Viking SOS Part 2 1980s Tactical Awesomeness
So I did a post on this gun 5 years ago, since then it has spent about that much time in the gunsafe not really getting used. Seemed like it was time to pull it out and take a look at it again, so I took a few pics while I had it out, debating what to do next with it.
These were made in the early 1980s, by Fabarm for Viking, a UK company. This was at a time when pretty much the whole of the tactical shotgun market was made up of only a handful of guns, like franchi's SPAS from a few years before, and maybe the like of a Winchester defender with a pistol grip, there just wasnt much else.
Anyway this gun saw little use even in the UK, with some being sold to police etc, and some less 'tacticool' versions being sold as well in the UK market, but faded away pretty quickly.
After 5 years, heres what I can tell you: feels good to hold, and does come up on target fast. The pistol grip is probably a little to thick, the wood is Oak, and is fine, the recoil pad area is tiny, the action works fine, the sights pretty good, and in honesty I cant say that the follow-up shots seem to come any faster with this moreso than most other guns (one of the reasons for the high sight line was the lowering of the bore line in relation to the shoulder).
I have only tried slugs and Buckshot out of it, and truthfully that small recoil pad does not make it fun.
For this much shotgun, a little over 7 pounds isnt bad, with a 24 inch barrel. The front sight block is often shown and illustrated backwards for some silly reason on these guns, its an aluminum casting (like the handle) and the angled side has dayglow orange paint as a highlighter in the top of it.
Fabarm used a staked in place ejector, seems less ideal than say a remmy 870, but works, and is easily replaced on the barrel extension
Due to british gun laws this gun, and others I have seen, have been roll crimped to limit magazine capacity to 2, yeah 2 rounds, and it sucks.
Overall without the mag modification I think this would have been a good gun, it feeds and ejects well, point and handles well, and the sights work ok, though obviously are not adjustable. For a gun intended primarily for Law Enforcement it seems ok, but it does seem like alot of machine work for the time, that today we would take for granted.
So I did a post on this gun 5 years ago, since then it has spent about that much time in the gunsafe not really getting used. Seemed like it was time to pull it out and take a look at it again, so I took a few pics while I had it out, debating what to do next with it.
These were made in the early 1980s, by Fabarm for Viking, a UK company. This was at a time when pretty much the whole of the tactical shotgun market was made up of only a handful of guns, like franchi's SPAS from a few years before, and maybe the like of a Winchester defender with a pistol grip, there just wasnt much else.
Anyway this gun saw little use even in the UK, with some being sold to police etc, and some less 'tacticool' versions being sold as well in the UK market, but faded away pretty quickly.
After 5 years, heres what I can tell you: feels good to hold, and does come up on target fast. The pistol grip is probably a little to thick, the wood is Oak, and is fine, the recoil pad area is tiny, the action works fine, the sights pretty good, and in honesty I cant say that the follow-up shots seem to come any faster with this moreso than most other guns (one of the reasons for the high sight line was the lowering of the bore line in relation to the shoulder).
I have only tried slugs and Buckshot out of it, and truthfully that small recoil pad does not make it fun.
For this much shotgun, a little over 7 pounds isnt bad, with a 24 inch barrel. The front sight block is often shown and illustrated backwards for some silly reason on these guns, its an aluminum casting (like the handle) and the angled side has dayglow orange paint as a highlighter in the top of it.
Fabarm used a staked in place ejector, seems less ideal than say a remmy 870, but works, and is easily replaced on the barrel extension
Due to british gun laws this gun, and others I have seen, have been roll crimped to limit magazine capacity to 2, yeah 2 rounds, and it sucks.
Overall without the mag modification I think this would have been a good gun, it feeds and ejects well, point and handles well, and the sights work ok, though obviously are not adjustable. For a gun intended primarily for Law Enforcement it seems ok, but it does seem like alot of machine work for the time, that today we would take for granted.
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