- Joined
- Jan 29, 2003
- Messages
- 2,732
For a while now, I've been playing around with 7/8 oz 12ga loads. Unfortunately, I've felt that they are a bit lacking in performance when compared to 1 oz or heavier loads. I was never able to get the crimps just right, and my scores always dropped off a little using the lighter loads.
Not any longer!
I'm now using a recipe as follows:
Remington STS hulls
Remington 209P primers
17.5 grains Clays powder
7/8 ounce of lead shot (either 8.5 or 7.5)
and the secret is...
Ballistic Products Lightning wads
With the BP wads, the crimps are great and the patterns are deadly. These things pattern beautifully from both my Browning 425 and my wife's 682. The velocity is around 1250fps (published) and they are ideal for 16 yard trap (I'm confident that they'll work further out as well) and general sporting clays usage.
I've bumped up a notch in choke, and am now running Modified most of the time when shooting SC... but I really like the way they perform, and the recoil is almost negligible. I'm using the #8.5 shot for anything under 35 yards, and #7.5 on the longer shots. I've shot nearly 1000 of these in the past couple of weeks and continue to be impressed with how well they break targets
The only downside is cost, since they run $99/5000, plus shipping, but that is only an extra penny or so per shell, which I'm happy to pay for something that works so well with such little recoil. The other caveat is that this wad is designed for use with tapered hulls, so it may not work as well in a straight hull. IIRC, BP does have a similar wad (maybe the Rex-24) which is designed for straight hulls.
Not any longer!
I'm now using a recipe as follows:
Remington STS hulls
Remington 209P primers
17.5 grains Clays powder
7/8 ounce of lead shot (either 8.5 or 7.5)
and the secret is...
Ballistic Products Lightning wads
With the BP wads, the crimps are great and the patterns are deadly. These things pattern beautifully from both my Browning 425 and my wife's 682. The velocity is around 1250fps (published) and they are ideal for 16 yard trap (I'm confident that they'll work further out as well) and general sporting clays usage.
I've bumped up a notch in choke, and am now running Modified most of the time when shooting SC... but I really like the way they perform, and the recoil is almost negligible. I'm using the #8.5 shot for anything under 35 yards, and #7.5 on the longer shots. I've shot nearly 1000 of these in the past couple of weeks and continue to be impressed with how well they break targets
The only downside is cost, since they run $99/5000, plus shipping, but that is only an extra penny or so per shell, which I'm happy to pay for something that works so well with such little recoil. The other caveat is that this wad is designed for use with tapered hulls, so it may not work as well in a straight hull. IIRC, BP does have a similar wad (maybe the Rex-24) which is designed for straight hulls.