SHOT Show’s industry range day is a spectacle to behold. It’s massive, well organized, and filled to the brim with guns you can see, handle, and of course fire. Best of all, its someone else’s ammo. One gun I’d been really wanting to get my hands on is the Tavor TS 12. The Tavor TS 12 is a bullpup shotgun from IWI and is quite unique. It feeds from magazine tube like a traditional shotgun, but it has three rotating tubes. It can hold up to 15 rounds and is semi-automatic. A lot of questions have been floating around the web, so I wanted to answer some here, big thanks to IWI for helping me answer these and letting me grip and rip with the gun.
How does it load?
While one tube is in action the other tubes are at the right and left loading gate. You load it like a traditional shotgun through either the right or left loading gate. You could even use both. This allows you to load it like any other shotgun. You can load it while keeping it down range and focusing on the target ahead of you. You can also load while you shoot without taking the gun out of action. The Tavor TS 12 retains the best features of a tube fed shotgun in that way.
In a pinch, you can easily eject a round and then load a slug, or specialty round.
Indexing the Tubes
Indexing the magazine tubes is actually very easy. Inside the trigger guard is a button. Hit the button and you can spin the next tube into place. It’s easy to reach with the trigger finger and quite intuitive. What’s great is if you run Tube 1 dry, when you rotate to Tube 2 the gun automatically loads the round. This substantially reduces the time you have the gun out of action.
The tubes spin easily and some audible and tactile feedback really helps let you know its in place.
What about lefties?
The gun can be set up for right or left-handed use. You can swap the ejection port, the charging handle to a left-handed configuration. Loading the Tavor TS 12, using the safety, and indexing the tubes is ambidextrous.
Final Comments on the Tavor TS 12
Here’s a quick hit list of notes I made when shooting the gun. This isn’t a full review in any way, but a first impression.
-Recoil is quite low
-The trigger isn’t super ‘mushy’ or ‘bullpupish’ It’s not perfect, but good enough for a shotgun.
-Everything is really intuitive and easy to use
-Reliability was top notch
-The gun is hefty, but the weight is well balanced.
-Yes it looks like the gun from Starship Troopers
Here is a Short video we took at the range, it may clear some things up.
