Posted on 10/27/2015 9:17:30 AM PDT by w1n1
The AK family of weapons is reliable and rugged. It was designed to be operated by illiterate teenage conscripts with little to no training. It was never intended to protect a family after a natural disaster and is ill suited to that purpose. If the answer comes down to supportability and simplicity, you need a shotgun.
Everybody has their own ideas about guns, that is part of their charm. There are near-infinite combinations of precision, wounding potential, and magazine capacity. There is much opinion on this. I will give you mine. You are welcome to violently disagree; it is your God-given right.
I have been to some bad places around the world and have seen bad things happen. When I lived on the Gulf Coast, I went through the aftermath of several major hurricanes. I now live in a rural area and maintain a wide selection of weapons. When I hear a noise in the night, I grab the shotgun.
Simplicity
The AK was designed for wartime production. The elimination of a bolt hold-open feature saved three parts. In Soviet Russia, magazines are scarce and valuable, so you are driven to hold the magazine to work the flapper magazine release. This is meant to make you hold on to magazines rather than let them drop free, since itll be in your hand before you insert the next magazine. The sights require a tool to adjust. This keeps recruits from messing up the fine zero the factory armorers put on it.
Semiautomatic rifles have their place. In the proper hands, with quality ammo and parts, they can shoot a lot of rounds a long way. There is also a place for bolt guns, but the relatively slow rate of fire demands that they be employed with some stand-off. At distance, even a Lee-Enfield or Mosin-Nagant could be effective.
My vote for home protection? The all-American choice is the Remington 870. The pump shotgun is incredibly simple. The controls? A safety button and a pump. Work the pump and shoot. Got a jam? Work the pump and shoot. Repeat as necessary and reload. Read the rest of the shotgun story here.
Almost stopped reading right there. Shotguns are great, but I like to ability to kill things up close and at a distance. In fact, the worse things get, the more likely I will be to engage at greater ranges.
A shotgun is a great home defense weapon and can be impressed into service beyond that, but the moment that I transition to an open area outside of a building, I prefer a rifle/carbine, most any rifle/carbine, to a shotgun.
Applies to both your rifle and your gun.
The best self-defense weapon you can have is a working brain. Any gun you can possess is probably already possessed by the turds, so that is not a leg up in itself.
Fortunately, a working brain cannot be readily purchased at a gun show with ill-gotten gain. That is one advantage that we CAN have over the scumbag “black lives matter” anarchists.
Mine was born as a Yugoslavian illiterate conscript AK
but when it got to Ellis Island somebody tattooed some
American numbers on it.
Poor old thing.
The shotgun for blowing 'em out of my house and the AK for blowing 'em out of my driveway?
Works for me, except for the AK part.
Already got the shotgun...really don't like an AK...think I'll stay with my Mini-14.
Every AK I've seen/handled was a stamped-metal POS.
Probably very effective for a jihadi running thru the desert, cleaning it only when he stops for a quick camel humping, but it's not for me, other than as an oddity, or a throwaway after a one-time use.
Yeah, yeah, I know...there are those that will absolutely swear that an AK is the end all, be all of every long weapon ever designed and built, but it's nothing more than a cheap piece of crudely constructed trash, intended to be just that.
Yeah, I'm an AK snob.
But would you really want to bet your life with the Russian-designed POS?
Not me.
Unfortunately. Or not.
I was pretty much of a butthole in my teens.
It all comes down to proper training.
Another opinion stated as fact, but without any real evidence to back it up. My preference is for an UZI, or if I had the money an MP-5K (Stated also without any facts to back up my opinion)
Pump action shotguns like the 870 are great until you’ve short stroked it in the heat of the moment and have a heck of a jam to clear.
Just don’t get mixed up between fighting and fun...
Just buy a tactical shotgun with a factory 18” barrel.
I’ve got an 18” 870 with a recoil reducing synth stock and pistol grip that is really nice.
Well, er, I mean I used to have one before that boating trip gotdangit!
You know that that goes!
(very good parody)
I would go to a good gunstore that takes trade-ins and gives a fair price.
Trade in your full-length 870 and I don’t think you would have to give much to boot.
That way you have a brand-new defense shotgun with no barrel worries and someone else can put your full-length model to good use.
Yep. I was reading an article written by a career burglar. He said he wasn't much concerned over dogs or alarms. But hearing the sound of a pump shotgun, that was something else again.
Most .410 shotguns will ALSO shoot 45 cal bullets too (i think)
I know mine does
(or it did before the tragic boating accident)
check out a Circuit Judge.
When the SHTF it can be used any number of ways
AR-12
Mr. niteowl77
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