I know only one guy who’s ever had an issue with a Benelli functioning, he is a fellow duck hunter and notoriously bad at maintenance on his gear. He cursed Benelli every chance he got, when he finally showed me the gun it looked like it’d been used as a boat paddle and left on the bottom of a lake for months. He had owned it two years shot the hell out of it and first time it had a hiccup threw it in the tool box and left it. We bought a SBE3 3” same time frame i used mine for sporting clays, doves, squirrel, spring/fall turkey, coyote, ducks, snow goose 2 years in a row. Over 2000rd each yr, from 2-3/4” #8 to 3” #4 buckshot never had an issue that wasn’t operator induced.
I bought used 3” M2 for 3 gun matches for ran it close to 5yrs once again never an issue that wasn’t operator induced. Money and time got tight had to give that up.
I’ve got an Ethos in 20ga the ole lady has ran for sporting clay and everything else past 2 years same deal never an issue. 2000+ Rounds not a single issue, it’s went click 3 times that’s because of a bad primer in shells which got wet.
From 9 degrees in a duck blind to 90 degrees in a dove field in September. I have never had to do anything more than to wipe off/out the grime, run a bore snake down the pipe and give a few drops of oil in the moving parts. Either I’m the luckiest sob on the planet or I just take care of my shit better than most. I’m not saying that somewhere someone didn’t get a lemon and it put a bad taste in their mouth for a particular brand/model but having owned four of them in 15yrs I’ve never had a problem. The sbe3 even with extended mag for snow goose and shooting 200rd a day never had an issue I didn’t cause. I’ve been around a few years and slung a lot of lead the #1 issue I’ve seen with malfunctioning shotguns is lack of maintenance. I don’t care which brand/model y’all choose, if you don’t occasionally clean and lube it it’ll stop working eventually.
The “click” is from not getting the bolt closed, careless handling while mounting the gun, or snagging the bolt handle on something as you walk or move around a blind. The Ethos and SBE3 you have to try to get the bolt to stay out of battery. They’ve changed the spring in the bolt head and pretty well fixed the issue on all their guns now days.
