Help me identify these shotshells

[tube_ee]

I picked up a bunch of shotshells on my last trip out to the public range. Got some Winchester AAs, and a whole mess of Federal shotshells. In looking for reloading data on the Alliant website, I discovered that there are a bunch of different Federal hulls.

Mine are red, ribbed plastic, with an 8-point crimp, and marked

Federal
3 dram
1 1/8 oz

I'm not educated enough to tell what kind of basewad, if any, is in these hulls. Given the dire warnings about mis-matching shotshell components, I'd like to know what I've got before I load them. The rest of the components are Green Dot powder, Claybusters 1118-12 wads (Winchester WAA-12 equivalent), and Winchester W209 primers.

Help!

--Shannon

 

[birddog]

Are they dark red, almost maroon?

 

[tube_ee]

That's right. Dark red with gold printing. There's also a "3" off to the left (base of shell) side of the load description. Whether that's some sort of code, or just another reference to the 3-dram-eq load, I don't know.

--Shannon

 

[birddog]

I'm pretty sure they are the Federal "Value Pack" hulls you can get at Wal-Mart. I used to buy, then re-load them all the time. When I get home, I'll look up the specifics.

 

[scout26]

They are probably TOP GUN's. or the Cheapie Value Packs They can be reloaded (maybe good for one or two) and you have to pretty much use Federal Primers and Wads. I've got a Federal reloading guide at home that I got a few years back and if IIRC it didn't list one non-Federal component for any loads.

I tried reloading some, but I ended up with squished hulls, bad crimps, crimps that wouldn't stay closed. They were more trouble then they were worth. I gave away the two bags of wads (12S3's and 12S4's, IIRC) and a couple of boxes of Federal primers to a guy at my club, two weeks later I heard that he had given the wads to someone else (but he kept the primers for his muzzleloaders).

Point being, yes you can reload them, but all Remington's and AA's are much better hulls. Avoid the headache with the Federals and toss 'em, same goes for the Red Winchester Universal's (The Wally-World Bulk packs) Chuck 'em.

I can get 10-15 reloads out of just about any Remington Hull, and 10-12 out of AA's.

 

[tube_ee]

The Alliant website give the following categories for Federal hulls:

12-Gauge, 2 3/4-in. Fed. Gold Medal Plastic Target Shells

12-Gauge, 2 3/4-in. Fed. Hi Power Plastic Shells with Rolled Paper Base Wad

12-Gauge, 2 3/4-in. Fed. One-Piece Plastic Shells

12-Gauge, 2 3/4-in. Fed. Paper Target Shells

Would any of these be appropriate? If I can find data, I'll load 'em up. If they only shoot once, well, they were free for the picking up, so I'm money ahead anyway.

--Shannon

 

[birddog]

12-Gauge, 2 3/4-in. Fed. Gold Medal Plastic Target Shells

I've used load data for the above shells for the Federals you're talking about. No problems.

PM with further info sent.

 

[tube_ee]

Well, I loaded 'em

Loaded 2 boxes. I took the information that birddog gave me (thanks, bro!), and went to the Alliant website (Federal's was useless.) I checked not only birddog's recommended hull type, but every Federal hull for which Alliant showed a 1 1/8 oz load. Lucky me, there was a range of 18-19 grains of Green Dot that appeared on all of the lists. Velocity varied according to hull type, but the load was always there. Seemed like the safest choice to me. Luckier me, the bushings for that load were already in the Load-All II, as I had loaded up my very first box of shells with that same load in Winchester AA (silver) hulls.

Some thoughts:

1. Loading shotshells is as fun as loading brass cartridges, but it's not the same thing. They're different somehow. I hope to narrow down the differences by doing a lot of both.

2. I hope the Green Dot shoots as well as it loads, at least for the .38 Special. 3 different loads were tried, using each disc that my Auto-Disk charge table showed as being in the range. All three discs threw very, very regular charges. We were checking every 8th charge, (homemade loading blocks, 8x13 holes, last shell per row,) and most fit a +/- 0.05 grain window. Not much powder was spilled either, compared to Bullseye.

3. The Load-All seems to need many more strokes, including crimping strokes, to really settle down and drop consistent powder charges. I've been weighing every 5th charge, and it seems to take 10-15 shells (70-100 strokes of the press) before the powder starts falling consistently. The first loads are almost a full grain light, and they ramp up to where there going to be over the first dozen or so shells. This is after throwing 5 - 10 charges in a row and cycling them back into the hopper.

4. The folks who said that the Federal hulls wouldn't live long are probably right. They don't crimp anywhere near as clean as the Winchesters do. The crimp on the AAs folds over nice and clean, making an almost 90-degree angle with the sides of the hull. The Federals are noticable uglier. Nothing that makes me nervous to shoot 'em, but I bet the hulls will split right where the crimp folds over the top of the shot.

5. According to reloading calculators, I'm making premium feild loads for a promo load price... Around $4 a box. I'm cool with that, as 1 1/8 oz game loads go for at least $5 around here.

Thanks for all who helped.

--Shannon