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5 Essential Drills for Your Home-Defense Shotgun

Make sure you actually shoot it and practice!

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Learn to rack the slide as soon as the trigger is pulled for rapid follow up. You may notice this happening with the motion blur of my forward hand.
 
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I wouldn't call those drills. I also disagree with one of them and a couple others are only relevant if you have a shotgun that only holds 4 rounds. Still another is not relevant at all for home defense. Well, I guess if you have a big enough house to get off a 25 yard shot inside of it maybe. "Cruiser ready" is not how my shotguns are stored.
 
Bassbob said:
I wouldn't call those drills. I also disagree with one of them and a couple others are only relevant if you have a shotgun that only holds 4 rounds. Still another is not relevant at all for home defense. Well, I guess if you have a big enough house to get off a 25 yard shot inside of it maybe. "Cruiser ready" is not how my shotguns are stored.
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Hornady makes a really nice rapid action clamping device that uses RFID to open where you can mount a defensive shotgun or AR-15 in an inconspicuous area of your home or business for quick access.
 
10mmLife said:
Make sure you actually shoot it and practice!

Learn to rack the slide as soon as the trigger is pulled for rapid follow up. You may notice this happening with the motion blur of my forward hand.
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^ I honestly think that these are the two biggest items with the manual pump-action shotgun.

"Running the pump" in a vigorous and decisive manner as soon as the shot has broken is something that's typically not thought of by those who haven't given more time to the shotgun as a defensive weapon.

Short-stroking the pump can cause all sorts of havoc. Run it like you mean it, and practice that way.

Great call, 10mmLife.
 
TSiWRX said:
^ I honestly think that these are the two biggest items with the manual pump-action shotgun.

"Running the pump" in a vigorous and decisive manner as soon as the shot has broken is something that's typically not thought of by those who haven't given more time to the shotgun as a defensive weapon.

Short-stroking the pump can cause all sorts of havoc. Run it like you mean it, and practice that way.

Great call, 10mmLife.
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Thanks professor!

Great break down per usual! 😁👍

I always appreciate your input!
 
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A lot of people out there don't get the concept of fast cycling and say things like if you couldn't get them with the first shot you shouldn't be shooting.

What if you're defending against a bear? I sure wouldn't stop shooting until nothing's moving or I'm out of shells.

What if there's more then one perp?

What if you missed? It could happen.

Shotguns aren't magic and any number of things could throw off your accuracy in a high stress situation such as the lack of proper stance because of environmental factors such as stairs or angled cover in a dwelling you never trained for etc...etc...etc...
 
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Any serious shotgunner is pulling back on the slide as they're pulling the trigger. Assuming we are talking about a pump. And you should be able to cycle very nearly as fast as you would a SA.

I have my 8 round 500 set up for tactical reload and I have spent a good deal of time practicing it, but to me it is far from the most important thing you should be working on with that particular shotgun. Personally, a shotgun with 3 or 4 round capacity wouldn't even be something I would consider for self/home defense. Something like the KSG, the SRM 1216 or the Tavor TS12 is not a shotgun I would give much thought to having to reload. Obviously the gun or ammo could malfunction and you should be prepared to deal with that.

I know we've discussed this here before and we all seem to understand that there is a difference between defending your home with a shotgun, (particularly in the middle of the night, in low light conditions and without a clear assessment of the threat and whether it is a target or your cat or your kid) and some situation where you are using a shotgun for self defense outside of your home. My point being that the way you train for these things is different and you should probably spend more time training for the one that is dramatically more likely, which is going to be navigating your dark house to see what that sound was for most of us.
 
10mmLife said:
Make sure you actually shoot it and practice!

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Learn to rack the slide as soon as the trigger is pulled for rapid follow up. You may notice this happening with the motion blur of my forward hand.
Click to expand...

Not necessary with a semi-auto...;)

My frontline HD shotgun is a Benelli M1S90...backed up with a couple of Mossberg pumps, and the “boom stick”...a Beretta 686 chopped to 18.5”.
 
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