| Striker | Protecta |
| Caliber | 12 Gauge (2 3/4 in - 70 mm chamber) |
| Length (butt folded / open), with 12" barrel | 508 / 792 mm | 500 / 800 mm |
| Barrel length | 12 in (304 mm) or 18 in (457 mm), other lengths also were made |
| Weight, empty | 4.2 kg | |
| Magazine capacity | 12 rounds in non-detachable rotary cylinder |
The Striker shotgun was originally designed in the early 1980s by the someone Hilton Walker from Rhodesia. After the fall of Rhodesia he moved to the South African Republic, where he continued the development of his counter-insurgency, high capacity combat shotgun. First production models of his shotgun, named "Striker", were made during the mid-1980s, and found its way from the South Africa and into the USA, and other countries. The key advantages of the Striker shotgun were its large magazine capacity, which is doubled the traditional shotguns magazine capacity of that time, and rapid-fire capability. On the other hand, the rotary cylinder-type magazine was bulky, very slow to reload, and the basic action was not without certain flaws. During the late 1980s Mr. Walker redesigned his shotgun, getting rid of its watch clock-like cylinder rotation mechanism, and replaced it with manually operated cylinder rotating mechanism, linked to the side-swinging vertical front grip. The rest of the features of the Striker, including the DAO trigger, cylinder design and top-folding butt, were retained, and the spent cases auto-ejection feature was added to speed up reloading. The shotguns of updated design, called "Protecta", are still manufactured in South Africa by the Reutech Defense Industries, and offered in various barrel lengths, ranging from 171 mm (Protecta Bulldog) to the 760 mm, and with various finishes. I must admit that the most bizarre firearm I've ever seen was the gold-plated Protecta (with huge, gold-plated muzzle brake), which was sold in one of the central Russian gun shops in Moscow for local equivalent of the several thousands of US dollars. 