Mossberg 500 - Accessories and Combinations

Accessories and Combinations

The Mossberg 500 has always been marketed as a multi-purpose firearm. Mossberg sells a wide variety of accessory stocks and barrels, allowing many configurations to be made (including, in the past, a bullpup configured model 500). Mossberg is also the only company to ever offer a double action-only model. The model 590DA offers a longer, heavier trigger pull to reduce the chance of an accidental discharge by the operator, and was targeted at the police market.

With the appropriate parts, the same Model 500 can be a field gun, a slug gun, defensive weapon for civilian, police, or military use, trap and skeet gun, or .50 caliber (12.7mm) rifled muzzleloader.

Mossberg has also sold "combination" sets, with a single receiver and more than one barrel. Common examples included a 28-inch (71 cm) field barrel packaged with an 18.5-inch (47 cm) cylinder bore barrel for defensive use, or a field barrel and a slug barrel, or a slug barrel and a .50 caliber muzzleloading rifle barrel.

A unique item offered by Mossberg for the Model 500 is a line launcher kit. It uses special blank cartridge to propel a shaft with an optional floating head and a light rope attached to it; a canister hung below the barrel to hold the line spool. A test of the Mossberg 500 with line launcher by the BoatUS Foundation showed an average range of over 330 feet (100 m) with the floating head. Distances of 700 feet (210 m) are claimed for the non-floating long distance head.

All Mossberg models including the 835, 535, 500, 505 and 590 (except for Special-Purpose and Law Enforcement models) are shipped with a wooden dowel, also called a duck plug, located in the tube magazine. This is to comply with U.S. migratory bird laws. This dowel reduces and regulates the number of shells that can be loaded in the gun. This can be removed by taking off the barrel and pointing the shotgun downward and shaking it back and forth lightly until the dowel falls out.