Hey all, I've an old Winchester 1300 Defender 12g that is basically my all purpose shotgun.  I use it for HD, shooting clays, general fun on the range, and possibly 3 gun in the future.  I've been considering the Vang Comp barrel treatment since chokes aren't an option for this thing and I would like tighter shot patterns (only other barrels I've found that fit this model are 22" fixed cylinder bores).  I'm also wondering if the porting is worth the extra $55 as well.  Some reduced recoil would definitely be a nice bonus.

My take on it: his barrel work or magic back in the day would get you pretty close to flitecontrol patterns. This is with normal ammo.. still holds true today. I have not shot a lot of birdshot but what I did was more even and uniform. Also tighter by a degree of choke maybe two with premium loads.

Unnecessary if shooting Flitecontrol buckshot.

Looking at ammo prices, doubt I'll shoot much of that out of it.  Bear in mind, I am looking to shoot a variety of ammo out of this barrel.

Unbelievably worth it.  Makes pretty much everything pattern like flitecontrol and makes flitecontrol look like a slug at 20 yards.  That's out of a 14" barrel, side by side comparison with a 14" non-vang'd barrel.  Hans does voodoo magic on shotguns.  I'll be sending my 18" barrel off to him once I get around to it.  

FWIW  I used one of his back bored and ported guns when my Benelli M4 vomited a piston.  

I finished the last two days of class with it, the tight patterning of buckshot and the diminished recoil impressed the heck out of me.

I had him do the backbore and porting and sight work on my 870P ,the pattern is amazingly tight, accuracy is excellent and with the porting you can be back on target very quickly.

I'm very happy with the work he did and don't regret having it done one bit.

Funny anecdote, his loaner had the surefire forend on it, during the night arroyo shoot the light failed, so I used the E2D I had in my pocket, the instructor said I was the first person he ever saw use a shotgun with the Harries technique.

I agree 100%. Had them work over two 870's, a 12 and a 20 gauge. I couldn't be happier with the work.

I see myself shooting these a lot more now than I did over the past few years.