Different AA Hulls, shotgun reloading

[au_prospector]

Hey guys,

I normally do not reload 12 GA hulls. My late father left a bag of Winchester AA hulls in his garage which were the older red variety. For Christmas I decided to load up the hulls and give them to my brother who inherited my fathers 12 gauge Wingmaster. I had Unique, lead shot and only had to purchase some wads. I used my late father's Lee Load All II, and my brother was touched by the present. I load 20 GA Winchester AA all the time so the 12 GA was no big deal except for the higher volume of Unique required and more shot per shell.

Anyway today at the range I came across some obviously factory once fired AA hulls. Some were orange (Winchester AA Orange TrAAcker) and some were gray (Winchester AA Super Sport Sporting Clays). My question is would I have the ability to load them as normal AA hulls or are these not usable? They are of a low brass variety. Except for the color they look like AA HS hulls to me.

 

[kimbernut]

AA

I'm not familiar with the orange hulls but I load the Gray hulls all the time and prefer them along with the Gold Remington handicap hulls. Excellent service from both.

 

[GarySTL]

I shoot at the Olin range in East Alton about once a month and come home with 200 or so AA hulls each time. Both red and grey they load the same. But they have changed manufacturing process some and those hulls are marked HS. I'm told they are slightly different length and require resetting your crimp.

 

[rcmodel]

There is a definite difference between the old red hulls and the new HS hulls.

The old red hulls were compression formed in one peice without a base wad.

The new HS hulls?
Nope!

The inside taper is different and they probably should use different wads for proper seal.

See this about that!

http://www.ballisticproducts.com/bpi/articleindex/articles/hulls_aa_new/NewAAhull1.htm


rc

 

[Muddydogs]

The hulls you found sound like the New AA HS hull. They load the same as AA CF hulls but the internal 2 piece base wad can give a guy problems seating the wad which usually effects the crimp. Shine a light down in the hull, you should be able to see the base wad and how it comes up the side of the hull, old AA CF cases don't have this as they have a one piece base wad. Newer HS cases have HS stamped on the case head but the older ones don't. I separate and load HS separate from CS as some crimp station adjustment is usually needed. The new HS hulls come in red, gray, light gray and orange. There might be other colors that I don't know about.