[texasheat]

What shotgun would you reccommend to protect my home?

[bkt]

My Remington 870 20ga.

20 gauge is good for the home. It has less kick than a 12ga and there's less risk of overpenetration.

A Mossberg 500 series is certainly in the same league.

[GUNGIRL]

eh...I have a Benelli Nova Tactical..

[notdku]

Just curious but the old adage is shotgun for home protection. Why is that? Shotguns seem too bulky to maneuver through the house and seem like they have a higher chance of being grabbed by the intruder if you came face to face with one around a blind corner or such.

[bkt]

For some people, accessibility is an issue: behind the Iron Curtain here, shotguns can be purchased fairly easily, but you have to jump through hoops to get a pistol permit (it takes six months to a year to process the permit paperwork).

Choice of ammo is important no matter what you use. You want to stop an intruder but not harm anyone on the other side of the wall. Some people load in a slug/buck/bird sequence in the event an intruder needs progressive forms of discouragement.

Arguments can be made favoring a pistol over a shotgun and vice versa. Use what you're comfortable with and practice, practice, practice! (Can you wake up out of a sound sleep, grab your firearm, chamber a shell/round, take the safety off and aim it all in a few seconds?)

[Brian Briggs]

Mossberg 590 12 gauge here.

[BrassMonkey]

Shotguns have a few advantages over handguns, or rifles for H.D.

1.) At close ranges where a H.D shooting would occur (5-20 feet) no pistol, and few rifles can come close to the power of a shotgun with #4 buck or greater.

2.) Over penetration beyond your property is less likely with a shotgun vs a pistol, or rifle. This is critical if you live in a urban area with close neighbors (civil liability and all).

3.) Aim a pistol, aim a shotgun with an 18" barrel and you will see that with most shotguns the muzzle does not extend much farther than that of a pistols at arms length.

4.) It is much easier to be accurate with a long arm, than with a handgun.

I was more than a little bothered the first time I saw a box of Hornady TAP in .308win. The idea of marketing .308win for HD sounds like a horrible idea unless you live way out in the stix with no near by neighbors.

[GUNGIRL]

Originally Posted by notdku

Just curious but the old adage is shotgun for home protection. Why is that? Shotguns seem too bulky to maneuver through the house and seem like they have a higher chance of being grabbed by the intruder if you came face to face with one around a blind corner or such.

uh yeah...you hear a shotgun being racked back...you know you need to run...just the fear of hearing one does it for me

[dkpbxman]

Before I retired from the NYPD, sometimes we'd be on the street with a crowd of nosy people around us totally unfazed by our drawn .38's but when the Emergency Service guys showed up and racked the old 12 ga. Ithaca's , people would stop in the middle of a sentance and stare.

[Splatter]

Originally Posted by notdku

Shotguns seem too bulky...

Not necessarily: