16ga.com ~ View topic

http://www.shotgunlife.com/shotguns/tom-roster/evil-recoil-part-3.html

I tend to believe guys like Tom Roster and ED Lowery when it comes to shotgun ballistics.

"Speed kills" may be true, but it doesn't define what it's killing. Birds or nerves and retinas?

Joined: 28 Aug 2014 Posts: 924 Location: Eastern Tennessee

Interesting read. I'd love to show that to the guys carrying 3 1/2 in shells at high speed steel.

Joined: 21 May 2010 Posts: 603 Location: Victoria BC Canada

A good article. It is meant to be digested whole, but I will quote what I feel is the key point, especially for older, lighter fixed breach guns;

"Because of the physics of balls which causes them to slow down more quickly the faster they are launched, it’s a mathematically spurious route to think or claim that you are upping the lethality of a shotshell load containing round pellets by increasing the velocity 150 or so feet per second for a given load weight over what has been traditional. By the time the pellets get beyond 40 yards that increased per-pellet velocity and energy at the muzzle has been so substantially shed, that the faster-starting round pellets are now traveling at about the same speed as the slower-starting round pellets."

I focus my own gunning on 1200fps loads with regular to light shot loads. If you love those big auto loaders, suit yourself.

Wow I hope nobody would stuff 27 grains of Green Dot in a load. As much as I like company's that support the 16 gauge and it's components. Their loads and rhetoric remind me of a crooked politician. It's hard to take them serious and put any confidence in them.

Joined: 28 Aug 2014 Posts: 924 Location: Eastern Tennessee

Carlos,

It is funny how my practices have changed in such a short period of time. Started learning to hunt in December 2013 and started reloading the middle of last year. Since the beginning, my shot weight has shrunk, my speed has declined, and my guns have gotten older.

I've loved it all, except duck hunting. Not sure I'm a big fan.

Member Joined: 31 Aug 2005 Posts: 1257 Location: Nebraska

That article starts down the road of lighter loads but stops at 7/8oz. Would like to see them continue to the demonstrably effective level of even lighter loads of 9s at high speed and publish those results. Anybody here have an 'in" with Roster or Lowry?

Joined: 21 May 2010 Posts: 603 Location: Victoria BC Canada

KGB: I have heard that #9s can be quite effective, but remember that the lighter/smaller the pellet the lower the ballistic cooefficient. In other words, having regard to the quote above, high initial speed is sooner lost.

My lee adjustable shot dipper bottoms out at 7/8 oz. so no experience. I do use a lot of 7/8 oz. loads.

Member Joined: 02 Sep 2010 Posts: 829 Location: SW Ohio

Those seem similar to the light super high speed loads Nick talks about, but since we do not know his ingredients or recipe we cannot compare.

Joined: 19 Apr 2014 Posts: 429 Location: Maine

I made the mistake awhile back of buying the BPI 16ga reloading book. It is full of recipes with lead whistling out there at 1400-1600 FPS. Not many useful loads. My unprofessional opinion is many times it isn't the lack of FPS that accounts for the miss it's usually operator error. 2 cents worth.

Lowery has passed, but Roster may be contacted via email. Not sure what his response would be to the light load of small shot at high velocity.

Innovation can be wonderful at times. I'd hate to still be pursuing upland game birds with a matchlock; I much prefer the lineup of 16's listed below. But. . . . those BPI loads look like a Rube Goldberg invention to me.

Maybe I'm just an old hard-head, but I think I'll stick with standard low velocity 1 ounce loads for quail/grouse-sized birds and a 1 and 1/8 high velocity load for pheasants. After 50+ years of shooting wild quail, I firmly believe a 1 ounce load of shot (e.g. 8's) is needed to obtain the necessary patterns for effective kills. So, I don't use 20s or 28s. I don't dove hunt a lot, but I also believe 1 ounce in the minimum and 1 and 1/8th at low/moderate velocities would be best. Have you really looked at the "kill zone" on a dove? Past 25 yards, a lot of doves can fly though the patterns of a lot of gun/choke combinations. During quail season (also the late dove season in my state), I shoot at quite a few sitting doves in fence rows (strictly an added treat for us wild bird eaters) with 1 oz. of 8's or 7/8 oz of #7 steel (on federal land) at around 25/30 yards--and about half of them fly off! Draw a dove breast sized target on a piece of paper and back off 30 yards--better have a full choke if you want to consistently put pellets into it. All this to say, I don't use less than 1 ounce of shot on game birds, don't shoot 20 or 28 gauge at em, etc. Watching thousands of quail die over the decades with 1100-1150 fps loads has convinced me. (Go easy on me, Skeetx!)

Rooster pheasants are tough birds, and I again firmly believe that a 1 and 1/8 standard high velocity load is the ticket for them over dogs. I've never shot driven pheasants or cornfield pheasants with groups of hunters, so I can't speak to that. The hunters I go with bring home about 85-90% of the birds they shoot at, and very few cripples are lost (partially thanks to the dogs in combination with standard high velocity loads). I won't be shooting anything but a 16 gauge high-velocity 1 and 1/8th load at pheasants as long as I'm able. Nothing lighter--not at any velocity. I've shot hundreds of pheasants over the last 35 years, and never shot a single one with any of the 12 gauges I used to use for open water duck hunting. Ever single one of them has been with a 16.

My opinion, but light shot loads don't need to be in the upland game fields except possibly in the hands of expert shots with appropriate chokes or possibly on birds like woodcock and ruffed grouse where the majority of shots are under 20 yards. And 1100-1250 fps is time-tested when it comes to killing game birds. No BPI thunder for me.

Clays may be something else. No feathers on em, so I can't speak to that.

Member Joined: 31 Aug 2005 Posts: 1257 Location: Nebraska

Reading around on that site, Roster's article on shoddy barrel modifications addresses using chronographs. I wondered about their accuracy when trying out some of my reloads years ago, and apparently they're not to be trusted.

I have been fortunate using the chronograph with my reloads. I take a listed load from the spreadsheets and then shoot it and compare to the published velocity. Most of the time if I build the load properly, the chrono and published loads are within 100fps or many times closer. Where I have difficulty is trying to get reliable readings at 40 yards. I did some testing yesterday on the 1750fps load with 7.5 lead at 40 yards. Most of the data was about 900fps. I have yet to try the 9 size lead. As others have pointed out the high velocity sheds speed faster than the lower velocity pellets. I believe a 1300fps 7.5 drops to around 600fps @ 40 yards - a loss of 700fps. The 1750fps 7.5 loses about 850fps @ 40yds.
I am not sure if this site has been noted on this forum in the past. But this page has formulas that can be down loaded to calculate shotgun data including velocity at a given distance. The download works for microsoft PCs, apparently, and not for me and my Mac computer.
http://50.97.175.152/BB/shotgun.htm

I was wrong about that posted site. You cannot get a velocity at a given distance. It offers the time to a given distance.

KGB,

Roster is a nay sayer unless he is the guy doing it.

Sometimes chronos are way off, but ProChrono, Pact, Oehler, Shooting Chrony among others work just fine and are plenty accurate enough to get good velocities 95% of the time.

Use the diffusers, stay between 2 to 3 feet from the start screen and chronograph on cloudy days and you will be successful.