Lotsa Shootin Time

Tenmilephenom · 01-12-2008, 06:56 PM

So Cayagad- with no puter for a week and nice weather ya must of knocked the dust off all your front stuffers. Maybe in that time even picked up a new one----or 2???

cayugad · 01-12-2008, 08:04 PM

Yes I have a new one, and did a lot of hunting with the shotgun. I was testing how far I could knock a pine squirrel out of a tree with it. I managed to pop one at 38 yards according to the range laser finder. It did not kill him, but he had to crawl along a limb and gave me time to reload. And at 20 yards I could bounce one almost ten feet out of the tree to the dog. So I had a lot of fun out shooting them. They were getting a little thick anyway.

wabi · 01-12-2008, 08:20 PM

Were you dusting them off with the NewEnglander?

cayugad · 01-12-2008, 10:28 PM

Yes.. 90 grains of APP 2f, an over the powder card, then a fiber wad, then a cut off plastic shot cup, 90 grains of #5 shot and then two over the shot cards. It was really dusting the little monsters. They started to get smart though, they would head high into the trees and lay on limbs when I would approach them.

frontier gander · 01-12-2008, 10:56 PM

hows the NE shoot for ya? I bought a NE a couple days ago and plan on having TC replace the .54 with a 12g.

cayugad · 01-13-2008, 09:29 AM

The New Englander is really an exceptional rifle and shotgun. Granted I expected a little more range then say 30 yards for my turkey loads, but most of my turkey shots were taken at 25 yards where I set my decoys. So I still do not foresee a problem using the NE for that aspect of the shotgun. As for a grouse shotgun, I had exceptional luck this year. Our grouse population was at a high in their cycle and I managed to score a number of birds. Squirrels and rabbit will be a easy shoot with the shotgun part.

I was testing shot patterns the other day (when I decided to thin the squirrel herd) and found some interesting combinations of wads, hulls, etc to try. I was shooting a; 90 grains APP 2f, over the shot card, a plastic hull with the bottom clipped off so just the cylinder was left, and then two over the shot cards on top of the 90 grains of #5 shot. At 25 yards, it would simply cover a 8x11 piece of paper. There is no way anything could live through that pattern. I was also trying some strange combinations but have not decided what I like best. Still more play time needed in that respect.

As a rifle is where the NE really surprised me. It is not a fancy rifle as many know. Composite stock, standard sights, but for some reason the rifle just plain shoots. It is a very accurate rifle. My rifle is a .54 caliber and I admit I have not shot it as much as I intended to. Hunting season showed up and the range time got messed up there. But with round ball it does real well. I want to test it with a lot more different projectiles and see if I can get it shooting some REAL conicals in the near future.