thing though now is that Remington in its new iteration has not released anymore 20ga cantilever barrels, so my wifes 870 combo has a side saddle and rifled sights with irons, not ideal.
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I’ll have to try it on one other 870 and see, I haven’t totally given up on it. Hoping to find some accutips now that Rem is back in production, I also read online of guys having good results shooting foster slugs out of their rifled slug barrels. Challenger’s were one that seemed to perform well, I have a fair amount of those tucked away and have always had them group well out of my smooth bore barrels.

I know what you’re saying about barrel to receiver fit though, my 14” NEA barrel it very snug fitting. When I got it I had to give the top of the barrel a few swipes of a fine file to get it to fully slide into the receiver, it has always been a great shooting barrel. I guess I could always try shimming a barrel for tighter fit if I wanted to experiment, I’d rather not pin any of the ones I have. Having a slug barrel was more of a novelty for me and not a must have, no shotgun only season here.

I’ve been tempted to get into loading 12g specifically for buckshot and slugs, would be fun to cast and load sabots and do some load work up for that barrel.
 
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Butcherbill said:
I’ll have to try it on one other 870 and see, I haven’t totally given up on it. Hoping to find some accutips now that Rem is back in production, I also read online of guys having good results shooting foster slugs out of their rifled slug barrels. Challenger’s were one that seemed to perform well, I have a fair amount of those tucked away and have always had them group well out of my smooth bore barrels.

I know what you’re saying about barrel to receiver fit though, my 14” NEA barrel it very snug fitting. When I got it I had to give the top of the barrel a few swipes of a fine file to get it to fully slide into the receiver, it has always been a great shooting barrel. I guess I could always try shimming a barrel for tighter fit if I wanted to experiment, I’d rather not pin any of the ones I have. Having a slug barrel was more of a novelty for me and not a must have, no shotgun only season here.

I’ve been tempted to get into loading 12g specifically for buckshot and slugs, would be fun to cast and load sabots and do some load work up for that barrel.
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Fosters are soft lead, they will probably lead up the bore pretty bad, my buddy did some testing with his and it leaded up bad.

The challengers are harder cast so less leading.

I got a Lyman mold now, I am amazed with the 12ga loading how well it shoots, will be able to have some fun now with a rifled slug gun.

It is amazing that the accutip slugs are $40/5 :O
 
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