Browning Gold Problem

[tjwatty]

My son is shooting a Browning Gold, gun works just fine except with 3.5 shells. They seem to hang up when the second shell is cycling into the chamber. It ejects them fine but the next load catches on entry to the chamber. It handles 3" and 2 3/4 just fine and it doesn't seem to make a difference who's shells he uses, it doesn't do it all the time, just at the most in opportune times. A trip to our local smith today didn't reveal any glaring problems and cleaning doesn't appear to be an issue. I told him if he had just bought the Bennelli,,,, and then he uses bad words at his Daddy. I think I'll just tell his Momma...
Seriously, anyone had any similar trouble???

[skeet]

First off I just have to say it...It's a (gag) Browning (gag). 2ndly Browning has seemed to have a problem with this. What happens is the shell lifter seems to not go up as far as it should. Is the gun new or older? Can't be too old. The shell is so long and heavy at the end it doesn't allow the shell lifter to go high enough. If you can, try to bend the end of the shell lifter up just a bit. Not much...a couple hundredths will probably do it. Don't depend on Browning to fix it...just won't happen any time soon. Fixed a guys 11-87 3 1/2" gun like this too. In lieu of bending...try gluing a piece of smooth hard material on the shell lifter. The stuff they use for counter tops(formica) worked for me on a 3" A-5. Glued it on with contact cement. Chamfer the edges to the front and back. This is just a temporary fix. Shoulda bought one of the other B guns No touble with my SBEII or the Beretta Extrema I had.

[fabsroman]

TJ,

I have no idea how you can fix this problem. Might it need a stronger spring for the shell lifter? Maybe a new spring from Browning will do the trick, or you can look at Numrich Gun Parts for the spring. They usually aren't that expensive.

Let's see how long our Benellis keep shooting before they run into problems. I love all the people that think Benellis are overpriced. This will be my 9th season with this gun and I haven't had any problems yet that weren't my fault. The one problem I did have was a piece of shot falling out of a poor reload, rolling down into the trigger mechanism, and getting caught in the safety. For some reason, the gun would only fire a single shot. Took the gun apart in the field to fix it, and had a spring launch off into the grass. I couldn't find the spring, so I had to order a new one. However, none of this had anything to do with the reliability of the gun. It had everything to do with my poor crimp on a reload and my poor handling of the trigger mechanism. I have also used this gun for almost all of my dove, duck, goose, and upland hunting, and started using it for deer hunting 3 years ago. I would have to say it has thousands of shells through it, and I would guess somewhere above 5,000.

[skeet]

Browning and Benelli are both overpriced...and now Remington is getting into it. Making a "NEW' improved 1100 for 1100 bucks. C'mon...way too much. When I was back east the J&P sporting clays range shut down. Darn terrible thing..took my Grandson up to shoot a round of clays before they closed. While there I bought one of their rental guns. Beretta 391 with the overbored bbl. Only 2 months old and still in the carrying case and all the extras for 650 bucks. Not keen about the 391 but the price was right I guess. Even those things are 1100 bucks. Sheesh. The Gold will work just fine if you can get the front of the shells up. Bend the lifter or put a shim in there. Seriously

[fabsroman]

That is a shame about J&P. Did they close down because they weren't making any money, or did they just decide to sell to a developer?

I'll agree that guns are getting insanely expensive, but that is because people like you go through a Benelli SBEII and a Beretta Extrema in a couple of years. It seems like you are buying a new gun every time I turn around. As long as people are willing to try out all these new guns on the market because they have the Comfortech system or whatever new gadget is on them, then we will continue to pay high prices for new guns. When people finally stop and say enough is enough, prices might stop going up into the stratosphere.

Seriously, when I was buying my SBE, it was $1,050, and I was seriously debating buying the 3 1/2" Gold because it was $200 less. In hindsight, I am glad I didn't, but you can bet I will not be spending another $1,400 just because the SBE now comes with a Comfortech stock, a larger trigger guard, a new forearm, and a new magazine cap. Nope, not me. Sad thing is that I thought about it, and my wife even said I could, and then I thought better about it.

As long as Americans keep spending money like it is water, and we do because the nation as a whole has a negative savings rate if you do not take into account retirement accounts such as 401's, IRA's, etc, then manufacturers will keep putting out things with little improvements and increasing the price of the product.

I have said this before and I will say it again, my Benelli is going to be my last hunting shotgun for quite a while unless they come out with some serious technology advancement.

By the way, $1,100 for an 1100 is utterly insane.

[skeet]

Fabs...1100 bucks for any shotgun is ridiculous. This "new" 1100 is just chock full of innovations. The companies have to keep comin up with all this stuff so they can stay in business. Remington has made over 6 million 870's. How can ya keep making something that doesn't really wear out without "new" innovations?? And I haven't really bought a "new" gun in a long time. The last absolutely new gun I got was a Beretta Extrema that I got at Bass Pro about 3 yrs ago. It was an ok gun ..Not a UPS but not great either. I didn't pay anywhere close to retail for it either. Retail was somewhere around 1050 or so and I paid 810 and that included tax. Before I'd pay that retail kinda price for the new guns I'd go buy used ones any day. Even with all the "new" innovations and technology...with guns there ain't really anything new under the sun. Look at the new Short mags...They give approx the same velocities of the calibers they are replacing...and they save a whole 2 er 3 ounces of weight and don't really kill farther or shoot any better than the older stuff...so what is the reason?? Keeps the gun companies in buisiness I guess...cept Winchester. But still most of the guns sold in the US now come from overseas somewhere.

[fabsroman]

Skeet,

I'm just busting your chops. I know you don't buy many new guns and I knew you got one heck of a deal on that Extrema because you either PM'ed, e-mailed, or called me about it and said I should get one too at that price, but by buying people's old guns, that allows them to buy new ones.

As Americans, we have a lot of excess. Look at me, I am almost finished building a new road bike, and I am already looking at a time trial bike and a crit bike that I want, but do I really need them, that is the question. I want an AR-15 and an AR-10, but do I really need those? The way I look at it with the guns, it is better to have them and not need them, than to need them and not have them. I just see way too many people buying way too much crap.

This is why people nowadays will never be in a position to retire comfortably. They will never have their house paid for. They will never have enough saved for retirement. Now, I know you aren't like that because your house was paid for a long time ago, but Americans are just not saving like they should.

Did you know that the National debt is at $8 trillion+. That is $8,000,000,000. The amount spent on the Iraq war is almost $400 billion. The tax gap/shortcomings (i.e., people that didn't pay what they should have) is about $340 billion a year. I am scared to look at what the trade deficit is. As a nation, I think we are in for some tough times in the decades to come.

[skeet]

I agree with you on the hard times oming...and it may not be decades getting here. I lived through some hard times...maybe not a depression like our folks did but we were poor(didn't know it) and did what ever we could to make a buck. People now days want it all given to 'em. Sad to say though...it is our own fault. We wanted our kids to have it better than we did....never really realizing what we were doing to our kids. My darlin daughter really doesn't know that money can be saved...even after I helped her get outta 20 grand in cc debt. She made the money and I made her pay the debt...and she really has stayed away from credit cards... but really doesn't realize that money can be saved for the future. Not all her fault though. She was married to a rich guy and they spent money like it was water. She got into the habit, I guess.....and like most habits...really hard to break 'em. And with the Democraps coming back into power...we gonna get taxed and spent.

[fabsroman]

The taxing doesn't really bother me too much. Yeah, my wife and I already pay enough in taxes every year to buy a nice, and I mean nice, new car, but if the taxes help out the country and I can still eat, so be it. If it means I am only losing luxuries in my life, so be it. I will feel bad for those people that are barely scraping by, buy barely scraping by seems to have a different definition today than it did 30 years ago. Barely scraping by means you cannot afford the $50,000 SUV and you need to settle for the Ford Focus instead. I am seriously cringing at having to ever pay over $30,000 for a car, but I guess the day will eventually come but it will not be any time soon.

I am just going to try to make the best out of whatever happens. If the democraps make the tax laws more difficult, that is good for me too.

[Aim to maim]

Originally posted by fabsroman


Did you know that the National debt is at $8 trillion+. That is $8,000,000,000.

Actually, I believe 8 trillion is $8,000,000,000,000. An understandable error. Having gotten as bad as it is, it might as well be 8 quadrillion. All those zeroes have a numbing effect after a while.

By the way, didn't you mention once that you are a CPA?

[fabsroman]

I've mentioned I'm a CPA probably more than once. Problem is that I don't have any clients in the $8,000,000,000 category. I only have a couple in the $1,000,000 category, so all the extra zeros confuse me. LOL

I was trying to put the actual numbers out there because it has a better effect than just saying 8 trillion dollars, but it looks like I screwed up.

Something tells me that China and the Middle East are probably financing our debate. That makes me sick.

[Aim to maim]

Originally posted by fabsroman

Something tells me that China and the Middle East are probably financing our debate. That makes me sick.

They do indeed hold many of the notes, and that does not bode well for any of us.

[M.T. Pockets]

I've seen lots of shotguns have trouble with the 3.5" loads, including Beretta's, Benelli's, Winchester SX2's. I've seen the Remington 11-87 have troubles with everything. I've never hunted with anyone using a Browning Gold, but I understand it works on the same action as the SX-2. Not a lot of troubles with any of these guns (except the 11-87 but that's another story), but once in a great while the 3.5" seems to have trouble cycling in these autos. My thoughts were the empties catch the receiver a bit during the ejection and it slows down the whole cycle and the next round fails to reach the chamber. Just a thought on it.

No autoloader is fool proof and I'm convinced that some leave the factory doomed to give their owner head aches. Overall though, they're all pretty darn good.

[tjwatty]

I knew I'd get the straight stuff here. We get our deer early this weekend we will bend the stuff out of that (gag) Browning.
fabs, the SBE II did the same thing the next day, I think it was just in sympathy, or maybe the fact I hadn't even wiped her off since opening day, in any case , a cleaning and we're back at'em. Now if I can just train that darn thing to reload itself while I'm out in the boat I'd have it made. I don't seem to be able to remember.