Today we're going to look at the DP-12 by Standard Mfg. of New Britain, Connecticut.
It's the new large capacity bullpup shotgun on the market. Set to go up against the UTAS UTS-15 and Kel-Tec's KSG, it's approaching the idea from a new direction. Rather than two tubes feeding a single chamber, they basically took two shotguns and melded them together. It's chambered to 3" so any 12 gauge ammo you can find will fire from it, but I'd test any short shells before using them.
Initial impressions were that this is a well constructed, robust shotgun. The balance when unloaded is biased to the aft. I don't know if this was intentional or not, but when loaded it has a nice center of gravity. There's plenty of rail on top for mounting optics, lasers, etc. I just put a cheap red dot for range testing today and it worked fairly well. The controls are logical and follow the basic AR setup. They're also ambidextrous. The slide lock is on front of the trigger guard and easily reachable and usable by the trigger finger. The front pistol grip comes standard on the shotgun and is solid to the slide. Something that's looking to be a problem with the Kel-Tec and a couple of incidents of self inflicted wounds when the front pistol grip has come off when racking. The loading/ejection port is open and easy to inspect.
Loading is straight forward and easy. Racking the slide back allows you to load the barrels and sliding it forward closes the ramps and loading the magazine tubes is easy. Also, these tubes truly hold 7 3" rounds each. Unlike the KSG or the UTS which kinda/sorta holds 7 rounds of 2 3/4" shells if you really cram them in.
Firing is easy and the follow on shot is quick. Recoil is very manageable. Loads from 2 3/4" bird shot up through a couple of 3" turkey loads really had very little difference. Part of this maybe the weight, it's basically two pump shotguns you're carrying. But the recoil was still fairly straight back with very little muzzle climb.
Racking is easy and forgiving. One doesn't need to slam it back and forth to get it to work unlike the UTS. It will take a little training to get used to the Bang-Bang-Chunk action since the slide won't unlock till both barrels are fired.
As mentioned above, the follow on shot is quick due to the double barrel configuration, and the slide throw is not too long.
All in all it's a nice shotgun to shoot. Now keep in mind this is not your grandfather's turkey gun or the next big thing in skeet/trap shooting. This is a compact maneuverable shotgun that holds enough rounds to keep your worst nightmares at bay. In other words, this is a great home defense shot gun. It's short enough that you can swing it around in hallways or doorways with out any difficulty while still carrying enough rounds to deal with the threat.
There are some things that I'm not too fond of. First off, the weight. Like I said it's basically two pump shotguns in one frame and while I can't say that it's double the weight of the UTS or KSG, it is definitely heavier by a few pounds loaded or unloaded.
The safety is familiar but lacks that positive lock in position that I'd like to feel when moving it. Currently it just rotates to the stop without locking into position once it's there. The other big issue I have with the safety is that it wont move to safe if only one chamber has been fired and the other one is still "hot". Which means you'll have to fire twice no matter what or manually release the slide and eject one live round with one spent to get the safety into the safe position.
The shotgun has no way of knowing if the chamber is loaded or empty. Say you load 6 rounds in one tube and only 4 in the other. You'll end up at some point with one chamber empty and depending on which one it is you'll get a click-bang or bang-click before the slide will unlock and you can rack the next round(s).
There is no "field stripping" this shotgun. You need a couple of allen wrenches to disassemble it. I'm a big believer that you should be able to do basic cleaning of any gun without having to resort to a gunsmith's bench to do it.
And finally, the price. Currently they're only available from CheaperThanDirt.com and they're retailing at $1395.00 each. Hopefully they will come down as they get more of them out there, but CTD bought the first 30,000 units so, don't expect other vendors or a price change anytime soon.
I hope that Std. Mfg. addresses the safety issue. You should be able to put the shotgun on safe even if you don't fire both barrels. As for the safety feel and the one empty chamber issues, while they would be nice to solve, I won't lose any sleep over them.
So, I give this shotgun a thumbs up. It's got a good beat and you can dance to it.
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| Std Mfg DP-12 |
It's the new large capacity bullpup shotgun on the market. Set to go up against the UTAS UTS-15 and Kel-Tec's KSG, it's approaching the idea from a new direction. Rather than two tubes feeding a single chamber, they basically took two shotguns and melded them together. It's chambered to 3" so any 12 gauge ammo you can find will fire from it, but I'd test any short shells before using them.
Initial impressions were that this is a well constructed, robust shotgun. The balance when unloaded is biased to the aft. I don't know if this was intentional or not, but when loaded it has a nice center of gravity. There's plenty of rail on top for mounting optics, lasers, etc. I just put a cheap red dot for range testing today and it worked fairly well. The controls are logical and follow the basic AR setup. They're also ambidextrous. The slide lock is on front of the trigger guard and easily reachable and usable by the trigger finger. The front pistol grip comes standard on the shotgun and is solid to the slide. Something that's looking to be a problem with the Kel-Tec and a couple of incidents of self inflicted wounds when the front pistol grip has come off when racking. The loading/ejection port is open and easy to inspect.
Loading is straight forward and easy. Racking the slide back allows you to load the barrels and sliding it forward closes the ramps and loading the magazine tubes is easy. Also, these tubes truly hold 7 3" rounds each. Unlike the KSG or the UTS which kinda/sorta holds 7 rounds of 2 3/4" shells if you really cram them in.
Firing is easy and the follow on shot is quick. Recoil is very manageable. Loads from 2 3/4" bird shot up through a couple of 3" turkey loads really had very little difference. Part of this maybe the weight, it's basically two pump shotguns you're carrying. But the recoil was still fairly straight back with very little muzzle climb.
Racking is easy and forgiving. One doesn't need to slam it back and forth to get it to work unlike the UTS. It will take a little training to get used to the Bang-Bang-Chunk action since the slide won't unlock till both barrels are fired.
As mentioned above, the follow on shot is quick due to the double barrel configuration, and the slide throw is not too long.
All in all it's a nice shotgun to shoot. Now keep in mind this is not your grandfather's turkey gun or the next big thing in skeet/trap shooting. This is a compact maneuverable shotgun that holds enough rounds to keep your worst nightmares at bay. In other words, this is a great home defense shot gun. It's short enough that you can swing it around in hallways or doorways with out any difficulty while still carrying enough rounds to deal with the threat.
There are some things that I'm not too fond of. First off, the weight. Like I said it's basically two pump shotguns in one frame and while I can't say that it's double the weight of the UTS or KSG, it is definitely heavier by a few pounds loaded or unloaded.
The safety is familiar but lacks that positive lock in position that I'd like to feel when moving it. Currently it just rotates to the stop without locking into position once it's there. The other big issue I have with the safety is that it wont move to safe if only one chamber has been fired and the other one is still "hot". Which means you'll have to fire twice no matter what or manually release the slide and eject one live round with one spent to get the safety into the safe position.
The shotgun has no way of knowing if the chamber is loaded or empty. Say you load 6 rounds in one tube and only 4 in the other. You'll end up at some point with one chamber empty and depending on which one it is you'll get a click-bang or bang-click before the slide will unlock and you can rack the next round(s).
There is no "field stripping" this shotgun. You need a couple of allen wrenches to disassemble it. I'm a big believer that you should be able to do basic cleaning of any gun without having to resort to a gunsmith's bench to do it.
And finally, the price. Currently they're only available from CheaperThanDirt.com and they're retailing at $1395.00 each. Hopefully they will come down as they get more of them out there, but CTD bought the first 30,000 units so, don't expect other vendors or a price change anytime soon.
I hope that Std. Mfg. addresses the safety issue. You should be able to put the shotgun on safe even if you don't fire both barrels. As for the safety feel and the one empty chamber issues, while they would be nice to solve, I won't lose any sleep over them.
So, I give this shotgun a thumbs up. It's got a good beat and you can dance to it.
1 comment:
Thanks, an interesting concept... I'll see if I can get a look at one!
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