Winchester M 12

[KCSO]

Last night a fellow brought me a Winchester M12 shotgun and wanted to sell it to me. The gun was in a basket in 3 pieces and had come from his uncles barn. The barrel was now crudely 25 1/2 inches after it had been dropped from a corn picker, yes picker, and had stopped up the machine for a half a row. The gun had no blue and a 4 digit serial number. The butt plate was missing and apparantly had been missing for at least 20 years prior to the gun being stored. Since the gun appeared to be all there I gave the requested $75.00 and thought I would clean it up for parts.
The entire gun was full of dried dirt and gummed oil and I had to BOIL it for 1 hour in Simple Green to make a dent in the crud. The another hour in the Kroil bath and I finally got the gun all apart. While the gun was boiling I trimmed the stock and installed a recoil pad. I then chucked the barrel in the lathe and cut and crowned the barrel at 24". Then I cleaned all the parts back to metal and lo and behold everytihng was there except for 2 screws! Now I am thinking that it might be worth while to put the gun together...

Now here is why they don't make M12's anymore...
There are about a million all steel milled parts in a M12 and they all have to go together in a certian order. Assembling a M12 and/or a M97 is about like doing a jig saw puzzle of a winter day in the artic with a polar bear sh!##ing out a leopard seal into a hole in glare ice. In other words FUN with a capitol F/no!
Now here is why they should still make model 12's...
After reassembling and oiling I tightened the take up 1 notch and everything screwed together tight. I then loade up 5 and testfired the gun and it worked faultlessly and effortlessly. The fired cases were in better shape than the cases from a new Charles Daly pump.
Lets assume that to get this quality of a gun made now days we would have to pay $800. Now here is a gun that after being used since WW1 and ground up in a cornpicker and then slathered with oil and stored in a barn, cleans up and shoots perfect 90 years later. This old M12 will be good to go for another 50 years now.
Compare that with a M word gun that costs $350 from Wallyworld and may last through the next 20 years, if they keep making plastic replacment parts.
Hooray for the old ones!!!

[MT Gianni]

Great find and statement of truth about that gun. Numrich arms wants $112.50 for a 30" full choke bead sight bbl but it shows out of stock. Gianni

[fishhawk]

just for info for you a mod 97 barrel will fit a mod 12 found that out by trial and error many years ago. fishhawk

[HABCAN]

Lets assume that to get this quality of a gun made now days we would have to pay $800.

My bet?? FRN1,800.00!! Quality craftsmanship like that no longer exists in mass production.

[pumpguy]

What are you going to do for a choke? I assume that you cut it past the factory choked portion of the barrel. Any chance you could cut it to accept replacement screw in chokes?

Cool find by the way.

[357tex]

I love the md 12 shotguns.I have 2 one is like yours with a 20in sawed off barrel.I have had both for years neither has any finish left.Both were made in the 20's.The other one I bought in hight school back in 68 it has a 30in full with a solid rib.IT has killed a truck load of ducks,before the lead ban.They are high class all the way.Keep both loaded always short barrel with number 2 shot long barrel with number 5 shot that it loves.A man cannot go wrong with a md 12.:-D

[shotstring]

I loooove mdl 12s! Not only the best made but the most aesthetically pleasing of all the pump shotgun designs. Great for doing some of that fancy multiple target stuff on clays if you're so inclined due to fact you can still hold down the trigger and just pump away just as fast as you can bring the gun around on target.

[BD]

The only shotgun I have ever owned is a 16 guage model 12. My grandfather gave me one with a 2 1/2" chamber when I was ten. When I was 18 my grandfather died and my grandmother gave me his 16 guage model 12 which had a 2 3/4" chamber, nice bluing and a poly choke. I foolishly sold the older one with the short chamber for $200 to a guy who could reload for it. I wouldn't even take a guess at how many birds that shotgun has downed. I do plan to buy a newer one one of these days so I can hunt waterfowl again. I just haven't gotten around to it.
BD

[onceabull]

BD:Long ago,when raising daughters,horses and dogs,economics dictated that I settle on one shotgun for upland birding mid-september to mid-January. I was fortunate enough to get a 16 G Md.12,with polychoke,and never regretted that decision. 16 model 12s were built on a unique frame sized to gauge. with the tightest Squeeze on the PolyC.and short mag.#6's it will take chukars out as far as I can hit them these days, and nearly as far as the 3" 12 G 1& 3/4 loads of copper #6's I used before I gave up carrying that much gun for those ^&%$%^# ! birds. Found a nice full choke orig.16 later; it's a safe queen until a well known So.Calif.member gets up here to hunt. Can't embarrass him by carrying an oltimey Adj.choke shotgun in his presence. Happened it stop by current fav.indy gunshop Y'day. Gent whose law enforcment career includes a stint as U.S.Marshall for Idaho was negotiating with owner over a darn nice orig.model 12,12 G, 28"Modified,said he intended to chop barrel off to 20" in order to own replica of issue shotgun in first Peace officer Job.!!! Owner was still making best effort to send him elsewhere to find a "Beater" when I had to leave....Name withheld in order to avoid offending local members of this forum.!! Onceabull

[KCSO]

It's getting a Carlson screw in choke system. The 24" barrel is plenty long enough to swing on pheasants and will still make a handy duck gun for jump shooting out of the canoe.

[Kraschenbirn]

My field grade, 30" modified Model 12 was purchased (new) by my father in 1937 from a Western Auto hardware store in Salem, IL and I bought it from him in 1962 when he "upgraded" to a (Belgian) Browning A-5. Over the years, it's bagged everything from barn rats to Canada geese (plus an awful lot of clays) and is still my favorite field gun. I've got an early Rem. 870 and a couple of over/unders...a Browning and a Valmet...but when pheasant season rolls around, it's the old Model 12 that comes out of the rack.

Bill

[Char-Gar]

I have a minty 1958 Model 12. It has the 30" bbl and I had Briley install choke tubes. Heck of a shotgun.

[Newtire]

My Dad gave me his to use when I turned 14. He bought it after being discharged from the army in 1943 with a lot of little souvenier Japanese grenade fragments in his butt. He used it for duck hunting but quit hunting when they dropped the limit below 15. It's the slickest working shotgun I have ever seen. I used that thing on all sorts of small game & birds growing up in Illinois with it's full choke and never managed to blow anything to pieces. We tightened up the takeup screw once and that was it. They just don't make guns like that anymore. It still shoots and has never misfired or jammed ever that I can remember.

[timkelley]

I have a Mod 12 in 16 guage, my dad picked cotton for most of one summer back in the 30s to buy it. Someone used it but didn't clean it while he was gone to WW2 and so it has little original finish but it sure can shoot. I have always believed it has it's own radar in it, even "I" can hit a quail with it.

[fourarmed]

KCSO, you didn't say what gauge it is. With a 4-digit SN it is early. Is it a 20?

[carpetman]

Prior to 1964 a Remington model 870 and a Winchester model 12 sold for about the same price. The Rem was made out of pressed parts and had stamped checkering--they looked ok,but really didnt begin to compare to the quality of the machined model 12. Havent measured them but I suspect a model 12 receiver is twice the thickness of the 870 receiver. Remington could make a big pile of guns in the time it took Winchester to make one. If Winchester had rasied their price to what they were really worth they would have been doomed. That is what forced the move to Japan in 1964. My first gun was a 20 guage model 12---still have it and it still looks great. I also have the .410 Winchester model 42 in 3 inch chamber-full choke--what a sweetie. Only gun I have that I know the serial number on---it's the same frontwards or backwards. Never tried a model 97 barrel on a model 12,but the butt doesnt interchange although it can be made to work with modification.

[C1PNR]

I bought my M 12 from Purcell's, a local dealer, back in the late '60s or early '70s. Just a Plain Jane field grade 12 Ga. with 30" full choke and bead front, no rib. But man does it shoot! I haven't used it in many years, and I'll not put any steel shot through it.

Just a few years ago I was offered a M 25. It looks just like the 12, but I don't know much about them. It has an 18" barrel marked "Full" which leads me to believe it's been shortened. The muzzle has been crowned and bead installed, though. It does make a good bedside comforter.[smilie=1:

[fourarmed]

The model 25 is basically a non-takedown M12. There was also a M12 Featherweight made for a few years in the late 50s, early 60s. The FWTs were not very popular. I guess people who wanted a M12 wanted a real one.

[hydraulic]

I have a Model 25 because I had my Dad pick the gun up from a Chevy dealer in a nearby town who also sold a few guns. I wanted a Model 12 but Dad didn't know the difference. I worked on a farm all summer of 1952, for $2 a day, to buy a new Model 12, and wound up with the 25. Still have it and still hunting with it.

[shotstring]

As much as I love the mdl 12s, in my opinion they are not as strong and trouble free as the 870 remingtons however. Closer tolerances mean more sensitivity to dirt and grime, and I have seen lots of mdl 12s with split magazine tubes. Don't know whether it is the thickness of the metal or the fact that they may be more brittle than Remingtons.

I grew up in S.D., and went out every few years to visit my folks there. There was a gun shop in one of the smaller midwestern towns there that specialized in model 12s. Seems every farmer had at least one, so this guy somehow got hold of many of them. He had an 80 by 40 foot room filled with nothing but racks of model 12s![smilie=w:

Most were priced around $125, although the last time I was there, the price had caught up with the market, and they were going for the low side of regular model 12 pricing. Think I should have made a few purchases when they were at the hundred dollar mark. Woulda Shoulda Coulda......sigh.