The Super Shorty is a pump action shotgun reduced to a 2-round tube capacity and a 6.5″ barrel made by Serbu Firearms. The first one was made in 1998 and since then Mark Serbu has made more than 6,000 of them. There have been a bunch of minor variations, including batches made on both Remington 870 and Mossberg 500 actions, models in both 12ga and 20ga, and some with 3+1 or 4+1 capacities. It’s a gun that Serbs himself finds a bit ridiculous, but it is also his company’s best know product, and has not been used in a bunch of movies, TV shows, and video games.
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“(…)including batches made on both Remington 870 and Mossberg 500 actions,(…)”
https://modernfirearms.net/en/shotguns/u-s-a-shotguns/serbu-super-shorty-eng/ claims that Most popular models that are used for conversion are 12-gauge Mossberg 500, Remington 870 and Maverick 88 are specimen of last known to exists?
I can’t say for sure, but it’s completely realistic since the Maverick is a 500 with some cost-saving measures. I was just thinking about it when Ian talked about buying a base shotgun as a high up-front cost (88s are in the low $200s in the US).
You should have mentioned those are nine .33 caliber holes and i was quite surprised all nine were on paper at 20yds.. Also a birds head grip will give less felt recoil to the firing hand as well as help control muzzle flip.
A real bird’s head grip (like on a magnum hunting revolver), maybe.
The thing called a “bird’s head grip” on a Shockwave serves one purpose, and one only: extending a sub-14″ bbl “firearm” over 26″ OAL so edgelords can feel like they’re getting one over on ATF. Have you ever noticed how pistol grips on everything else (including pistols) look like the pistol grip on the Serbu, and absolutely nothing built since the 16th Century looks like the Shockwave grip? Transmitting (or resisting) forces requires surfaces as close to perpendicular as possible. That’s why “bird’s head” grips on custom hunting revolvers are even more vertical than the traditional (“plow handle” grip).
A birds head grip is just the grip from a conventional stock without the rest. It keeps you wrist and forearm inline with the receiver note under it. It makes a real difference.
The handgrip of a shoulder stock is not meant to apply forward pressure. When PGO shotguns were made by yahoos with hacksaws, they all looked like that. Once manufacturers and professional customers got involved, none did until the loophole. Even today, 18″+bbl PGO shotguns use conventional pistol grips. So do stocked long guns with pistol grips. There are ARs with horizontalish “compliance” grips, but nobody else buys them. No bigbore hunting handgun (same ergonomic problem set as a PGO shotgun) uses a Shockwave-style grip.
Take the heaviest dumbbell you can bench press (conventionally, with the bar perpendicular to your palm and your forearm inline). Then move all the plates to one side and try to press it while holding the other end of the bar near horizontal. I don’t recommend being underneath it.
Or just watch the part of the video where Ian and his buddy talk about using the Serbu with the foregrip horizontal (contributing much less to resisting recoil).
It reminds me the first Deus Ex game…
I think these are really cool range toys, but… Man, have you suffered a horrendous failure of judgment/wisdom if you ever find yourself in a situation that actually calls for one of these. About all I can really think of is “Going in after wounded bear/lion/tiger/water buffalo in dense brush…”
In other words, you’ve signally failed to think the situation through. Nature is shortly going to have her way with you, and I would hope that you had the wit and wisdom to have your affairs in order…
Still, fun thing to play with. I find myself wondering “How does it do with slugs…?”
And one of those Ak shotgun mags, mag. Justification; Posion toad outbreak in Georgia or something…
“(…)Posion(…)”
What is this?
About the only use I can thing of is a booby trap. Even the old High Standard Model 10, as impractical as it was, would be a more sensible choice.
For those who think “But it can be hidden in a briefcase or under a jacket”, so can a Mini-Uzi or an MP5K. And even with a short 20-round magazine in either one, it gives you better performance on target than one of these things.
Also, they don’t have to be “pumped” for each shot- or burst.
Another example of how the shotgun just has no reasonable place on the modern battlefield, and today even its role in the police armory is questionable at best.
clear ether
eon
“About the only use I can thing of is a booby trap(…)”
But then it would either need convoluted construction to reload it for 2nd and 3rd shot, or accepting it will fire only once.
Observe that XM26 existence https://modernfirearms.net/en/shotguns/u-s-a-shotguns/m26-mass-eng/ suggest there was some need for short 12 gauge fire-arm. Yet it does substantially differ from Serbu Super Shorty, as it has detachable magazine and it in standalone version does sport stock.
“(…)don’t have to be “pumped” for each shot(…)”
Now I start wondering how heavy and unwieldy would be 3-barreled LUPARA i.e. something like this https://sketchfab.com/3d-models/triple-barrel-shotgun-a28380fd86644fc4ab3a4ad55a0764ca compared to Serbu Super Shorty?
How to take advantage of the 3-shot capacity in a booby-trap? In any case there are really nasty legal prohibitions on booby-traps. Unless, of course, you are thinking of a SHTF survivalist scenario.
I’m thinking of the classic “up in a tree aimed down the footpath and trip-wired” type. Years ago I ran into those being used to “protect” marijuana “nurseries” in the back forty of a national forest.
They didn’t worry me as much as the tripwired frag grenades.
clear ether
eon
Then lose the traditional pistol grip and concede that the three barrel monster as a booby trap will always be attached to something like a tree or a post and design a way of securely affixing the gun to such.
I suspect that “booby trap” as a use-case might be a tad on the expensive side, and I’d strongly suggest that black-market Claymore mines might be more affordable and far more practical.
And, of course, after a bit of thought… This may well be one of those weapons where the “psychological factors” play a much bigger role than sane people might think. Just like my old police friend noted, you roll up on a scene and haul a Thompson out of the trunk, people tend to pay attention. Plain ol’ shotguns and carbines? Not so much, in his experience.
I have to admit that if I were to encounter someone with one of these, I’d be impressed with their general level of insanity and/or economic status. You don’t casually buy one of these things; you have to go out with malice aforethought and a lot of money. Which both have their implications…
It’s about like that nutter I ran into hunting, years ago: Dude had what I’m certain started out as some sort of 10 gauge double-barreled goose gun, which he’d sawn down to about 10 inches and a pistol grip. I was not about to question where he put his elk camp, and I’m pretty sure that the game warden responsible for that area didn’t, either.
The bootlace sling he had it on didn’t encourage one to develop a positive impression of his mental faculties. Southwestern Washington state has some serious loon issues, in my experience… About like Appalachia, but without the charming Scots-Irish inbreeding. The ethnic melange you find out in the sticks down there is impressively varied, but simultaneously insular and stuck somewhere back in the early 20th Century. I actually encountered people who still identified as Wobblies, and some Finno-Scandic types who I’m pretty sure spoke some Finnish and/or other Baltic tongue at home.
Also the only place I ever saw anything like convincing evidence of something big, hairy, and apparently possessed of thumbs. Once ran into a bunch of things that I swear to God resembled the sort of bedding sites you find in Africa where the mountain gorillas are, and miles away from any likely human activity. Strange region of the world, and one that a lot of people don’t pay attention to, at all.
Re: the guy with the 10 gauge whom the game wardens ran scared from. In high school I used to go shooting after school with an H&R revolver with homemade shoulder stock attached. A rig even I knew was illegal, but the Feds then didn’t worry much over small town Montana. Our town Marshall saw me sally forth numerous times and never peeped. I doubt he had me on his: ‘Badass, Do NOT Mess With!’ list. His job, as he saw it, was writing tickets and handling occasional emergencies, not enforcing federal firearms law. The same, I am guessing, as your overawed (and hypothetical?) game warden. I mean, if we are all storied tough guys, why doesn’t this place look more like Valhalla?
Been to the Pacific Northwest and had very rational and normal people start in on all the encounters they had with the “big hairy things with thumbs”. Not sure why they would risk a negative reaction from me. But I do think that I should have been a priest or a detective because in so many casual encounters with strangers they just start telling me their deepest, darkest secrets.
That could be an index as to the population you are dealing with. Isolated people who babble to strangers. I worked a gig near Eureka Montana once. People who only claimed to have had Bigfoot encounters counted as Norris.
The Wobblies are still around, on a small scale. Been trying to unionize Starbucks and fast food businesses in the Pacific NW. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_Workers_of_the_World) But still would not want to mess with these people. Not sure about about how “stable” many of them are.
Black market Claymores? Isn’t that what one buys from undercover federal agents? Or at least tries to.
There are some places where there is nothing but brush. Anywhere you have to go you might encounter a not wounded animal without doing something stupid as you posit. I can see that this gun might be of value with slug ammo at very close range. Too bad Ian did not test fire with slugs to see how far away from the target it is still accurate. And in this case I would go with a pointy breacher muzzle devise to make sure the muzzle is firmly in contact with the critter. Read about bear attacks and see how “up close and personal” they get.
I don’t understand that use case.
For me, slugs serve one narrow and specific purpose – to extend the inherently short range of a shotgun. Why use them at very short range? If I don’t need the pattern that shot provides, why choose this over any number of single-projectile options that don’t limit me to three rounds and manual pumping?
Because most people who write about guns are as reliable as the old Penthouse Forum was filled with real life encountets
“(…)bear attacks and see how “up close and personal” they get.”
Observe that Siriuspatruljen does make use of GLOCK 20 automatic pistols in 10mm Auto, for situation where big predators (including, but not limited to Ursus maritimus) do not allow deploying their rifles. Said weapon is many times lighter and shorter than Serbu Super Shorty and (what is important for usage in stress situation) easier to use (just pull trigger again to shot again, no need to fumble with pump). Experience of Steve Nelson (who worked teaching bear defense courses) is that .454 Casull revolver https://www.americanhunter.org/content/8-best-charge-stopping-bear-cartridges/ could be also used successfully for that purpose.
Lots of really dumb things are super awesome, so I don’t understand the question.
You just described my opinion of Tony Hawk.
clear ether
eon
Dumb things awesome? Perhaps…perhaps. Awesome to whom, however? One fears like calls to like.
Was looking for a Serbu Super Shorty several years ago and could not locate one for sale at that time. Ended up with a similar A.O.W. made by Safety Harbor. Unfortunately, it came equipped with a hard plastic grip that made shooting the gun absolutely excruciating. Thankfully I found the soft rubber “recoil tamer” grip made by Hogue-huge difference in comfort. Glad you noticed how to mitigate the recoil by using your front hand on the vertical fore grip, which helps a lot. Oh, and you might look for Winchester Low Recoil-Low Noise AA shot shells. You can shoot boxes of those through one of these type of A.O.W. guns with ease.
Velocity of buck shot , slugs ?
The answer to your obvious question would probably have an unwanted dampening effect on the “short as an end in itself” attitude. Sober facts are not at all cool.
https://www.shotgunworld.com/threads/barrel-length-velocity-difference.557343/ gives following average velocities for Super Shorty [6.5″]
Buckshot 1018.4
Slugs 997.60
Birdshot 893.6
Make a couple of million dollars off a product you think is stupid. What a country!
Like Montaigne said about chess, ‘Too serious for a game, too frivolous for a vocation.’
use it for ostrich hunting akin to bear hunting with a pistol
I can see this as a breacher tool. This would not need an extra person with a regular shotgun that would get in the way of the rest of the team getting through the door. The breacher has this on a single point sling. Blast the door open. Drop the gun. Step aside to let everyone else in, without them tangling up in getting around the shotgun. The breacher raises their weapon (a long arm slug by their side or a pistol) and proceeds into the building. This scenario would need to be tested.
I agree with Kirk on the psychological value. I can see this being used at close quarters by somebody like a gate guard. Have this hanging down from a sling in plain sight and anyone wanting to do something funny will have second thoughts.
If you breach the door with a full size shotgun then hold it vertically in front of the body and step left, no one is going to get hung up on it like they might the sling dangling range toy your guy just dropped. It looks to me like someone invented a useless gun that you’re working overtime to find a job for. Which is putting the ass before backwards. (More ether, I can’t watch)
Can it use aquila short shells? maybe improve on the capacity
Can a regular Remington 870 use short shells? If so, this incarnation should also. That would be useful for those Georgia poison toads.
Look here: https://ammo.com/ammo-review/aguila-mini-shells-review
I don’t understand the adapter that is needed, but I don’t see why it would not work in the Serbu.
Even it is working you will get +1 for capacity (2 x 3 inch shell is 6, divided by 1.75 gives ~3.43). Better grab OTs-62 https://modernfirearms.net/en/shotguns/russia-shotguns/mc-255-eng/ if you must use 12 gauge compact weapon.
I’ve seen yesterday promo photos of SS with 5 of this mini shells.
Now, how can you increase as much of payload by using stronger powder, with less volume…
Observe that https://modernfirearms.net/en/shotguns/u-s-a-shotguns/serbu-super-shorty-eng/ does exists in at least 3 different lengths. Shortest has magazine capacity 2 (actually presented), middle has 3, longest has 4. This would result in 3, 5, 6 respectively (just calculating from lengths) and therefore total capacity 4, 6, 7.
Would the shorty modification work on a semi-auto shotgun?
If its gas operated, there could be lot of problems, imo
I am thinking that the blowback semi-autos might work.
Observe that Atchisson Assault Shotgun in its’ early blow-back version, see 2nd image from top https://modernfirearms.net/en/shotguns/u-s-a-shotguns/atchisson-aa-12-eng/ has long tube extending into stock, where bolt was riding, so while you maybe manage to shorten barrel it would still remain relatively long.
This proto AA gun had some kind of patented retarding scheme which nobody understands (lol!), not just pure blowback. Probably didnt work too well
Looked at the schematics of several blowback semi-auto shotguns. The ones I found from the major manufacturers have a recoil buffer in the stock. That won’t work.
Maybe there are little known models that would work.
Depends on gas port placement, I guess R12 https://modernfirearms.net/en/shotguns/u-s-a-shotguns/remington-r12-versamax-tactical-eng/ might be best suited for such kind or alteration, as it has gas port literally in chamber.
Look at this animation of the Versamax (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCpgNeea_xY) There is a recoil buffer in the stock.
See High Standard Model 10;
https://www.forgottenweapons.com/high-standard-10b-video/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Standard_Model_10
I remember firing this thing on the range- with no affection whatsoever.
clear ether
eon
Then there is the Russian MTs255 revolver shotgun (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MTs255) This could be cut down and would give more rounds before reload.
This already was done and spawned OTs-62, see 4th image from top https://modernfirearms.net/en/shotguns/russia-shotguns/mc-255-eng/