Cheap vs Expensive O/U

[Crispy]

Hey ya'll,
I'm thinking of getting a 12 ga. O/U at some point and at the moment I'm leaning towards getting one of the cheap Stoeger's I see for $500 or so. I guess my question would be what makes an expensive ($1k+) O/U worth the extra money? The design seems less complicated with the break-barrel so I wonder how much can go wrong by not buying something expensive

Anyone own a cheaper one and have good luck? It would mostly be a range gun but I'd want to take it into the duck blind also.

[Bofire]

 :)Go handle them.
Carl

[Cap.Silver]

I have Remington 310 Spartan /Baikal 12 ga got it couple of years on sale for $275 (incl.rebate) and I'm happy with it .
You'll need to order some choke tubes I think ,but it wasn't a big deal .All 3 of my friends got the same guns and we never had problem .I wouldn't take it to blind when is really s...y it is more upland type of gun ,it has wood stock ,great value IMO.

[high country]

Go shoot a quality shotgun and you will see. Much of it is cosmetics.....but there are a lot of nice features once you get into the 686/ceasar g neck of the woods.

[jyerxa]

I have a berretta mod 303 and I have a stoeger side by side. I will never use the stoeger to go hunting, I got that because it is cheap and compact and I don’t mind it collecting a little dust sitting the house for home defence reasons and it is very simple to operate in a high adrenalin situation like home defence. Now my Berretta is a different story. I clean that oil that and keep it pristine for the hunt.

[Hyde]

I bought 3 of the Spartan (Remington imports), one side by side, and two O/U's.  The SxS would fire both barrels at the same time (ouch).  Although I liked the o/u's, one of them is inoperative now for no apparent reason (less than 5 boxes of ammo).  I haven't fired the second o/u.  Wanna buy it? 

I could have had a nice one for what I have in these 3 POS's. 

[uplandhunter870]

the difference is huge between cheap and expensive o/u although its not really explainable its something you just have to feel for yourself.

as for the cheaper o/u's i have heard lots of good things about the stogers and one of my hunting buddies has a pair of CZ canvasbacks in 12 and 20 ive shot them both they get the job done but wont be winning any gun of the year awards.

[Wa hunter]

You get what you pay for up to about the 1,500 mark then it seems like you are paying for extra stuff.  I have a Beretta 686 silver pidgeon that I have put at least 10,000 rounds thru without an issue I bought used at the gun show for 1,100 Ive seen them as cheap as 700

[SpringerFan]

I have a Citori 625 field. Love it. Swings great and feels great. When you break it open it is tight. No all squirmy.

I have shot others. A Stoeger that was loose as all get out. Didn't feel real safe with that.

When I got in to shooting and hunting a few years ago, I was told to do it right the first time. Or I could buy a lower end model and replace it in a few years.

All comes down to what you can afford and how much you will be shooting.

Good luck!

[AWS]

My Winchester 101 was bought in 1966, I shot competition with it for 30 yrs, then restocked it, had the chokes changed and use it for shooting birds at hunt tests.  Well over 100,000 shells through it, many of them 1 1/4 nickle international loads and you still can't close it on a piece of copy paper.  Chipped one firing pin over the years.

My Browning Superposed Lightning 20ga was made in 1967 and still feels like a new gun, my favorite non-salt duck gun.  Who knows what year my LeFevre was built but I shot it in the State International Skeet Shoot a few years back, it never missed a beat, it's my go to grouse gun.  My 1955 Darne is going to SD for a couple weeks of pheasants.

Quality goes a long way.  Unless they get run over by a truck I expect them to be still going strong for another 50 yrs.  I don't have safe queens, all my guns get shot.   

If you look around you can pick up some real quality shotguns for a reasonable price,  just have the money ready because it will not be there tomorrow.  Hit the local trap ranges and check the sell boards a lot of times a guy will start out with a decent field grade O/U and decide that he needs a dedicated  sorting clays or trap gun and lets the field gun go to finance the specialty piece.  I found my Browning at a MZL shop, someone traded it for a MZL and they didn't even look at it and priced it as a fixed choke Citorie (cheap) man I wrote a check so fast.

AWS

[helzbelz888]

bought a CZ canvasback earlier this year. shoots awesome! first round of trap i shot 24/25 and couldnt be happier with the accuracy. its a wee bit hard to open after you shoot the top barrel  dont know what causes this...

[Crispy]

Thanks for the input guys. In a lot of ways I think I need to find the balance between the two (very expensive and very well made vs very cheap and questionable quality) because I probably won't buy it if I can't duck hunt with it. At $400-ish I may try a Stoeger out and sell it at the used market value and see how I like it, but this is all a year or so off and if I get a designation I'm working for I may have to treat myself with some bonus money.

Thanks all 

[CP]

I have a Stoeger Condor and it’s reliable and dependable, seems like a fine shotgun …. until I pick up my Citori.  Compared to the Browning, the Stoeger is a POS.  But it still does everything a shotgun needs to do, and for the price of the Citori, I can buy 4 Stoegers.

[high country]

I had a cs ringneck with a river style safety/selector.....it sucked. Itraded it for one with a beretta style safety/select......much better.

[JKEEN33]

I've got a Franchi Renaissance, Ruger Red Label and a Browning Citori. Love each one for different types of hunting. Have shot a couple of the budget over/unders and they just don't feel good or shoot well in my opinion. Save a little longer and get something you will keep a lifetime.

[SkookumJeff]

I have xx number of shotguns, some expensive, some not so much.  I like them all or I would get rid of them.  The expensive shotguns I own tend to be a lot lighter and more svelte in form in comparison to my less expensive guns and I enjoy carrying them in the field a lot more than I do my less expensive guns.  I believe the more expensive guns tend to wear better and stay tight longer than the cheaper guns.  Like probably everyone else, I started out buying what I could afford, and got  better  more expensive guns as time went by and my financial circumstances changed.  I also took advantage of some great deals I lucked into over the years to acquire many of the guns I have now.  I used to have a Baikal O/U shotgun, what Remington sells now as their Spartan line.  Made by IZH, it was a tank and HEAVY, but I busted a heck of a lot of clays with that thing, I always thought it would make a good duck blind gun IF I wanted to use a O/U in a duck blind (rather have a semi auto).  One thing about cheaper guns, so long as they are kept in good shape and don't break and you don't pay too much for them, and you buy a mainstream gun and not some unknown import brand, you'll probably get most or all of your money back on them and they tend to sell faster.  More expensive guns in my experience, are more hit and miss on return on investment.  Not a big problem for me as I have a real hard time selling any of my guns.  Most of the few I've sold to finance other gun purchases I wish I had back.....especially my foul weather gun a 20 gage Rem 1100 express.  Don't know what it was about that shotgun but I seldom missed game with it.... That used to be my go to shotgun when the weather was so crappy I didn't want to take my Benelli Montefeltro out for upland game....

Skook