Echo 12g Semi-Auto Shotgun by Breda

The Editor tries out a smart, new Italian shotgun the last week of the shooting season….

Breda has a specialised steel processing plant and manufacture not only a wide range of shotguns but also ship engines, thermal plants and even train engines.
The factory claims that their shotguns undergo extreme testing and are made to exact tolerances, something that I have no doubt is correct.

The first production shotguns, released by Breda after the Second World War, were of the long recoil auto type. I have heard that these were very well made and brilliantly designed; being simpler than the Auto 5 and sturdier than the 48AL.
Some guns made by Breda are very similar to Beretta models. The Altair auto is a spitting image of the Beretta 302 with the addition of externally threaded chokes tubes.
The Vega under/over is almost the same as the 686, the Andromeda SXS is similar to the Beretta 626 with many parts being interchangeable. I am not sure how this came about and who was making for who. Some say that the Beretta 302 has a Breda made barrel.
The Breda Grizzly is almost the same gun as the Benelli Super Black Eagle II with the Grizzly being about a thousand bucks cheaper.

Technical

The Echo is an inertia driven gun with a fixed, ventilated rib, 28 inch barrel in vanadium-chrome steel. The barrel’s internal chrome finish is mirror polished and comes with a shallow aiming notch and small red fibre-optic foresight. The breech is chambered for 2 ¾ or 3-inch shells.

If you wanted to shoot extra large 3 ½ inch magnums, you’d go for the Grizzly model. It’s a heavier model gun with a synthetic stock, available in black or Advantage-type camo finish.
The receiver of the Echo was in a brushed aluminium alloy with a flat nickel finish (also comes in a black version) and some nicely detailed laser etching.
The breach block is completely chromed with a rotating head.
The Echo has a finger operated cut-off lever for simple extraction of a chambered shell.
It takes four magnum shells (3 + 1) or five standard ones.

The woodwork is beautifully grained as I’ve mentioned and is an absolute piece of art. They are all made using premium, high grade walnut with finely detailed laser etched hand grips.
It comes with four Briley thin-walled screw-in chokes, several stock adjusting shims, a pair of snap-on sling swivels and is, of coarse, steel-shot compatible with a specific choke supplied for steel.
It must also be noted that the Echo easily breaks down without any tools.

In the Field

The Echo is a light gun at just 2.6 kilos.
It comes up beautifully, points quickly and fitted me pretty well. It was set with a fair amount of turn in the butt which
I personally like. The stock was maybe just a centimetre short for me as my eye tended to cast just a little down the rib with a rapid point. Nothing that changing the shims wouldn’t fix.
Best thing about shooting the Echo was; it is a very fast gun, even with the 28 inch barrels. It swings fast and shoots easily.

I patterned the Echo with Rio 3” steel in no.2’s 36gr at 25 metres and had no issues there. After trying dozens of different steel shot cartridges in several guns the Rio has given me good consistent patterns.

The Shoot

An early start at a local farmer’s pond saw a few late season Mallards fall to the Breda.
Actually, the first shot with the Echo was a beaut as
I took one of a pair of high-flying ducks that passed over (that the two other shooters missed I must add). The wind was howling and it was raining consistently so the ducks had their “blinkers” on when flying, reducing their usually keen eyesight. Still, after almost two months of shooting, they were very cautious. We ended up with a reasonable bag of nine for the morning so had to be happy with that.

A few days later I was out for an evening on the Tauranga Harbour and put up a nice pheasant just on the edge of the
mangroves. By the time
I dropped my decoys
I was carrying, worked the bolt to chamber a round and lifted the gun the bird was near maximum range. However he folded neatly and dropped in a reasonably clear spot so I found him without having to search too much. Nice! This is what the Echo was made for, quick,
accurate shots. Now why is there no-one around to see my best shooting? Recoil was surprisingly light, no doubt due to the gun being so well balanced.
A couple of distant birds turned ever so slightly towards my spinning Robo-duck and I nailed a double of big Mallards to go with the pheasant to end the season just nicely for me.

Conclusion

The Italians sure make some fine shotguns.
A nice bit of kit is something to be proud of, even just something small like a knife but especially so with a beautifully made gun like this one. It’s hard to explain but you just feel comfortable out carrying one. The good shots feel better than before and even sitting in the pouring rain and with a cold biting wind it was hard to remove the slight grin on my face as I looked down at the first bird that
I had taken from two other very experienced shooters with a gun I’d never shot before. All in all, this is one very sweet weapon, I liked it a lot.

Distributed by Hayes and Associates, Tel (06) 3796692, www.hayesandassociates.co.nz