B. Rizzini makes good guns. Cole Fine Guns and Gunsmithing makes good guns better. In a nutshell, that’s the idea behind the new Rizzini BR240 Cole Special Sporting, a run of Rizzini’s target O/Us made in cooperation with Cole.
Italy’s B. Rizzini is one of the leading makers of the Brescia O/U style, a gun made with barrels that pivot on trunnions in place of a full hingepin, and an underbite lockup. You’ll see the same action on a Caesar Guerini, a Fabarm, or a Fausti, in large part because there are members of the Rizzini family everywhere in the Brescia gun trade. One of them, Battista Rizzini, founded B. Rizzini in the 1960s, and their guns have been imported to the US by various firms ever since.
Cole founder Rich Cole is a gunsmith of long experience who worked and trained in Italy. Cole Fine Guns and Gunsmithing has locations in Maine, in Florida, and at the National Shooting Complex in San Antonio, and they are well-known in the target gun market. The Rizzini BR240 Cole Special is built to Cole’s specs to suit American shooters. So, this American shooter put it to the test. Here's my full review.
Rizzini BR240 Cole Special Sporting Specs and Overview
Length: 50.5 inches with choke tubes installed
Weight: 8.2 pounds
Barrel: 30 or 32 inches (tested) plus extended Cole chokes, flat vent rib, ventilated mid-rib, middle bead, white Bradley front bead, blued
Action: Break action O/U
Trigger: 3 pounds, 10 ounces, adjusts for length
Capacity: 2
Finish: Black Cerakote with gold on receiver
Stock: Oil finished walnut, adjustable comb, right-hand palm swell
Chambering: 3-inch 12-gauge
Price: $5,400
The Cole Special's list of features includes a trigger that adjusts for length to accommodate different-sized hands, a more pronounced right-handed palm swell, and a more tightly curved pistol grip, along with a slightly longer length of pull. It’s good-looking, too, with a fairly straight-grain, oil-finished walnut stock, classic target-gun lines (full pistol grip, round-tipped forend), and a matte dark-gray Cerakoted receiver with gold accents, including a shield emblazoned with “Rizzini” on the bottom and “Cole Special” written underneath. It comes with five extended, silver Cole choke tubes and a nice hard case. In the case were a pair of snap caps, an excellent Cole choke-tube wrench with a crank handle, as well as some grease and handled wrenches for working with the adjustable hardware. More about the hard case itself in a bit.
Related: Best Shotguns of 2024, Tested and Reviewed
Rizzini BR240 Cole Special Sporting Test Results
Despite what some people insist, it is not more important to look good than to shoot good. Good looks are a bonus, and this gun has them, but the real test of a gun is, does it shoot? This one shoots. It balanced just ahead of the trunnions, and the weight distribution was ideal for me. The gun had enough weight up front to be mannerly and easy to swing without being too muzzle-heavy. At 8 pounds, 3 ounces overall, it absorbed recoil even from heavy 3-dram, 1 1/8 ounce loads, despite an inadequate recoil pad. It had triggers so nice, at a consistent, clean, 3 pounds, 10 ounces, that even I noticed how pleasant they were to shoot (and I don't care about trigger pull on a shotgun). It fit me extremely well without adjustment, too, and it shot where I looked. As for the Cole extended tubes, there were some targets that turned inside out when I hit them, and while I’d like to take the credit, I’m not sure it was all me.
The gun is not perfect. The recoil pad isn’t even a recoil pad, but just a thin, solid rubber buttpad. Perhaps Cole assumes we’re going to add an aftermarket pad while having the stock altered to our desired length of pull anyway, so the factory pad doesn’t matter. But the gun deserves a Kick-Eez or some other soft pad. And the Rizzini case isn’t long enough to accommodate 32-inch barrels with choke tubes installed. It’s likely not a problem with the 30-inch guns, but it was with my test gun. You have to take the chokes out every time you want to put the gun back in its hard case. I am assured that in the future, these guns will come in longer cases that will let you leave the chokes installed.
Related: Blaser F16 Pro Sporting Shotgun Review
Final Thoughts on the Rizzini BR240 Cole Special Sporting
Pros:
Excellent trigger
Good weight and balance for a sporting gun
Nice lines and finish
Cons:
Must remove chokes to fit into hard case
Thin, ineffective recoil pad
This is a gun intended for the serious recreational shooter, a group made up of people who shoot regularly, maybe enter two or three tournaments a year, and who like seeing Xs on the scorecard. If that’s you, then the Cole Special is a gun you should take a close look at.
