Gun Appreciation Thread - Page 147

Here's my baby. Optics next. LMT upper, bushy lower. Custom painted by yours truly. Looking to swap the KX3.

Quote:

Originally Posted by zarathustra 

Thought I could get some input from you gents. I grew up shooting, fishing and hunting. I had to give up my collection when I moved to NYC. Having recently moved from the city, I have the opportunity to start my collection again, except doing it the right way now. Rather than simply buy whatever stikes me for the day, I want timeless pieces. Prefering bird and waterfowl hunting to deer (at least with guns), my thought was to get a semi-automatic 20 gauge. Any thoughts to brands? I happen to like the Benelli's, but am not sure as to their quality today. Any thoughts?
As per a handgun, I have always wanted a 1911 style .45, particularly the customization options. I liked my SIG220, it was a bit spartan for my tastes now. Where is a good place to start looking there? Kimber's were just starting to be distributed when I left the hobby. From what I can tell they still seem to be a solid gun.
Thanks in advance for any insight you can provide.

20 ga. will limit you in waterfowl shooting now that you have to use the non-toxic crap. The best shotgun is much like the best hunting boot, it is what ever fits you best (and you shoot the best). Many along the North Mississippi flyway will tell you that anything other than a Benelli in the duck blind is a single shot, and there is some truth to that. The Benelli Super Black Eagle is a great waterfowl gun but not so much for upland. Benelli is inertial cycled and most of the others are gas bleed off operated. Of course that means a Benelli will kick a bit more but as long as your doing wingshooting likely will never feel it. You can use shims to adjust cast and POI on Benelli and most Beretta's today which is a plus for me. I like to float targets and birds a bit, it is hard to hit what you can't see. The only semi I have left is the Benelli Ultralight (BUL) and it is one hell of a gun. Also have one of the first Benelli Sports made and it has more than 100K rounds through it and several thousand in the BUL, the quality is still there. I grew up was raised on Ithaca 37's and Remington's, they are somewhat neutrally cast and I can still shoot them decently. And yes the new Remington's are nothing like the older ones just spend a little time on a sporting clays course to see that. Not talking about just the 1100 eating O rings either. The old A5 humpback was a heck of a gun with a more netural cast than Brownings made today but heavy in the uplands unless you have a sweet sixteen. The made in Japan ones are just as good as the Belgium ones IMO. The new ones coming out are not identical to the older ones. I also like my O\U's a lot and my preference is Beretta and the Rizzini family- B. Rizzini, F.A.I.R and CG. They are all great guns for me but hard to pull off a triple with 

I'm retired military and the lowest ranked medal I have is Expert in pistol, the 45. And one that I am a bit more proud of over a lot of those "higher" ranked medals. I try to stay out of the pistol debates on here. We all have our preferences. There is nothing wrong with the Kimberly 45 from what I have seen but like any 45 it takes a lot of practice to become good with it. Shoot often and shoot well.

zarathustra sounds like the 45 worked for you, and that is all that matters. If it isn't broke don't fix it. Although there is a saying beware the man that shoots just one gun there is also something to the saying buy the biggest gun safe that you can't afford because eventually you will need it, trust me on that one.... 

Also seems like the 20 works for you. My first thought was, as usual, anything the 20 can do the 12 can do better. But I also shoot the 20 and have ~6,000 yellow hulls around here that I feed one of my MEC 9000's with an electric motor attached. If you like the 20 you might want to check out the benelli montefeltro (AKA monty). To me it is one of the best handling semi's around, worth a try. They are 6 lbs. same as the BUL in 12. For me if I go much below 6 lbs. the gun can get too wimpy especially for pass shooting or sustained lead. Weight does help with recoil in any ga, it is basic Newtonian physics. A friend of mine has a 20 Monty and for late season pheasants in SD goes to 3" 20ga. shells. Because it is light as he says it will "knock your eye teeth down to your piss sack". Pretty sure he is implying that the recoil is kind of stiff with heavy loads. But is fine with standard 2 3/4"

A couple of months before bird season opens I switch out my target shotguns for my hunting guns and put a couple thousand rounds through each on clays. What I did on my BUL was remove the worthless gel recoil pad and put a kick-ezz on it. I have 2 different thickness pads depending on how much outerwear I have on so I can keep the LOP the same. And put some slickeez on the heel and toe to prevent snagging on mount:

The Kickezz pads are heavier than the stock pad so the gun lost some of its dynamics. To restore it I went to a screw in (gasp!) poly choke. Hey don't knock it. We used to think they were ugly as sin. But the way this thing shoots and handles makes it almost pretty to me, and no more choke tubes to fumble with. It also brought the weight up to about 6 3/4 lbs:

Just a couple of ideas thinking outside the box. Birds don't really care what you are shooting at them. And if your friends in the blind do, it is time for new friends IMO. But I also like upgraded EELL wood on my target guns.

I'm not a 1911 guy per se.  I've handled Colt, Springfield, Sig, Para Ordnance, and few others.  I like the Springfield.  I believe you can still get it in a GI spec package, very basic configuration.  You can also get models that are "fully loaded".  Depends how much you want to spend. 

Les Baer and Cabot Arms to name two more really expensive brands.

Some are loyal followers.  Some think they are overpriced compared to less expensive 1911s.  Some say they all have reliability problems out of the box.  If you want to dig deeper, check out 1911forum.com.  As mentioned above, I own one.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JohnGalt 

Thoughts on kimber?

First of all, you need to acknowledge that a portion of the price you pay is simply for the name and the reputation assigned to the company. Now that that's out of the way, they're pretty solid guns once you get past the break-in period. Until you put 500-1000 rounds through them, they seem to be a bit picky on ammo. Personally, I find it easier to just drop in a stiffer recoil spring, which makes pretty much any ball ammo ride those feed ramps like butter on ice. If you're at a $1k price point, give or take, it's a reasonable choice to make, but Kimbers are not the manna from heaven that will turn you into a master shooter, nor will any gun for that matter. 

Qualification: I own 1911s, including Kimbers, and my first 1911 was the Kimber Warrior II.