Tromix AK-Style 12ga

[oldbillthundercheif]

I saw a tiny ad in Small Arms Review for a 12ga AK. I just got around to checking out their website...

http://www.tromix.com/Welcome.htm

These things look like pure entertainment. I love automatic shotguns, but can't stand tubular magazines. They are ancient, clumsy to load in stressful situations, and need to go away.

Shooting a rimmed cartridge in a vertical mag seems kind of wacky, though. I know all the various British guns in .303 worked well, and the Dragunov was perfectly functional w/ the 7.62x54R, but it seems like it would be easy to get wrong.

What the heck is up with these beasts?

[Esquire M Busterbury]

Having 8-round magazines of semi-auto 12Ga with ak-like reliability...sounds like too much fun to me. Meet the new street sweeper. Saiga is my new favorite company.

[.351winchester]

excellent combat shotguns. Durability of a Kalashnikov pattern, detachable mag, etc. beat the Street Sweeper design in every category. I plan to purchase a Saiga 12 with folding stock. Truly a devastating weapon and used every day by elite Russian military/police units.

[liliysdad]

Ill keep my ancient, slow to load tube mags. If its not broken, dont fix it.

They have advantages, such as the ability to accomodate any length of shell, they are low profile, easily rebuildable, decent capacity, and allow you to instantly vary the type of shell you wish to shoot. They are quite quick to load under stress, if you train.

[.351winchester]

"and allow you to instantly vary the type of shell you wish to shoot. They are quite quick to load under stress, if you train."
Neither is as quick as with a mag. I don't know if you can just place a round in the chamber like with a pump. But you can go from a full mag of buck, slug, birdshot, etc much quicker.
Tube mags require a lot of length to have decent capacity, the 20" Mossberg 590 for instance.

I do not know how the shells would feed from a mag. There have been other tactical/HD/assault type weapons featuring a magazine as well as high quality bolt action slug guns with, but not many. I want to think any AK derivative will be death and taxes reliable, but honestly would feel safer with a Remington, Benelli, FN. Regardless this seems to be a great design, most shotgun advancements have been totally impractical monstrosities (SS, Neostead, Mag-7, Spas 12 and 15, USAS 12, so on), this seems to be quite practical

[SuperVepr]

Tromix has some fine looking stuff but those prices are SICK! I think I would go to Robinson Arms first for that kind of scratch...

[Gazpacho]

Mine has proved completely reliable with slug and buck. A little bit finicky with birdshot. AGP has just released a 10 round single stack magazine, giving you an 11 round shotgun. The Saiga-12 will shoot 3" magnum shells, but the recoil is brutal, and IMHO there is no need for such ammo in a combat shotgun. Loaded with 12 pellet OObuck, you can put 132 pellets in the air in under 5 seconds easy. For a machingun, that would be a rate of fire of 1,584 rounds per minute.

Here is an old thread on mine. (http://www.thehighroad.org/showthread.php?t=198723&highlight=saiga) Some changes since then.

[oldbillthundercheif]

Nice.

I think I may have found my next lead-launching project.