12 gauge roundball results

[jordanka16]

Got my first round of roundball testing done. Had some pretty good results. It was 34-44 grains of blue dot, an x12x gas seal, a nitro card, and a big fiber wad all in a 2 3/4 fiocchi hull. Best group was 38 grains, at about 1300 fps. And that's a 5 shot group at 50 yards. Other picture is the difference in poi between 36 and 44 grains, the heavier load actually impacted lower, quite a bit in fact.

 

[jordanka16]

Forgot to add, these are .735 roundballs in a rifled henry slug gun.

 

[Spindrift]

Very good results!
This is actually a rabbit hole I’m trying to avoid....... but shotgun slug/ball- reloading is so fascinating...

 

[fiver]

fascinating?....yes.
not anything at all like metallic reloading?
ooooh yu betchya.. it's a whole different skill set.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

I have had this mold for many years... Up till last fall, I hadent loaded shotgun in nearly thirty years!!
This is of interest! Thanks for the thread!!

CW

 

[Rally]

Those are pretty great results for round ball! I’ve not loaded any myself, but going from what I’ve seen posted elsewhere, those are respectable targets.

 

[CZ93X62]

What Rally said.

1300 FPS imparted to a RB weighing ~550 grains is no joke.

 

[5shot]

Great results. I'm starting to play with some Tri-Ball loads.

 

[STIHL]

Very fine shooting.

 

[richhodg66]

I've only dabbled in this and not with a rifled barrel. I used .690 round balls with OK results, but I have a .72 caliber ball mold now I'll get to eventually.

Nice shooting.

 

[RicinYakima]

.72 Brown Bess balls did not work for me, as they were unevenly cut on the front of the 3" chamber. I did much better with patched .690" balls in brass cases. FWIW

 

[fiver]

those forcing cones can bite you pretty hard.
the older guns have short sharp angled ones and not the long tapered ones the newer guns have.
the old ones were optimized for cardboard and cork stacks which weren't as efficient at blocking gas [also why you used 20grs. of target powder back then versus 17.5 now to do the same thing]
but they did excel with some load combinations the new guns struggle with.

 

[jordanka16]

.72 Brown Bess balls did not work for me, as they were unevenly cut on the front of the 3" chamber. I did much better with patched .690" balls in brass cases. FWIW

These are .735 roundballs, they are oversized so they have a large bearing surface when fired to get effective grip with the rifling.

Pretty much for rifled barrels only, maybe would work in a large enough cylinder bore but probably unsafe in any sort of choke.

 

[richhodg66]

What alloy are you casting these from?

 

[jordanka16]

What alloy are you casting these from?

Just range scrap/whatever I have laying around. Doesn't seem to be too picky about alloy, they don't even have any lube on them.

 

[JustJim]

I used to play with these in some of my old doubles. My impression was that accuracy was more-consistent when the balls were lubed. I used Rooster Jacket, after that was gone I went with a water-based commercial floor wax (couldn't tell the difference between it and Rooster Jacket). I suspect any lube would work.