CJMart

This may be common sense to some of you seasoned veterans, but to any of you just starting out or relatively new to turkey hunting: make sure you RESEARCH, RESEARCH, RESEARCH your gun/choke/shell combinations for compatibility. A victim of not reading the fine print, I wanted to throw this warning out to anyone who may be patterning Federal Supreme Mag-Shock Heavyweight loads. Apparently their "Flight Control Wad" doesn't get along well with ported choke tubes as my Indian Creek can attest to. I simply read the product description of the tube on MidwayUSA.com that stated, "...will accommodate all lead, steel and hybrid heavy loads with shot sizes from #2 through #8" and made sure I didn't venture of that path NOT knowing a specific wad could cause damage. I, of course for safety purposes, made sure all the shell specs lined up but I didn't read the fine print on the shell box. (In fact, I don't have the box in front of me and am not sure if the warning is there or not regarding ported chokes) Sure enough it hair-line fractured my tube and I had to use a vice-grip to get it off. (Meanwhile sweating in hopes the threading on my Benelli Supernova barrel weren't destroyed).

Side note: with my first hunt here in Ohio 4 days out you can imagine I'm scrambling. (First world problems, I know.) Indian Creek is closed on Mondays as I'm going to inquire with them about overnighting a new one. If this doesn't pan out the good folks at Midway will replace the choke but it's on backorder until mid-May.

CalHunter

Good info to know. sounds like the print size should be more prominent to avoid future mishaps. Best of luck on your upcoming hunt. Do you have any buddies who have an extra gun you could borrow?

CJMart

CalHunter,
I've got an 870 and chokes available for it...I am just bummed as I'd dropped decent cash on a Benelli SuperNova and a red dot this winter and the thought of not using it until next spring is daunting, hahaha. Push comes to shove I'll buy another choke locally and try to find time to pattern it before Friday.

CalHunter

Best of luck and glad you're safe with an accident like that.

swampbuster

At least you or any one else was not hurt. Sorry for your misfortune and good luck

HatchieLuvr

I'd venture to say thats not a "hairline fracture", it's too perfectly straight up the tube and at a 90deg from the ends. The vast majority of tubes on the market today are made exactly like that one, they are bent around a mandrel/form and seam welded. When to much pressure is exerted on them, they split just like that. The only way to assure that NOT happening is to buy a tube that is cut from billet/one piece of steel like a Rhino, obviously that jacks the price up quicker tho! (And in this case, that pressure would've gone to the next weakest link and either blew out the tube/stripped the threads or burst the barrel)

I would for sure want to check your barrel over but based on that seam splitting, I'd say you are probably ok. I'd mic the barrel to assure no non-visual bulge just to assure proper seal on ANY choke used in that barrel now.

Hopefully you got lucky and I personally think ANY wad (or anyther component) that doesn't work with ported/slotted barrels or tubes in todays market is just flat out stupid marketing! The VAST majority of aftermarket tubes are ported/slotted for a multitude of reasons!

Adrian J Hare

Great advice - A lot don't know about that...

CJMart

Just an update. Spoke to Indian Creek this morning and they said they think they ran a bad batch of steel around the fall and have slowly got a few calls here and there on some of their Benelli chokes. Looks like it could have been the combination of wad and bad steel, maybe? Gentleman @ IC was very apologetic and is next day mailing me a new tube. (The shipping cost of which was nearly the price of the new tube) Great customer service from the guys @ IC matched with the patterns I was throwing on Saturday with my Black Diamond Strike choke may have made a customer for life out of me.

HatchieLuvr

CJ that's GREAT news and it shows that company is TRULY concerned about customer service! So many would've just ignored the call or give you the run around and hoped you would eventually just give up and move on. Yes co.s like that make customers for life! (And in the long run that's the cheapest, easiest way to handle folks. It's actually easy to be a standout in todays market because most DON'T do it that way and take the easy way out.)

Glad it worked out for you!
HL

mrl0004

They had this problem a while back, and switched from a metal blended choke to a stainless steel choke. Of course the flight control wads are a known no-no to use with their chokes, but I am kind of worried that they're having trouble again because of their construction, because I shoot an IC in my Benelli.