Shotgun Fun
 

Well guys, I have spent a bunch of time at my lease doing some range shooting with my new shotgun and I've been having a great time. I've gone through 1lb of APP 2f powder and have a pretty good load/pattern worked up for April 1st, our spring turkey opener here in Tx.
After many different combos of wads and volumn my best patterns are shooting 90gr APP 2f with over powder wonder wad, plastic shot cup,90gr vol. #6 shot and another wonder wad over shot. With X-full choke this load throws a pretty nice pattern at 40yds and the other barrel with full choke will do well at 30-35yds. Now all I have to do is find the birds, call them in, and not get busted!
My patterns when I started were low and right. I corrected this problem by putting my ear plugs in. Now I'm not flinching like I was. Live and learn. I had no idea what was wrong until I remembered to protect my hearing. Then my shooting problem resolved itself!
I have yet to try larger shot or PRBs since I don't have any yet but I'm really looking forward to it. Particularly the PRBs. I think they will be great for hogs. I'll let ya'll know.
Greg, AKA Txrookie

RE: Shotgun Fun
 

Now you need to get out there and smoke a turkey with that thing... good luck and its nice to know they are good shooters.

RE: Shotgun Fun
 

Good luck with the toms. After the season you might want to try a regular AA wad instead of the expensive shot cups. I've found them to work pretty well for patterns and I put a glob of lube in the compression joint, it really cuts down on the fouling. And, they are much cheaper..

Doug

RE: Shotgun Fun
 

Doug S, please forgive my ignorance but I don't know what a AA wad is. Is that the fiber over powder wad? What are they and where can I get them?

RE: Shotgun Fun
 

txrookie,

That's my name for a standard wad used in shotshell reloading, you can get 500 of them for 7 bucks and they work quite well. I use a thin 1/4" -3/8"over powder wad, then the AA plastic with very thin overshot wad, that glob of lube you put in the compression joint of the AA wad really helps with BP fouling and plastic fouling as well. You also might look into using coin wrappers for speed loaders. They can be used a number of different ways depending on your loads, for hunting I just keep a few pennywrapperswith powder twisted into one end and shot in the other, dump the powder, stuff the wads down and then the rest of the coin wrapper/shot..pretty fast once you get a system down. For buck shot loads I keep the shot in a dime wrapper and after the powder and wads are in I just stuff the whole wrapper in. Just something for you to play with in the off season...

Doug