[JuniorPre 360]

I've put 4 or 5,000 rounds through the gun in the last couple of years, only cleaned it about a half dozen times and it works great!
Anybody got any updates?

I killed a lot of ducks and geese this year, some of them in ice and snow storms. This gun shot every single time I pulled the trigger and is right on the nut accurate. I mentioned earlier that the hammer was starting to wear and kind of mushroom from being hit so much. I found out it was just some corn leaves that got stuck on the hammer and turned the same color as the internals of the gun.

I still need to get my bolt out so I can give it a proper cleaning. I have about a month and a half before turkey season when I install my steady grip on it.

The only "con" is that it still won't cycle cheap lead shot.

 

[mudpack]

This gun .... is right on the nut accurate.

How does one determine if a shotgun is accurate?

 

[Roger Annabel]

The only "con" is that it still won't cycle cheap lead shot.

My gun won't cycle the cheap Winchester shells but it eats up cheap Federals from Walmart (100 shells under $25)

 

[mudpack]

When do we get to the "death test"???

 

[Roger Annabel]

so the gun has an easy 5000 shells through it and shoots near flawlessly...
until Federal changed the cheap shells they sell at Walmart. They changed the box, but the description stayed the same and the shells looked exactly the same to me but the gun stopped cycling. Shells would usually extract but not eject through the loading port and just stovepipe so first I broke down and did a really good cleaning on it. No effect. Next I figured maybe the ejector had worn from thousands of shells so I ordered one of these and changed it. $20 so no big deal, but it did absolutely no good. Then the light bulb went on and I changed ammo. I bought Estate brand shells that are even a little cheaper than the Federal shells ($5 a box at Walmart) and even though they are made by Federal, they cycle just fine.

go figure

 

[mudpack]

So, would you say the Stoeger is somewhat picky about the ammo it's fed?

 

[JuniorPre 360]

so the gun has an easy 5000 shells through it and shoots near flawlessly...
until Federal changed the cheap shells they sell at Walmart. They changed the box, but the description stayed the same and the shells looked exactly the same to me but the gun stopped cycling. Shells would usually extract but not eject through the loading port and just stovepipe so first I broke down and did a really good cleaning on it. No effect. Next I figured maybe the ejector had worn from thousands of shells so I ordered one of these and changed it. $20 so no big deal, but it did absolutely no good. Then the light bulb went on and I changed ammo. I bought Estate brand shells that are even a little cheaper than the Federal shells ($5 a box at Walmart) and even though they are made by Federal, they cycle just fine.

go figure

Are you shooting 2 3/4 or 3 inch shells?

 

[Roger Annabel]

I'm shooting 2¾ inch shells with 3 drams eq powder and 1⅛ oz #7.5 shot

and yes it does seem to be picky but I'm pretty sure if I were shooting hunting loads I would have no problems

when I first got the gun I kept a log of what shells it would cycle and which ones jammed, but it ate Federals for a year and a half so I stopped, figuring I was good

I blame Federal for changing their shells, I just wished that I knew what it was that they changed

overall, I still think it's an awesome gun (and not just for the price)

I found this video to be interesting:

starting at about 5:30

 

[Roger Annabel]

bump

 

[duckdozer]

So After 10k ish rounds I have my first failure in the weapon. Looks like this would be a common issue down the road for guys putting heavy use in the gun. I just broke it down as season has finally ended for me. Everything was coming along nicely and then I noticed after it was all took a part that that action bar was broken where the cut out for the bolt, this is a weak spot in the action bar so it is only natural that it broke here. Not upset at all as this gun has been put through the ringer. I was just bragging about it this weekend to some guys that were from Illinois that were shooting one that looked pretty new. I told him to check out this thread on how to make the shim for the extension tube. On the plus side it is only a $50 fix and is something that I can do myself. There isnt anything on this gun that is too complicated for one to completely tear down to the housings.

 

[mudpack]

that action bar was broken where the cut out for the bolt, this is a weak spot in the action bar so it is only natural that it broke here.

A break would indicate poor design engineering, poor materials, poor heat treating (if required) or any combination of the three. I wouldn't say it is "natural" for it to break, I'd say its a manufacturing flaw.
Regardless, considering what you paid for it, and the number of estimated rounds you've run through it, I'd say you've gotten your money's worth out of it. :thumbsup:

 

[DuckSlayer5200]

that action bar was broken where the cut out for the bolt, this is a weak spot in the action bar so it is only natural that it broke here.

A break would indicate poor design engineering, poor materials, poor heat treating (if required) or any combination of the three. I wouldn't say it is "natural" for it to break, I'd say its a manufacturing flaw.
Regardless, considering what you paid for it, and the number of estimated rounds you've run through it, I'd say you've gotten your money's worth out of it. :thumbsup:

It's only a manufacturing flaw if it doesn't meet the requirements. It could be a design issue or that it failed because it has exceed its useful life. Everything mechanical will fail. It just depends on how long the designers intended the part to last. 10k rounds seems like a lot to me so I wouldn't think twice of the failure happening after that kind of use.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[Roger Annabel]

no one wants to see their gun fail, but one part breaking after 10K rounds is pretty damn good

and it's surely an easy one to fix, you just put in a new part and keep shooting - the big question I have is: did the gun keep shooting with the broken action bar?

I still think this is a great work horse of a gun and a great design and certainly easy enough to take apart to replace parts

 

[Roger Annabel]

so after 3 years of the gun being flawless with some shells and choking on other brands, I had decided that I'd just keep it going by using the shells I knew worked well. But it was always in the back of my mind that it shouldn't be picky about shells and a gun this good should shoot ANY shells, so I kept looking online to see what I could learn and I ran across a few blogs suggesting replacing the extractor with one from Benelli, so I tried it and I'll be damned if it didn't seem to fix the problem.

30 some bucks and this great gun is now nearly perfect. I can't understand people that think this is just a cheap throw away gun. I'm pretty sure I will keep this gun forever, but I actually am cheap so I figure that if I can shoot the cheap Walmart ammo that saves me $1.50/box, it'll pay for itself in a month or two. Yeah, for breaking clays I always shoot the cheapest ammo I can!

still waiting for Dozer to tell us if the gun kept shooting when the action bar broke :sad:

 

[walnuts4x4]

I love my 3500... Finally removed the steel choke and put in my turkey choke... Ready to go Tuesday morning...

 

[Roger Annabel]

since Dozer has given up on this I can only assume that the broken action bar was the "death" of the gun and thread

Butt here is my conjecture about the fatal failure of the action bar. I hate to try to figure these things out by myself, but since he won't tell us, here is the way I figure it: the action bar broke on one side so it was weakened, but kept functioning. It would eventually break on the other side and then the gun would not close the bolt, but with one side still intact, it would still function until it totally broke. Kind of awesome to think that the gun would still shoot in this condition, but unless Dozer tells me different I gotta believe it would still shoot

for a while :beer:

 

[mudpack]

DUP

 

[mudpack]

I can't understand people that think this is just a cheap throw away gun. I'm pretty sure I will keep this gun forever...

I think everyone agrees that the gun is cheap (doesn't cost much). Whether it's a "throw-away" gun is up to the owner. Yes, I think this was the "death test" the OP was talking about. Will he bring it back to life? Probably.

 

[Roger Annabel]

so now that the gun cycles all the types of shells that I can find, and should be actually perfect, it has developed a new flaw - sometimes it goes "click" when I pull the trigger on a second round. It always goes "boom" on the first shot when I let the bolt go, but on rare occasions the second shot will "click" after it cycled automatically by itself. I was thinking of replacing the firing pin thinking maybe it has worn just enough to not quite hit the primer, but I pretty quickly threw that idea in the trash bin; I just know the problem is that the gun is not in battery. Now this doesn't happen very often, maybe like once in 6 or 7 boxes. If anyone has thoughts, go ahead and tell me whacha think I oughta do.

 

[fatmanslim247]

Put a new action spring on it and keep chugging along.