[gmrake]

I am looking to purchase a quality 12 ***** auto that I can use for both sport shooting and bird hunting. I just found the fabarms Red lion on clearance for $549. Shop says the gun usally retails around $700. I like the H & K name and their quality and fact they have a lifetime warranty is good to know. Anybody have some opinions of the gun. Thanks

 

[APEXDUCK]

They are nice looking guns. Have never fired one or even seen one on the range but it's hard to believe they are not a quality gun with the HK name on them.

APEXDUCK

 

[Guest]

i have this gun, it is light, very balanced......but i have a major problem... it is very very hard to load. it's not that i'm weak, i have very strong hands. (worked in a metal shop for 16 years). that gun pisses me off so much because of that i don't use it anymore and i'm looking to sell it. i suggest u look at other guns first. take care

 

[Ulysses]

When you say that it is "hard to load", could you be more specific? Do you mean that it is difficult to push shells into the magazine? This could be a simple problem to fix. How well does the gun function once you have loaded it?

 

[jlptexashunter]

I have read nothing but good about H&K, but if you want to look in that price range Weatherby SAS has been getting good reviews and their price is around $550 for Synthetic and $599 for wood. Something to think about. I've read some glowing reviews in Field and Stream and Outdoor Life. I've never shot one but the one's I've played with at the gunshop looked great.

http://www.weatherby.com/shotguns/sas_field.shtml

 

[McKie]

I bought a Red Lion in Florida a couple years ago, paid I believe $425 for it. I've fed it all sorts of loads including some deliberately made very light; never a misfeed nor any other problem. I have the 24" barrel (ruffed grouse hunter), and using IC choke have done well on grouse with it. Considering the shooter. The gun patterns as well as any I've seen. I did lose a little spring when cleaning it; sent an email to H&K requesting a replacement but never got a reply. In fairness, it seems that not everyone I email ever gets what I send. Fortunately, after orbiting the earth for a few months, the spring survived re-entry and landed again on my basement floor. I'm happy with this gun.

 

[Guest]

when i say hard to load, i mean physically push the shells in the magazine

 

[Guest]

when i say hard to load, i mean physically push the shells in the magazine. the gun had some ejector problems in the beginning. i would shoot a shell and the action would stay open, and i sent it back to the company. their service is very very good. they fixed the ejector problem but this gun sux to push the shells in. i went on a tower shoot and had a very hard problem "keeping up" i couldn't load the gun quick enough because of the difficulty in loading. this problme totally pisses me off with this gun.

 

[Guest]

doesn't even matter anymore, i bought a Beretta A391 Xtrema. it's about 1000 times better than my red lion.

 

[Guest]

I have a red lion. While it is a bit hard to load the shells in, the Gun functions great! It comes with several chokes and I love the HK name.. I have used it for sporting clays, trap and skeet and it shoots better than my $2,000 Beretta! I bagged two turkeys last week with it! Great gun for the money!!! BTW I also have a Gold Lion... But The red Lion is Lighter and handles better! :lol:

 

[Guest]

I bought one of these at a Ducks Unlimited auction. Must have been the Vodka, because I need another shotgun like I needed another drink that night. But took it to Kansas for opening weekend of pheasant hunting a couple of weeks back and was VERY happy with its operation. I will concur that it is not the easiest loading gun around, but it seems well balanced, is not difficult to toot around and put enough lead in the air for even me to get a bird or two.

 

[Ulysses]

If I had a gun which had a difficult to load magazine, I would do a little investigating to see if I could solve the problem. I can only think of 2 likely causes for this problem. First, I would check the magazine follower (the cap on the receiver end of the magazine spring) and see if it was a too tight fit or if it needed some lubrication or perhaps cleaning inside the magazine tube. Second, I would check the strength of the magazine spring. My guess is that this is the problem. Take a magazine spring out of another gun and switch them and see what happens. This would probably solve the problem. It could be that the strong magazine spring is needed for shooting the real heavy magnum shells (due to the heavy recoil), but it shouldn't be needed for target or light field loads. You can always get a replacement magazine spring or you could even cut a few coils off the current spring to reduce the effort required to load the magazine. (P.S. Winders, don't try to tell us this will make the spring stronger. We've already had that discussion. :wink: ).

Anyway, if I liked the gun all except for the difficult loading, I would certainly try to fix the problem before giving up on the gun.