Stoeger M3000 “Sporting” Model Puts You In Open Division

There is a model of Stoeger M-series shotgun that I have seen a few times at a few of the larger sporting goods stores called the “M3000 Sporting.” It has the blue charging handle and bolt release of Stoeger’s 3-Gun model, the M3K, along with the knurled chokes but it does not have the port opened up for 3-Gun. It also has a 30″ barrel according to Stoeger’s web site which seems about 4-6″ long but would still work except…
 

…the barrel is ported.

 
I chatted with a competitor this weekend that was shooting her second club match and pointed out that the porting on her barrel puts her in open division instead of her intention to shoot TacOps. Her response was “it came like that.”
No matter who put the porting in or when it was done, most rule-sets state that porting on your shotgun or pistol’s barrel will put you in Open division. Even if a competitor’s intentions are true as they were in this case.
 
Know what you’re buying before you spend your hard earned dollars on something that you will have to replace after a few matches. If you have questions, you can always ask here.
 
And Stoeger, this is clearly a model not intended for 3-Gun so why not make the oversized controls a different color to help the consumer quickly figure it out?

One Comment

  • Adam says:

    Welcome to life as a Mossbeg 930 owner. Most 930s outside of the JM Pro are ported barrels too. I eventually had my local gunsmith chop and re-thread. I never even noticed they were gone, the make so little difference anyway.

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