Hi, I am an active trap shooter and just started getting into reloading. I was just wondering if anyone knows where I could get the specific " recipe" in order to load Winchester Universal shells. The only specifics I know is that the ones I use are Winchester compression formed 2 3/4 " shells, 12 guage, 1 1/8 oz of shot, 7 1/2 shot, 3 dram equivalent (1200fps). Any information on this topic would be greatly appreciated.

Books are available free from IMR, Aliant, and Hodgdons.....pick them up at your nearest sporting goods store, or search the web for any of them.

DO NOT RELOAD THE UNIVERSAL SHELLS!!!!!! These have the light weight Aluminum like base and are considered non reloadable. You need the AA hulls for quality reloads. I' ll see if I can find the quote on line at the Hodgden site. If I can I' ll see if I can post a link. I have loaded a couple and they don' t load well and I believe are not safe d/t the base composition.

Couldn' t find it directly, but here is a good site to check out. http://www.hodgdon.com/data/shotshel/

go to www.dogpile and in search type in " Shotgun Reloading" . you get the links to Imr Allient and all the rest. Your best bet on hulls is go Remington, the STS is tops and you can reload their Gun Clubs, Shurshot, sport loads with no trouble. I would get a Lymans 4th edition manual and it will give you a lot of help. Bob

Plinker, the Winchester you you described is a stanard load ie 1 1/8 oz at 1200fps. There are alot of different combinations you can use. IMHO the Federal Gold Medal and Remington STS are better hulls than today' s Winchester AA' s. It is worth getting the better hulls to reload with, I too would' nt bother with the Universal' s.
There are to many wad/powder/hull combinations to mention here, like Bobby said, get the Lyman Shotshell book, it has tons of info in it.
As far as shotshell data goes you need to adhere to the specific recipes. Dont go changing things on a load if it' s not listed. I wouldnt go with a load that is posted on here or any other forum without checking a loading manual first.
If you are plan doing to to alot of shooting, which I as a trap shooter too load 10' s of thousands of rounds a year buy the componets in bulk, it' s cheaper in the long run.
Alliant Red Dot, Hodgdon Clays and Accurate Solo 1000 powders are good in the load you want. Clay Buster wads and Cheddite powders are good values also. Sometimes where you live and shop dictate what reloading componets you use.

my $.02 AA

I agree with Double A. I could not find any more info on the Universal shells, Sorry. As for the STS' s, I' m having problems with them not setting the primer far enough into the base. Any help on that one? Also, My personal powder choices does not include the Allient Line, this includes red dot and green dot. Hodgden Clays is a much cleaner burning powder and costs the same. FWIW

Firsttime.I was having that problem with STS hulls and I was using Winchester Primers. I went and found a like recipe using Remington STS Primers and no more trouble.If you look close at Winchester Primer you see they are tapered and I think that why they don' t seat well in some remington cases. Also check your primer seater on your reloader is it adjusted to give you max. push? Bob

Thanks, I hadn' t thought of the primer itself being the problem. I just like the win209' s. Have a s#itload of them on hand. I also have a pile of the AA' s. Both new and old. Got e-mails from RCBS about how to fix the problems with the new AA' s and it seems to be working great. Ryan