Action flicks often show The Hero grabbing a 12-gauge shotgun and pumping it. I suppose this action transfers the shell from a storage area into “the chamber.”
What would happen if he pumped it again? Would it eject the whole shell? Also, once the shotgun shell is chambered, how does one un-chamber it? Another question: If one pulls the trigger without anything in the chamber, does the shotgun fire? (Yes, I’m that ignorant.)
Same with, say, a 9 mm. How does one unchamber the round? I can’t imagine it has to be manually removed.
If he pumped it again, the shell in the chamber would be ejected.
For a 9mm (on any semi-auto handgun), the same thing would happen. If you wanted to get the round out of the chamber, one way is to remove the clip and pull the slide back. This will eject the round.
A gun will “fire” without a round in the chamber. This is called “dry firing”. All you’ll get is a “click”.
Pumping again will discharge the shell whether it has been fired or not. A 9mm will eject the casing itself when fired or if you wish to eject the unfired round just rack the slide back and it will eject manually.
Yes, cycling the action will eject either the spent or whole round chambered. Pulling the trigger with a live round chambered = bang.
The same is true of a 9 mm, except that if you wish to render the firearm safe, first the magazine is removed, then the action is cycled to eject the chambered round, and after a brief visual check, one can be sure that no rounds are present in the firearm.
I have a pump shotgun. A Mossberg 500. There is a small tube that runs under the barrel that hold 6 shells. After loading the 6 shells, you can load one in the chamber, move the slide forward and “chamber” that shell. You would then pull the trigger firing the shell in the chamber. Slide the action back and the now empty shell is ejected and one pops out of the tube and when you move the slide forward again that shell is chambered and ready to fire. You can repeatedly work the action and eject all the shells without firing them. If there is no shell in the chamber but shells in the tube pulling the trigger will not fire the gun. But pulling the trigger without a shell is called dry firing and it isn’t good for the gun’s inner workings.
The Hero grabbing a 12-gauge shotgun and pumping it … transfers the shell from a storage area into “the chamber.”
Correct
*What would happen if he pumped it again? Would it eject the whole shell? *
A pump action shotgun cannot be pumped again when a shell is “chambered” unless you:
Fire the shotgun which would allow you to bring the pump toward you which would eject the fired shell
OR
There is a release lever on pump action shotguns whereby you can “action” the shotgun and eject the unfired shell by bringing the pump toward you.
When you bring the pump action forward it will chamber a new round if there is another round in the tubular magazine (‘storage srea’)
*If one pulls the trigger without anything in the chamber, does the shotgun fire? *
It would make a “click” but if you wanted it to “click” again you would have to work the pump action again for another click.
Yeah, guess I said what those folks said.
It seems the only point I added is that of the release lever needing to be pressed in order to “action” the shotgun so that you can remove a live round from the chamber without firing.
Geez, do I type slowly.