CZ’s Surprising Findings on the “Perfect Home Defense Gun”

Okay…lemme first apologize for the positively crap-taculuar video you’ll see (above). Turns out, it’s pretty damn hard to hold an iPhone, shoot video, and handle a gun, all at the same time. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. But the subject matter deserves better. Rest assured, loyal readers, TTAG is on it. We’ll have an honest-to-Yahweh, no-holes-barred (but quite a few holes punched in paper) review Really Soon Now.

Anyway, the nice folks over at CZ-USA and I got to talking today about sending us products to review.

“What kinds of weapons do you guys want to review,” he sez.

“All of them,” I sez. (Hope springs eternal.)

“Okay, what do you want to start with? What are your readers interested in,” he asks.

“Um…we’re all about self-defense, so, aside from your excellent (and IMHO, underrated) handguns, what do you guys bring to the party?”

“Shotguns. Specifically two shotguns.”

Now keep in mind that the C (and the Z) in “CZ” stand for “Czech” as in Czech Republic (nee: “Czechoslovakia”…the home of my forefathers). CZ-USA doesn’t just be-bop over to the design engineers and say something like “this would be really cool if you could whip this out for us.” Nope. They gotta go to their go-to guys in Europe and collaborate. Which is cool and everything, but makes for some interesting cross-pollination, if you know what I mean.

Turns out, CZ/European HQ had some interesting ideas on a tactical shotgun. (Which we will be featuring in a future review. Promise.) CZ-USA wanted a tactical shotgun. What CZ-Europe designed/sent was a kind of Swiss Czech Army Knife of a shotgun. A semi-auto that beats as it sweeps as it cleans, and does pretty near everything you need a shotgun to do, i.e.: huntin’ self-defendin’ and clay shootin.’ That one has proven to be a big seller for CZ (warming the cockles of RF’s heart, as he’s got the Jones for using semi-autos for the ultimate home defense gun).

Meanwhile, back here in the real world, reality reared it’s ugly head. CZ also commissioned a nostalgic throwback for the Cowboy Action Shootin’ crowd – what the (original) Wells Fargo bunch called a “coach gun” – a double-barreled, sawed-off shotgun that was used by the hired help sitting on top of a stage coach. (It’s the origin of the term “riding shotgun” for those of you not from the Lone Star State. But I digress…)

Seems when Man of the House tries to explain to Lady of the Manor how to defend herself, the coach gun is the Lowest Common Denominator. No tricky magazines to load. No worries about ejecting shells. Two shots. Point and shoot simplicity. It even cocks easy, since the hammers are as exposed as…well…Tiger’s tail has been lately.

It would seem that women like “simple and easy,” especially in cases where they don’t wanna do something in the first place. Like pick up a shotgun and blow some bastard’s head clean off. Which is exactly what will happen with the coach gun if you load it with 00 buck, or a great big, honkin’ slug. (Especially the expanding kind.)

Sooooo…what you see above is a really beautiful example of a coach gun, originally intended for the Cowboy crowd, but got a new lease on life when the fairer sex (“fairer” as in “prettier” – I make no claims that they are “fairer” in the judicial sense) figured out that something easy might get them better odds on surviving a shootout.

So take a look at the unfortunately shaky (but mercifully short) video. And start salivating for the day that we get this puppy (and it’s semi-auto kin) in hand, to do a little up-close-and-personal testing.