rbernie
Contributing Member
I had the chance to spent some time last week patterning a bunch of different 2 3/4" 12ga buckshot offerings (Winchester SuperX 00, Remington 0,00, and #4 loads, Fiocci LE 00, Rio LE 00, and Federal LE 8 pellet 00) through an 870 Express/Marine Magnum RS barrel and wanted to share some basic observations and a question....
I shot five rounds of each at a silhouette target (one target per load tested) positioned 15 yards downrange and then measured the resulting spread. My shooting was done at an indoor range that allows the use of shotguns on the pistol lanes; I've never tried shooting buckshot indoors before.
All loads shot a bit low relative to my POA, which I found interesting and unexpected. In the relatively dim lighting of the indoor range, the FLASH! BANG! of the 'game' oriented loads was very obtrusive. The Winchester and Remington loads all shot and patterned similarly, with the #4 Remington load giving 26" of spread and the others giving about 18" of spread. In addition to the extreme flash, the recoil from these loads was stiff to the point of being punishing. The Fiocci and Rio 'LE' loads gave about 12" of spread, with unobtrusive flash and recoil approximating that of upland game loads. The Federal load, as expected, shot very softly and gave less than 7" of spread; the difference between the Federal load (FliteControl wad) and everything else is quite startling if you've never seen it on paper before....
Has anyone patterned the Winchester Ranger SD and Remington HD loads back-to-back with other loads, to see how they perform relative to baseline offerings?
I shot five rounds of each at a silhouette target (one target per load tested) positioned 15 yards downrange and then measured the resulting spread. My shooting was done at an indoor range that allows the use of shotguns on the pistol lanes; I've never tried shooting buckshot indoors before.
All loads shot a bit low relative to my POA, which I found interesting and unexpected. In the relatively dim lighting of the indoor range, the FLASH! BANG! of the 'game' oriented loads was very obtrusive. The Winchester and Remington loads all shot and patterned similarly, with the #4 Remington load giving 26" of spread and the others giving about 18" of spread. In addition to the extreme flash, the recoil from these loads was stiff to the point of being punishing. The Fiocci and Rio 'LE' loads gave about 12" of spread, with unobtrusive flash and recoil approximating that of upland game loads. The Federal load, as expected, shot very softly and gave less than 7" of spread; the difference between the Federal load (FliteControl wad) and everything else is quite startling if you've never seen it on paper before....
Has anyone patterned the Winchester Ranger SD and Remington HD loads back-to-back with other loads, to see how they perform relative to baseline offerings?
