New endeavor: slugs.

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Paddy

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Okay so I am finding myself needing more slugs these days and the buggers are $$$ so instead of shelling out the dough, I'm considering blowing a ton of cash tooling up for slug casting and loading. I already load 12ga on a mec size master, but from the looks of it the press will not really be useful in slug loading except maybe the resizer station.

The parts I'm having trouble wrapping my head around are this:

Sabot slug, is a slug which has a plastic sled that carries it out the barrel and is then let go of the slug. But, if loading slugs in a typical wad with petals, doesn't the wad essentially make it a sabot as well?

If petals are omitted and a gas seal is used instead, along with fiber card spacers to elevate the slug to the correct height then the slug will be too small and"rattle" down the barrel unless it's a "full bore" slug which to me seems would need to be tuned in size to the barrel being used because shotgun barrels ID vary pretty wildly. +\- .015?! :scrutiny:

Okay so a lee slug mold casts about .680 which in my mind means it's meant to be loaded in conventional wad. If this unit is shot through a rifled choke do the petals on the wad absorb the rifling or ? Should I go directly to full bore molds?

What if I can't find load data for my combination of slug/hull/wad/powder/gas seal/fiber card? Shot shells are much more complicated in load data than brass cartridges. Lots of variables and slugs are elusive on data it seems. Is it possible to work up loads safely using the wads I have?

Thanks for any input. I might pick up a special slug reloading manual and see if it has any gems for me.
 
I use the Lyman 12 Ga. "wasp waist" design slug for loading in regular AA hulls and wads, using the regular star crimp. The slug looks like a big pellet gun pellet, and is deadly on deer, and plenty accurate, too.

The Lyman Shotshell manual has several recipes for this slug, and they're no big deal to cast. There's no voodoo involved in loading them, either. All you need is your regular shotshell press, the right AA wads and hulls, and the powders Lyman specifies. I got the highest velocities and best accuracy using Blue Dot powder, too. I get better accuracy from my 870 with the rifled barrel, but they're also pretty respectable out of the smooth bore 18" barrel of the 870.

Hope this helps.

Fred
 
Awesome thanks. Well I may not be able to use any components I have, which is always a shame of course, but what I do have is

Rio 2-3/4" new hulls
Western WT 12 orange target wads
Red dot, sr4759, international clays, tite wad

I'd really like to use the sr4759 because I think it would work well but that might be tough data to source.
 
I haven't loaded any of these in a long time, but I cast the Lee 1oz slugs using Winchester AA wads and hulls with 8 point crimps..

I did not use them for hunting, I just used them to destroy misc. items and to ring steel for fun.

I was very surprised at how accurate they were out of a smooth bore 870 with 18.5" barrel.:eek:

I'll have to dig my notes up and make more now that you brought it up.
That 1 oz slug is another fun thing to shoot at computer hard drives....:D

TxD
 
Thank you very much. Yes this is not for hunting, but steel ringers and shoulder bruising. I read that grinding a bit off the key drive part of the mold on the tip will add some weight to the front of the 7/8oz slug and increase accuracy.
 
I have the original Lyman Foster slug mould, a pair of Lee Key drive slug moulds, a Lyman Sabot mould all in 12 ga plus a Lyman 20 gauge sabot mould.
The Foster is miserable out of most guns and I've tried about every recommended book load there plus paper patching to get a better fit in the bore.
The sabot style slugs are catch as catch can..sometimes they work well, sometimes not. They depend on the plastic wad fingers gripping the rifling to impart spin. Some wads have the fingers peel off (no correlation to hard or soft lead other than a slight edge toward the soft peeling them off more (I mean cutting them off during bore time). I have found the 20 gauge sabot slugs work better out of my son's and my 500 rifled Mossbergs than my friend's 220. I've even tried roll crimping with unskived hulls. Good and bad. seems the thin wads tend to tear opening up the roll crimp.
Lee Key drives work a little better than Lyman Fosters.
I even have the old Lyman swage to put rifling on the 12 ga fosters. No difference and Lyman agrees that it makes no difference.
Best invention out there in recent years for economical accuracy is Federal's TruBall load which has a round centering device in the wad to keep the Foster slug centered in its travel down the bore.
Ten different commercial sabots plus several Nobel and Brenneke slugs have been tried in smooth and rifled barrels over the years and I find they work pretty well in rifled bores, and in my case, better than smoothbores. No, they don't ruin the rifling. Just a little soft lead to remove now and then.
I've even tried several minie balls in twenty gauge with proper wads. Not happy there.
Best load to date of any for me is the Winchester 3" BRI load at 1400 fps out of a Savage 210. 3" at 100 yards in poor weather which is how most of my deer hunting is done.
Second best is the Hornady SST which gives better accuracy but in the three deer I've shot with them ruined way too much meat. One was a quartering shot which caught the deer in the right ham (took a step as I shot) and came out the left shoulder ruining both quarters affected.
I figure I'm somewhere at about 2500 slugs cast, bought, loaded and shot over the past 48 years and am not an expert but have some pretty good ideas what works for me.
 
I love the wasp waisted slugs Fred mentioned. Heavier, easier to cast than the Lee drive key slug.

I also however love the Lee 7/8 oz drive key....

It fits in all trap wads, such as the op possesses, and works well with all but the lightest of trap loads.

Nice ( and equally not nice, depending on your load at the moment) is that for a given charge of powder and weight of payload, solid projectiles produce the least pressure, buckshot a bit more, and finally birdshot produces the most.

This is how Lee has been able to advertise the Lee slug as working in "any trap loads" both charge of powder and wad.

Sadly, at the very lightest loads ( 8000 psi or thereabouts, or less ) the slug will turn that load into a bloop tube all day. Lee leaves that part out...
 
Interesting. So, a lee or other slug weighing 7/8 can be substituted into a load developed for 7/8 bird or buck and be "safe"? That is convenient as a starting point at least.

Hive been powder coating my bullets as well, has anyone seen full bore slugs which were powder coated? Can't imagine it would help a trap wad loaded slug at all though.

Is like the looks of the lyman wasp. Seems like if it works for pellet guns, which actually operate in similar velocities if I'm correct, it would be accurate up scaled to say .681"!
 
Last edited:
Yes, there have been many many loads developed based upon that principle (*)
but there are some caveats.
For example, here are a number of loads I developed based upon that principle, as well as some new pressure-tested loads mixed in, at:

http://castboolits.gunloads.com/sho...lazing-Dixie-Hawglips-Hogtamer-bikerbeans-ins

But there are some principles to follow for safety.

More soon!

C-

(*) equal slug weight sub'd for shot weight.
 
You guys are running 2-1/3oz slugs over 105gr sr4759!? Wow. That sounds painful! My needs might not be as extreme and only hitting steels in repetition, but Im skinny and need to shoot 30-40 of these in a day without killing bony shoulder. The lyman wasp seems to be 1-1/8oz, and fit in regular pataled wads. I just slugged my bore and it came out to .731, I was expecting closer to .740 but I suppose that's good, nominal bore is .730 in 12ga.
The gun is a browning gold hunter auto. Not sure it's pressure limits, but it also needs to feed itself and its known to be somewhat load sensitive in the balance of springs and such. Any advice on sr4759 for that slug and gun?
 
Hive been powder coating my bullets as well, has anyone seen full bore slugs which were powder coated? Can't imagine it would help a trap wad loaded slug at all though.
Click to expand...

I did a few for novelty, but unless you are running a "naked" slug ( no protective wad or sabot) through a rifled barrel, its of little use.

PC is useful for reducing leading in rifled barrels, but ofters no advantage other than perhaps cool points and a little less air drag ( of little concern on a flying brick anyway) in a smoothbore.


By the way, OP, lee's charge table lists your powders in it, and might be of great help to you.
 
I found the lyman wasp shuttle type mold last night in a .730" but now can't seem to find it. Only one they offer is a .680 I think. Maybe that would be best to start with anyway.
Do they require a 20ga card of some type under the slug in the cup to protect the wad base or increase height?
 
You only need the cards to push the slug or ball up enough out of the shotcup so that its the projectile that opens the crimp, and not the wad petals. You need cards or filler to protect hollow base slugs as well, different question.

If you go with a .680" diameter projectile, try the Fed 12S-4 wad, which will get you a total diameter of btwn .731 - .732 and make sure to use a powder charge for equal of slightly less shot weight with all components otherwise the same. A.68" ball weight almost exactly 1 ounce.

That is very important! ALL components otherwise the same.

because of less side-wall pressure of slugs compared to equal weight shot, if all other components are the exact same, pressures will usually be lower w the slug. But if you change any components, all bets are off.

So for powder suggestions, you are looking for published loads using your hull, your primer, Fed 12S-4 wads, and 1 ounce shot weight.

I've made a few assumptions here, so please ask more questions if you have them!

(And check out the forums I linked to in their entirety; most guys there are doing exactly what you are trying to do)

C-
 
paddy,

A few years ago I started playing around with 12 gauge slugs for pig hunting with my Rem. 870 smoothbore. I tried Foster's slugs and giant pellet-gun type slugs from Ballistic Products Inc. I casted the Lyman wasp-waist slug in multiple variations including filling up the hollow rear cavity with epoxy trying to get consistent patterns. I bought the Dangerous-game-slugs from BPI which were made in Italy and shipped to the States. I tried multiple types of wads, cards and loads. I tried wads with the petals intact, halfway cut off and completely cut off. I tried cleaning any residual powder remnants out between shots. Nothing gave me reasonable consistency or accuracy (3" groups at 50 yards with a Leupold 2-8 power VX-3 scope) except the DGS slugs from Italy but they were too expensive and I was not sure on how consistent their supply would be.

Finally I bought a Savage rifled barrel made to fit the Rem. 870 for about $200 and got a 770 grain 12 gauge fullbore slug mold from Tom at www.accuratemolds.com. (after slugging my barrel). This with an appropriate load of Bluedot gave me clover-leaf groups consistently at 50 yards with a velocity of about 1000 ft./sec on the chrono.

If you check the slug casting section of www.castboolits.gunloads.com they are a great help. Good luck.

best wishes- oldandslow
 
Excellent info. This turbo fella seems quite up on the science and I like that. Tested some commercial slugs today, full bore rifled jobs and the "accuracy" was pretty bad so at least the bar is set pretty low off the bat. I have a lot of them on hand so it would be nice to improve their actual accuracy but looking forward I'd like to brew my own as well. Seems as though round balls might reduce a few variables inherently and possibly give adequate results over a wider spread of situations.

I'm trying to avoid the rifled barrel conversion. Not just the expense 400$?! But I think it would be cool to have a gun that shoots pellets and slug with relative ease without barrel swapping.
 
paddy,

A few of the prominent shotgun slug shooters at www.castboolits.gunloads.com besides Turbo are Longbow, Tommygirl and Hubel. If you can search for their posts it might provide useful info. Good luck.

best wishes- oldandslow
 
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