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To answer Kozak:
The main glitch I see with 870s is the staked-in shell latches coming from the factory not always staked well enough. Not a hard problem to fix, but it takes special tools to do it right and most 870 owners do not have those tools. Next we see timing issues between the slide arm and the shell latch, but that is not near as common.
Quality control of the "Freedom group" seems to be on and off as it relates to 870s now as much as it has been in the past, so I can't say I have seen any connection. I think it just depends on who is working at the assembly line on a given day.
As far as the safety of the 500 goes I would agree the screw should be staked and secured with thread locker. That is something Mossberg should do with all of them. The 590s come that way because they have to comply with USMC specs.The 500 is a VERY simple and nearly free to fix. Any 500 owner can do it himself, but I do have to agree with Jauarxk120 that it should be done at the factory.
I do not agree that it's a dumb idea or design.
Once the screw is fixed (and especially if you get the metal safety instead of the plastic one) they are pretty much fool-proof and 100% reliable.
That very issue was addressed by the USMC in the shotgun trials 20+ years ago and was fixed in the 590 prototype that was tested by the Marines and the SEALS. The Remington was also in the trials and they submitted the up-graded 870 to try to get the contract.
The Mossberg won in all categories.
That should give us some reason to think over the idea that the Mossberg is a "poor design". And if it is, the Remington was beat by that "poor" gun, which would make the Remington "poorer".
In defense of the Remington I tell customers this:
If you get a new one the best thing you can do is to get about 250-300 rounds of heavy loads and shoot it a lot as soon as you can.
The issues with the 870 are such that if the gun doesn't fail in the first 250 rounds of hard kicking ammo it probably never will.
The problem with the Remington is NOT it's design. It's how they assemble them.
250 round of hard kicking ammo will usually loosen up anything that was not "tied down" right and if the gun fails in the first 6 months or so, Remington will fix or replace it.
That is the reason so many people can say (honestly) they have had a Remington 870 for YEARS and it's been 100% reliable. If you get a good one (you usually will) they are good guns. If you get a bad one you'll know pretty soon if you give it some good high recoiling loads.
As a gunsmith what I don't see much is old well worn 870s coming in for repair. I see the new ones! And I have fixed new 870s (some several years old but not fired much) all the way back to the 1970s, so this has always been the issue with them.
I recommend the Mossberg as a new gun purchase because they work out of the box. That doesn't make the 870 bad, it's just not as safe a bet for a new gun buy.
But if you shoot the new 870 like a mad-man in the first few weeks or months and it works great, you probably will not live long enough to see it fail. If it's going to fail, it's going to do it soon and the sooner you get a new Remington back to the Remington factory, the better they will treat you, and the sooner you'll get it back fixed right
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