Versamax Replacement

Sniffer

Sniffer

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I have a Tac Ord Versamax with basically every option. I love the gun and it is a great fit for action / dynamic competition.

With the VM being a 3.5" gun (unofficially) the loading port is already pretty big and then with Tac Ord opening it up it makes loading easy. Also being 3.5" means that instead of 5 x 3.5" rounds it can hold 8 rounds (or 9 with a ghost load on the gate off the start). 8 rounds (1 in chamber and 7 in magazine) is optimal as that is the most efficient (2 x quad loads).

Are there any other guns out there which can / could have similar capacity? Seems like most of the guns are 3" which cuts the magazine capacity down to 7 (6 in magazine and 1 in the chamber). The Beretta 1301 Pro Comp has some slick features and although it is a 3" gun the receiver is a 3.5" which means it is big / lots of room to get rounds in the gun, downside is what I mentioned previously about magazine capacity.

Not super familiar with whats out there so curious if there are any platforms that fit the criteria as I might consider picking up something new.
 
One thing you will notice is increased recoil with the 1301. I have both and put a mix of shells through, including “full” slugs.. Vmax just soaks it up because of the weight, steadier hold for me
 
45CAT said:
One thing you will notice is increased recoil with the 1301. I have both and put a mix of shells through, including “full” slugs.. Vmax just soaks it up because of the weight, steadier hold for me
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I swap the stock to a TONI system Stock it actually perform the same as the Versamax minus the weight
 
Yeah the 1301 Pro Comp seems to be the obvious choice - does anyone miss the extra mag capacity (6 in the tube vs 7)?
 
Sniffer said:
Yeah the 1301 Pro Comp seems to be the obvious choice - does anyone miss the extra mag capacity (6 in the tube vs 7)?
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The Beretta 400 series is an option if you want higher capacity. It's the same receiver as the 1301 Comp, but uses 3.5" barrels.
 
Grain said:
The Beretta 400 series is an option if you want higher capacity. It's the same receiver as the 1301 Comp, but uses 3.5" barrels.
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Interesting.

Does the 400 series have the gate-lift-for-easier-loading feature like the 1301 Pro Comp?

I'm guessing that is a 1301 Pro Comp only feature (feels like the Pro Comp is Berettas offering for action / dynamic shooting).
 
Sniffer said:
Interesting.

Does the 400 series have the gate-lift-for-easier-loading feature like the 1301 Pro Comp?

I'm guessing that is a 1301 Pro Comp only feature (feels like the Pro Comp is Berettas offering for action / dynamic shooting).
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Not factory, but you can buy the lift gate from Stoeger and install it (in a 400).
 
Sniffer said:
Thats great info, thank you. The barrel is on the long side at 28" but I will keep this in mind.
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There are a lot of different 400 Model's, have seen them as short as 24". Edit, the 24" appears to be 3", the shortest 3.5" I can find is 26".
 
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Check out the Browning Maxus II. Factory auto load (The main reason I bought one), mag tube cutoff if you need it (I use it to ghost load), and has a regular mag tube cap you can put an extension on. Comes in 3.5", and the factory controls are decent.

Very simplified operation- no shell release button, so you get a shell if you rack the bolt. And auto-load, so you can stuff shells in any condition and you'll have one in the chamber. Makes full loads from empty a lot simpler too; you don't have to load 4, hit the shell release, rack the bolt, load 4 like on your VM. Just 2 quads and you're in business. I put a J Kenny auto load lifter in my open Versa Max, but the it was expensive as balls, and took a bunch of tweaking to get it to work 100%. The Maxus is flawless right out of the box.
 
Scotty454 said:
Check out the Browning Maxus II. Factory auto load (The main reason I bought one), mag tube cutoff if you need it (I use it to ghost load), and has a regular mag tube cap you can put an extension on. Comes in 3.5", and the factory controls are decent.

Very simplified operation- no shell release button, so you get a shell if you rack the bolt. And auto-load, so you can stuff shells in any condition and you'll have one in the chamber. Makes full loads from empty a lot simpler too; you don't have to load 4, hit the shell release, rack the bolt, load 4 like on your VM. Just 2 quads and you're in business. I put a J Kenny auto load lifter in my open Versa Max, but the it was expensive as balls, and took a bunch of tweaking to get it to work 100%. The Maxus is flawless right out of the box.
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Hadn't considered Browning but that sounds like a good fit. How has the reliability been? Does it run / feed anything or is it fussy?

I moved to the J Kenny autoloader on the VM too so I have ran it both ways (ie dropping the first round into the chamber and hitting the bolt release then loading the other 3 into the magazine or loading 4 straight into the mag and the gun auto cycles to put one in the chamber).

I too find the system fussy and expensive. Finding the sweet spot to get it running is tricky but it will work. Even with a machined / enlarged loading port I find that the lift gate sometimes hits the end of the first round after you load and jams (I find I need to push my thumb up the tube just a little to get the round slightly further away & give the gate a little more clearance to get to the lower position before the round springs onto it).

All in all it works well, if the port was more open / angled on the magazine side it would help as my thumb could carry the shells forward a little easier like I mentioned before but it was only when I stripped the gun recently that I realized why this isn't possible (more machining would be removing metal from the male and female threads of where the magazine tube couples to the receiver so the tube would have to tighten down to exactly the same place every single time it was removed).
 
Sniffer said:
Hadn't considered Browning but that sounds like a good fit. How has the reliability been? Does it run / feed anything or is it fussy?

I moved to the J Kenny autoloader on the VM too so I have ran it both ways (ie dropping the first round into the chamber and hitting the bolt release then loading the other 3 into the magazine or loading 4 straight into the mag and the gun auto cycles to put one in the chamber).

I too find the system fussy and expensive. Finding the sweet spot to get it running is tricky but it will work. Even with a machined / enlarged loading port I find that the lift gate sometimes hits the end of the first round after you load and jams (I find I need to push my thumb up the tube just a little to get the round slightly further away & give the gate a little more clearance to get to the lower position before the round springs onto it).

All in all it works well, if the port was more open / angled on the magazine side it would help as my thumb could carry the shells forward a little easier like I mentioned before but it was only when I stripped the gun recently that I realized why this isn't possible (more machining would be removing metal from the male and female threads of where the magazine tube couples to the receiver so the tube would have to tighten down to exactly the same place every single time it was removed).
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I've only ever run target loads and low recoil slugs through it, but it hasn't skipped a beat since new. Lightest loads I've tried are the standard 1oz of #7.5 at 1180 FPS, but it eats those. No break-in required.
 
Sniffer said:
Interesting.

Does the 400 series have the gate-lift-for-easier-loading feature like the 1301 Pro Comp?

I'm guessing that is a 1301 Pro Comp only feature (feels like the Pro Comp is Berettas offering for action / dynamic shooting).
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the Pro lifter is available as a part and its quite simple to do
 
wildchef said:
Actually The TONI is more comfortable and mitigate the recoil better than the stock kick off
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Wow, that's completely opposite to what you would expect. I was going to try TONI's M4 stock, but with no LOP spacers they won't work for me.
 
Still thinking about this (going to look at shotguns tomorrow), from memory the 1301 Pro Comp & my Versamax are ~21" but it sounds like most of the 3.5" guns have longer barrels.

I am almost sure that Tactical Ordnance can cut the barrel down (to say 21") - would mean cutting the barrel & rib and rethreading for chokes - does anyone know for sure (I can reach out but it is the weekend)?
 
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