Winchester 1887/1901

The Winchester Model 1887 and Model 1901 are a series of lever-action shotguns that were produced by Winchester Repeating Arms during the late 19th century and the early 20th century. The Winchester Model 1887 and Model 1901 lever-action shotguns were originally designed by famed American gun designer and maker, John Moses Browning.

Despite both these firearms having the same appearance, the Model 1887 and Model 1901 are different to each other. One of the differences was that the Model 1887 was originally designed to fire only black-powder, 12-gauge and 10-gauge shotgun shells while the Model 1901 was designed to fire smokeless powder, 10-gauge shotgun shells. Another one of the differences was that the Model 1901 was designed to be mass-produced and its parts being made to be interchangeable with other Model 1901 shotguns while the parts for the original Model 1887s were not made to be interchangeable with other Model 1887s.

Over the past few years, there have been many gun companies that tried to re-produce the Model 1887 and Model 1901 shotguns for the modern gun market, especially for the Western Action shooting discipline, but with limited success. Since 2000/2001, there have been two companies that have been trying to re-produce the Model 1887 and Model 1901 shotguns – ADI Limited of Australia (which produced a Model 1887 shotgun built around the action of the more modern and mass-produceable Model 1901 so that the shotgun can chamber and fire modern, smokeless, 12 gauge shotgun shells) and Norinco of China (who are currently producing a modern Model 1887 shotgun to take modern, smokeless, 12-gauge shotgun shells). Today in 2005, Norinco appears to be the only company that is producing a modern reproduction of the Winchester Model 1887/1901 series shotguns.

The Winchester Model 1887 and Model 1901 series lever-action shotgun have been seen in a few movies. The Winchester Model 1887/1901's claim to fame on the silver screen in recent times is the 1991 movie Terminator 2: Judgement Day as the signature weapon of Arnold Schwarzenegger's character in the movie.