I bought the judge as a range toy. But I do like to have some defence ammo for every gun I own. I tried the Win 3 pellet buck load and found it was not suitable. I could not count on all pellets hitting a full size silhouette target beyond 7 yards. I also saw from the box o truth that they would not penetrate adequately. I could not find any of the Fed buck load to try so I settled for silver tips and then corbon DPX. From looking at the BOT and this review
http://mcb-homis.com/judge/index.htm
You can see why the Win load doesn't get much penetration. They flatten out in the barrel and you get a pie plate instead of a round ball. You can see this on a paper target. One hole looks to be from a round nose projectile, the other 2 look like big fat wad-cutters. This same problem would hinder it's performance in a full size shotgun as well. Those flat plates are going to lose velocity fast and won't pattern well out of anything. The S&B buck load does better in the wet phone book penetration test because they stay round. He also gets a much better pattern with the S&B. The velocities he gets don't seem to be correct. The recoil of the S&B (878fps) round is similar to a .45 cowboy load. The Win load has more recoil and other testers have found it to be about 975 fps.
I finally found the Fed load and found that it would hold a 3 to 3.5 inch group at 7 yard. That's good enough for me. The question is will it penetrate. Here's another post on that subject from this thread.
http://www.taurusarmed.net/forums/index.php?topic=26851.0
"recently tested several flavors of 45 LC and 410 ammo in my Judge. I fired through four layers of denim into wetpack (soaked newsprint) from about eight feet.
Winchester Super X 225 grain Silver Tips: One round shed its jacket; jacket found at 10" and the lead at 11". The other round was nicely expanded at 13".
Speer Gold Dots 250 grain HP: Both rounds found at 14" with no expansion.
Winchester Super X 2-1/2" 1/5 oz slug: One found at 12" and one at 15".
Federal 4 pellet 000 buck: Two rounds fired, all eight pellets recovered between 10" and 13".
Paraklese Technologies* 4 pellet 0000 buck: Two rounds fired, all eight pellets recovered between 9" and 15".
Federal #4 shot and Paraklese* BB, all shot found between 4" and 5".
Note that all ammo from Paraklese was overpressure and jammed the cylinder of my Judge after each shot. All ammo has been returned to them for replacement but I haven't received it yet. When new ammo is in hand I'll repeat the test and will include Hornady Lever Revolution 225 grain LC."
Note that this is four layers of denim and into wetpack. So penetration depth will depend on how he does his packs. What's relevant is the comparison of the silver tips and the unexpanded gold dots to the Fed buck load. Penetration is on par with the silver tips and appears adequate to me.
I have the 2.5 inch cylinder version so no test of the 3 inch loads. My brother has the 3 inch chamber version. So I will eventually get around to playing with the 3 inch 5 pellet loads. If the Win uses the same pellets in the 3 inch that they use in the 2.5 inch they will likely flatten out too much. If they do it should show up on paper with holes that look like wad-cutters. Fed is coming out with a 5 pellet 3 inch load that will probably be the best choice.
