Remington 870 12 ga

Does anyone know if the 12 ga and 20 ga barrels for the Remington 870 are interchangeable?
I now they make a rife barrel but I was wondering if a 20 ga barrel will work on a 12 ga version.
Thanks

 

doubt it, I would think the chambers and shell tubes are different.

your saying you want to put a 20g barrel on your 12g and shoot 20g through it?

 

Yeah my brother-in-law has a Remington 870 12 ga. I know they come in 20 or 12 ga. So I wasn't sure if they were interchangeable. He was looking for the cheapest way possible to get his son a 20 ga to shoot.
I know some over\under guns give you a set of 12 and 20 ga as a combo gun.

 

over/unders are very simple setups with very minimal moving parts though.

 

You can't place a 20 gauge barrel on a 12 gauge receiver (or the other way around). You can swap out different barrels of the same gauge (i.e. you could have a long bird barrel, smooth bore slug barrel or rifled slug barrel for each receiver).

For what purpose will his son be using the 20 gauge? NEF makes solid break action, single-shot shotguns and they don't cost much. You can shoot foster type slugs through them as they have a smooth barrel, or you can shoot shot/buckshot. That would be the cheapest route for a new gun.

If you go the route of a pump, get a 870 combo which gives you a shot barrel and a slug barrel. They make kids versions which have a shorter length of pull and you can always add spacers as his son grows. You can usually get good deals on the combos from Dick's Sporting Goods.

As an adult, for clays and bird hunting I use a 12 gauge but for deer hunting I use a 20 as I prefer the ballistics of the new 20 gauge slugs through my H&R Ultra Slug.

 

An alternative, which I have never used is they make "adaptors" that you can use in the 12 gauge to shoot 20 gauge rounds. Basically it is a case (plastic I think) that is the size of a 12 gauge and you stick a 20 gauge shell inside of it. You then chamber the round. This gives it the appropriate size of the 12 gauge for the receiver, but allows you to shoot the 20 gauge round in the 12 gauge. My guess is performance will suffer and I would not shoot anything but shot through it. The "adaptors" are reuseable.

You can also find "reduced" or "managed recoil" 12 gauge rounds which have less kick than a full 12 gauge load.

 

yeah. freaking everything he ^^^ said. you can't swap a 20 in a 12 on an 870. and yes, if its gonna be the sons start up, learn how to hold it, aim it, so on gun, those 20 guage and 410 new england firearms are great. and cheap at walmart. heck i still use my pump NEF 12 gauge all the time.

 

You cannot swap. I contacted Remington directly because I had the same question.

 

I think those chamber adaptors are designed only for a break open single shot or a breakopen double barrel.