A customer brought me his FN Police Tactical Shotgun ( (POS) PTS) (WInchester 1200 clone) complaining it had jammed while firing a Sellier & Bellot 3" magnum buckshot load. The gun was jammed so tight he broke the stock trying to force the action open, but he had cleared the jam before bringing me the weapon.

I completely disassembled and inspected the firearm and found all parts in serviceable condition. I closely inspected the barrel extension locking lug recesses using my Hawkeye borescope and the bolt locking lugs and did not find any issues.

I test fired the gun using 2 3/4" Brenneke slugs with no malfunction, but when I fired one of Sellier & Bellot 3" magnum buckshot the gun jammed. On inspection I found that the rotating part of the bolt was unlocked but the action could not be opened using the slide. I had to tap the cartridge case using a 1/2" wooden dowel; but with just a slight tap the action opened easily. I fired a second round with the exact same result--jammed.

I've sent emails to both FN and S&B. I tried calling FN but no one answered the phone. I'm wondering if anyone here has heard of similar issues with this type firearm, and do you have an ideas as to what might be the problem?

Thanks

John,

Assuming there are is nothing around the mouth of the chamber for the fired magnum case to impel itself on, I would next look at the disconnector to see if it is dropping clear of the bolt carrier or "slide arm bridge" when the hammer moves forward. Maybe the added recoil of the 3" round is causing an incomplete disconnect with the disconnector.

Malm,

After I fired the first test round of 3" I noticed the bolt body had moved rearward about 1/4" so right away I thought maybe the disconnector wasn't engaging fully with the slide when in battery, and the slide had ridden up over it under recoil, but when I pulled the trigger group it didn't clear the jam. I pulled the barrel and the bolt was stuck in the barrel extension, even though the lugs had rotated out of battery. I dropped a dowel into the bore and the bolt popped out. There aren't any burrs on the bolt or barrel extension to stick a case--I've seen that before on other shotguns.

Since my first post I have some more info. I measured an unfired cartridge and the rim measures .8795" (only have one more) but the fired cases measure .8832" and .8891". I can't find SAMI spec for 12 gauge and I don't have headspace gauges so I don't know what it should be. I'm wondering if the chamber might be just a little oversize or the rim of these S&B rounds is just a little too big.

If this is a cartridge issue it could put someone in real danger if they were using these rounds in a gunfight and there gun jammed like this.

Have you tried it with any other brand of 3" shells? We had some guys using S&B at a Patrol rifle / shotgun instructor school this summer and I believe a couple of them had problems in their ReM-870's.

quote:

Originally posted by Rick R:
I believe a couple of them had problems in their ReM-870's.

That's blasphemy!

John,

I have a 1200 here and in checking, at a distance of 1/4" the bolt hasn't rotated enough to clear the lugs. Rim diameter on the chamber .886 and .074 on the depth.

If it only unlocks with a direct push on the bolt face it could be related to the bolt head camming pin. How did it and it's hole looks? And I too would try a different brand of ammo just to rule out an ammo related failure.

Malm,

There is a bit of galling on the bolt where the camming pin slides. It sure doesn't look like enough to matter but I don't know for sure. I talked to the owner today and he tells me there were two other guys shooting the same ammo when his jammed and they had issues as well. I'm going to do a little more investigating but more and more it looks like it might be too hot of a load.

Thanks!

Similar issue, but with a 20 gauge 1200. Fired cases or unfired - 'almost' extracts, but needs a tap by a cleaning rod to ease out.

What I found was even though the bolt unlocks it still isn't extracting. The rim of the shell is catching on the left side against the lug recesses - pushed by the extractor.

Any ideas on a solution?

Get yourself a 20 year old Benelli M1-Super 90 and save your life!!

Mine has MANY thousands of rounds through it of all flavors. Eats anything and everything everytime all the time - night time - day time - duck time - play time. Light bird shot - 3" OOO Buck - 50 cal sabot rounds...whatever. In 20 years not a single jam or mis-que. Did I mention it's fast??

All 7 rounds on target in tactical order in about 2 seconds (less if I'm in a hurry).

quote:

Originally posted by Rick R:
Have you tried it with any other brand of 3" shells?

+1

I had a m1300 come in a couple months ago with basically the same problem. Took a while but I finally found the lug on the barrel was not brazed in the right place, being off to one side. I spotted this because the barrel was not aligned with the receiver. Put a straigt edge along each edge of the receiver and see if the barrel is centered. I pull the lug off and moved it over close to 1/16 " and silver soldered it back on. Reblued the barrel, end of problem. What happened is the barrel is rotated out of line and won't let the bolt completely unlock, especially with heavy loads. Bill