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What do you think of this new shell carrier for Benellis?


Mesa Tactical

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Last week we were speaking to a Benelli owner on the phone (maybe one of you guys) and he suggested this as a new idea for mounting a Mesa Tactical SureShell shotshell carrier on a Benelli shotgun. It was a simple idea, easy to execute, and this morning we lashed this up:

 

mesa_tactical_sureshell_stock_mount_for_benelli.jpg

 

Basically, we made a bracket that replaces the sling loop plate in the Benelli stock. The bracket accepts a 4-shot SureShell yoke on one side, and retains the sling loop on the other. Best of all, it's completely ambidextrous. You can mount the assemby on either side of the stock.

 

Because of the location of the bracket, there is room only for a 4-shot SureShell carrier.

 

The bracket is 11 gauge steel and the shell yoke is aircraft aluminum. The production brackets would be black oxide or manganese phosphate finished (though the unfinished bracket is easier to see in the above photo). The complete assembly would retail for $60.

 

Whaddya think? If people like these, we can have them available by the end of the month.

 

[ 09-05-2006, 02:56 PM: Message edited by: Mesa Tactical ]

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I like the idea quite a bit. However, since it only offers 4 shells, I'd probably opt for one of the common pouch rigs. If you could work out a way to fit 4 shells on the collapsable stock, I'd buy it in a heartbeat.

 

As a matter of personal preference, I'd also prefer to have shell carriers on the stock enclosed, especially if there's one elsewhere for fast reloads. That's just me, though.

 

Out of curiousity, is there much 'wiggle' in it? I know the factory sling loops on my pistol grip stock wiggle a fair bit. Not much of an issue for slings, but wouldn't it translate to a fair bit of movement/rattle for the shell yoke?

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The point of this exercise was to take advantage of the modularity of our SureShell design to very quickly produce a simple but practical new shell mounting solution.

 

The limitation on the number of shells is because we simply run out of room. As you can see from the photos, if a 6-shot SureShell was used you would be unable to remove the frontmost shells (they would be just above the firing hand).

 

The bracket angles upward along the axis of the stock because that was the only way to make it ambidextrous. If you made a bracket that angled downward on one side of the stock, it would angle upward on the other. Also, the more horizontal the angle was, the closer the shells would be to your firing hand and thus harder to remove. In fact, keeping the bracket at the same angle as the axis of the stock makes the assembly more usable.

 

The only practical way to add more shells and to move the SureShell carrier further back on the stock would be to make the bracket out of a T-shaped extrusion, a much more ambitious approach that will have to wait for more market enthusiasm for stock-mounted SureShell carriers.

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That was actually my next suggestion -- a T-shape would allow usage of the unused area in the rear. I'd go for one of those in a heartbeat.

 

Since you didn't mention anything about the whole assembly moving a bit, I'm assuming you're just changing the size specs/fastening system so that it fits a lot more snugly than the factory sling loops, or perhaps mine are just a fair bit more loose than everyone else's. I don't know, I only had the standard pistol grip stock on my 11707 for about ten minutes when I got it home, and it's been set aside ever since.

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Hmm, we no longer have a representative M4 stock to play with, but with our M2 stock we tighten the rear nut against the bracket and can make it fit very tight and secure. No movement at all.

 

We'll play with our Benelli Nova a little later, after the NTOA show.

 

An extruded T shape is not hard, just a lot more ambitious and expensive than this simple bracket. We'll keep it in mind if this current idea takes off.

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Well, we are going into production with these. Why not?

 

Pursuant to GV00's concerns, we are not sure how these will work on an M4 stock. Our own M4 stock is filled with Bondo from a stock shortening exercise, but we do recall that the bracket did jiggle around back when the shotgun was new. At the moment we don't know whether it can be tightened.

 

However, we do know this SureShell carrier can be used just fine with M1s and M2s.

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Hmm. I may have to take a look at mine and see if it can be tightened. Been meaning to take a look to see if I could modify ithe stock to carry a makeshift cleaning kit, anyway.

 

I'm not currently using it, since I've got a collapsable stock on my shotgun right now. If you guys need one to play with, I'd be happy to ship mine over so long as it comes back in the same shape.

 

[ 09-13-2006, 01:32 PM: Message edited by: GV00 ]

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