I've had mine so dirty
that you could watch the bolt cycle back and forth. In real time.
Yet it never failed to eject the empty or to load the next round.
The gas tube and piston get quite dirty. Clean them every couple of hundred rounds.
DO NOT!!! take the trigger group apart!! It comes apart very easily. It's an absolute nightmare to get back together. And when, after screwing with it for two weeks, you do get it back together, the safety doesn't work. Ask me how I know this....
I love mine. I've got no idea how it ended up on the list of the "Five Worst Shotguns Ever Made", but that's a slander against what has been for me and my dad (who had it before me), a great gun. The only beefs I have are that it's heavy, and there's no really comfortable way to carry it afield, except at port arms, or with the receiver cupped in a hand. Every shoulder carry I've tried ends up with some metal corner or another digging into my flesh. That said, I've carried it all day after California quail, and I was more tired from all the walking than from carrying the gun.
--Shannon