Combine saltwater, driving rains, sand, mud and dirt where waterfowl and upland birds are the target, and you get the perfect testing ground for Benelli’s SBE 3 featuring the new A.I. with BE.S.T technologies.
by Scott Haugen
A pair of pintails banked hard into the wind and set their wings. Five shooters spanned across the tall grass embankment to my right. I was at the end. The upwind end.
Sure the ducks wouldn’t survive the gauntlet, I didn’t even grab my shotgun. But when everyone emptied and one duck was still beating wings to gain altitude, I quickly shouldered the gun and dropped the lackluster pintail at 45 yards.
It was the opening week of Alaska’s waterfowl season. I was there to test Benelli’s Super Black Eagle 3 featuring their new Advanced Impact (A.I.) and Benelli Surface Treatment (BE.S.T) systems. The trip was off to a good start.
I finished the morning hunt, having fired at nine ducks and dropped a limit of eight. The miss was my fault. I led the drake pintail too far and knew it the moment I pulled the trigger. I’d already doubled on that flock. I hate missing simple shots.
The Testing Grounds
Five industry friends and I were in Cold Bay, Alaska, hunting ducks, geese, and ptarmigan with a good friend and noted guide, Jeff Wasley, owner of Four Flyways Outfitters. Three other gentlemen were in camp. I hunted with them a bit, too.
I first met Jeff Wasley in 2014, when we hunted king eiders on St. Paul Island. We filmed a TV show on that trip. We’ve been friends ever since. I’ve been to Cold Bay to hunt with Wasley many times. He’s the one I turned to when I was an Alaska resident and needed help accessing emperor goose habitat. Together, we’ve shot a lot of prized puddle and sea ducks.
While puddle ducks, cackling Canada geese, and willow ptarmigan were our primary targets, we also wanted to head home with excellent eating coho salmon. Having lived in Alaska for nearly a decade, and having traveled much of the state the past 35 years, Cold Bay holds the largest size average of coho I’ve seen. The group caught many fish over 10 pounds, with a 14-pounder winning top honor.
The New A.I.
The Advanced Impact feature on the new Super Black Eagle 3 could play out in two ways. First, the A.I. performance is impressively realized in the downrange delivery of each payload. The downrange speed, and thus the accuracy, that this shotgun offers is very impressive. I shot 3-inch Fiochhi steel #2 for ducks and geese, with a full choke, and the same load in 4 shot for ptarmigan. I also shot Fiochhi’s Golden Bismuth in #4 shot for ducks and cacklers.
Tight patterns are the goal, and I want a softball-sized print at 40 yards. For me, the tighter the pattern, the better, thus the full choke. If hunting alone over decoys or in a small creek where birds are dropping in close, I’d downsize to another choke option. There are multiple choke choices with this Super Black Eagle 3 A.I.
Second, Advanced Impact design could be interpreted in the actual delivery of felt recoil. Personally, I think there is less recoil when shooting this gun versus the standard Super Black Eagles I’ve shot. But some buddies don’t agree, saying the A.I. system delivers slightly more recoil. This could be the result of how we shoulder, swing, and shoot the gun, as well as our body position at the time of firing.
To me, the recoil on my shoulder is more localized, feeling more like a quick punch than a resonating push that’s dispersed across more of the shoulder. Regardless of felt recoil, the precision delivery makes it easy to stay on target after each shot, which results in quicker, more accurate follow-up shots.
The Advanced Impact design features an internal barrel profile and proprietary chokes unique to Benelli’s A.I. system. This profile formula increases the velocity of whatever shell is being used compared to shooting with a standard barrel. The greater velocity results in greater energy, which testing has shown can generate up to 50 percent greater penetration, downrange. I noticed the difference with standard steel loads, which is what most of us hunt ducks with.
Don’t dismiss the value of this gun’s specialized chokes. Due to the consistent tapering of the longer Advanced Impact System BE.S.T. chokes, the transition of the payload is very consistent. The result of the design is a gradual compression of the shot and the wad as they move from the chamber to the barrel, rather than a sudden impact, which can lead to fragmentation of some brittle loads and even accentuate the scattering of steel payloads that lack smooth, round pellets.
My Experience
I’m a hunter, first, a writer, second. I had 21 years of hunting experience before penning my first article. I’m nearing my 4,000th published story, and this is my 49th year of hunting. If there’s something about a piece of gear I feel fellow hunters should know about, I’ll share it.
The first time I shot the A.I barrel in Benelli’s Cordoba last season, I instantly fell in love with it. I killed over 100 ducks with that gun, and my percentage of misses were reduced. Its accuracy and downrange power greatly impressed me. I shot a range of loads and shell brands in that gun, and it performed flawlessly over dozens of hunts, including a few in stormy saltwater conditions.
By the end of our five-day hunt in Alaska earlier this month, the SBE3 had my attention. But I do want to take it on more hunts before drawing definitive conclusions. I want to hunt with it by myself, where I’m in control of the shooting situations, something that can be hard to achieve when hunting with three or more people.
I also want to shoot it in a range of conditions, from high winds to icy mornings, amid pouring rain, and on saltwater in winter. Plus, I want to shoot various loads, including stacked steel, blends, more bismuth, and tungsten. Shooting multiple brands of shells in a variety of weights and speeds would be fitting.
In Alaska, I shot limits of ducks and more ptarmigan, and the gun performed perfectly. One of those days found us in heavy rain, and the gun cycled without a hiccup. On that day, two buddies and I shot Fiochhi Golden Bismuth and absolutely smashed cacklers at ranges that even impressed me, speaking to both the load and A.I. design.
We were in saltwater every day. At the end of the trip, I gave the gun a thorough inspection and didn’t find a speck of rust. “This BE.S.T system is for real,” confirmed Wasley. “I have it in other Benelli lodge guns, and they’ve never rusted.”
Wasley is one of the best waterfowl hunters I know, and he hunts in the harshest conditions on earth. Every hunt finds him on the salt, and often massive waves and spray soak everything in the boat. There’s no escaping the salt. “I’ve seen several guns quit working after a morning hunt up here,” says Wasley. “That’s why we carry a couple of dozen lodge guns, ones I know will work.”
Wasley was so impressed with the new Benelli Super Black Eagle 3 featuring A.I. and BE.S.T. systems that he bought one for the lodge. I let him shoot my gun one day. He tripled and had two doubles. That’s the best testimony these state-of-the-art shotguns could receive, right out of the gate.
