rking: My Citori XT doesn't bother me to shoot 200-250 rounds in a day with only a tee shirt on. It is back bored and ported from the factory and the vast majority of Trap and Skeet guns are as well and have been for the last 25-30 years. Most Factory made O/U's are as well as it is just the way they make the barrels now.
It costs more to do the extra Machining to the barrels so those guns cost more. mY XT was $2000. A M500 is an inexpensive Shotgun, and the vast majority are sold in some kind of Tactical Configuration. There is even on Combo where you get a 28" Sporting barrel and a 18"short barrel so you can have both worlds covered. I think that gun sells for about $350 ish.
My Father in law gave me this gun about 25 years ago. It was unfired and he bought it at Big 5 for $205. I bought the 20" barrel and Magazine tube from Brownell's for $116 and the Magpul furniture came a few years ago for @$100. So I've got about $250 in this gun.
I have used this gun a lot in local 3 gun shoots which might have 10 Shotgun targets in a string so I never experienced the same recoil issues I did in the Tac Shotgun Class where I fired 20 shots in a few minutes every time we came to the line. The cumulative effect of that much shooting in a short period of time is what has gotten to me. The gun fits OK and I will refine that as I go along. I have also reworked the inside of the action so the gun cycles like it has had 1000's of rounds thru it. It runs pretty nice.
There is a lot of back and forth as to the effects of Back Boring but the general consensus is that it makes the guns recoil impulse much smoother as opposed to the abrupt hit without the treatment. It also dramatically improves patterns. My gun shoots 00 buck at about 12-15" at 15 yards. Hans Vang Guarantees 7" at 25 yards and all the tests I have read over the last few days have confirmed that. He also has done thousands of these mods and people wouldn't pay for it if it didn't work.
AS far as porting I have lived with it on my Citori for 10 years and the only problem is cleaning the plastic from the wads out of the holes. the holes tend to work like a cheese grater. A Bronze Brush on an Electric drill solved that problem. The more you shoot the gun the less that occurs as the holes get chamfered on the inside more and more as the gun is shot.
The reason why I want to fix this gun is because Mossberg's are the Defensive Pump Gun. They are easier to run and don't malfunction as much. I'm sure the Rem 870 crowd with object, but all I saw in my class was people fumbling with their 870's. I had no problems adapting to the drills quickly because I was not fighting the gun.
One main issue is that the ejection port is smaller than the Mberg. This slows down the Port Loading of single rounds, and also complicates unloading and clearing of stove pipes and type 3's. The lifter on an 870 has a fence on the right side which gets in the way when trying to unload the gun or clear a type 3 (failure to extract) malfunction. The Mbergs don't have this problem.
I have some more work to do on this gun to get it where I want it. When done I will be able to shoot it like I need to. I have an old Browning A5 I want to "Tacticalize" as well. That will be easier now that I know what I am going to be doing with it
Under 100 yards Shotguns are devastating weapons. They have the ability to launch many different payloads from Non Lethal little Missiles to Slugs that are powerful enough to take down anything in N/A. It is fun to play with them, and I enjoy it.
More guns not less!
And NO 20ga. is not an option!
Randy