Paper Shotgun shells

[JWFilips]

Hi Guys,
Just wondering if anyone still sells paper cases and fiber wads for loading 12 gauge shot shells?
Over the years I have inherited my Dad's Savage 311 Double SS Shot gun but I really dislike what modern plastic shells and wads did for the Mod and Full choke barrels. Basically turned the Modified barrel into a Full choke and the Full choke into a rifle!
I broke down and bought a 12 gauge barrel reamer and cut the Modified to IC and the Full to Modified to Compensate for plastic shells!
I did testing before and after so I'm at least satisfied when I use it for upland game!

I also have Inherited my Late brother's Fox Sterling Side by side 12 G. This Shotgun is too nice to mess with cutting the chokes of the barrels.... but it suffers the same issues with plastic shells. These guns were not meant to shoot plastic and plastic wads! It turns them in to rifles The shot patterns are far too tight for upland game!
If I can reload Paper hulls with the old fiber wads I know I can get them back to their original patterns! After all I do this with my Flintlock fowlers I have built
( I can load for any type pattern I need on the fly)
Just wondering
Jim

 

[Ian]

Federal, Cheddite, Rio, etc etc. Wads can be had in any flavor from just about anywhere. You need some tools (irons, base sizers, rolling tool, priming punches, and so on).

 

[JustJim]

Try BPI https://www.ballisticproducts.com They usually have (or can help you find) most shotgun-related products.

 

[JWFilips]

Guess it is not something I can run in my Lee Shotgun shell reloader

 

[popper]

Not just the choke but the chamber isn't made for plastic. Gave away a shotgun and box of paper 410 many years ago. IIRC loaded 12ga was 100$ for 25. Petals don't flare right in the 'forcing cone' - had a G.S. hone the chamber but it still wasn't enough.

 

[RBHarter]

Federal was the last major commercial maker , as of 15 yr ago .

BPI probably has 85% everything available for shotguns and their own tested data sources .

 

[fiver]

Federal still makes paper [factory target] hulls, but man they are proud of them.
Fiocchi did make some, but they were more in the 16 and 20ga. realm.


JW I have a bunch of Federal 12ga. paper hulls here, but most of them are loaded at the moment, i'm fairly certain I have some empty hulls but I'd have to see if they are starting to get pin holes.
I know I waxed them before the last loading, many of them still didn't fold quite right because I can't find the paper blank cone for my PW's anywhere.

as far as the cork and card wads those are for sure still available.
luckily you can load those by hand and compress them with a mec loader [or other press] that has a pressure gauge.
a consistent pressure on the cards and powder does make a big difference in the loads consistency.

Annie Oakley sent her husband to the Lafflin factory to learn the process of the loading and compression so he could load her shells while they were in Europe.
they were living off her earnings and couldn't afford to lose, it was such a big deal she was smuggling powder into the various country's by using the bustles women wore at the time to conceal the packages of powder [the packages were hot water bottles]

anyway something else you might want to look at are bio wads theyre basically a paper wad that mimics both a plastic wad and a card stack.

 

[RicinYakima]

Rather than go thru that, I bought brass cases and loaded with 11 gauge wads, etc. Seem to work much better than plastic cases in the old guns. FWIW.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

One issue with paper hulls is they are 57 primer sized.... Everythingbis 209 now. I imagion one might swage them up...

CW

 

[L Ross]

When I load black powder shot shells I trim off the star crimp, load and roll crimp with an over shot wad. Works slick. I use card and cushion wads over the powder and under the shot and get proper patterning in old chokes and no burnt on plastic shot cup residue. I soak my cushion wad in melted Crisco.

I once obtained 100 brand new primed Alcan paper hulls. I loaded them and never shot them as they are so pretty.

 

[JWFilips]

One issue with paper hulls is they are 57 primer sized.... Everythingbis 209 now. I imagion one might swage them up...

OK That looks like that will stop me in my tracks! Bad enough trying to get 209's
Guess I may just stick with my Flintlock Fowler long guns....far easier to adapt any load I need

 

[L Ross]

Doesn't everyone have a stash of left over 57's?

 

[Joshua]

I’m just getting into this whole shotgun reloading thing. So take anything I say with a tablespoon of salt.

It seems that you could trim the less desirable type plastic shells and do a roll crimp. My understanding is that they won’t last very long, basically one or possibly two reloads. But they will work with the old style “throats”. I don't know about wads and such. I’m sure Fiver can chime in on the viability of this idea.

 

[CWLONGSHOT]

Yes your right it would work just fine. I do this exact thing for my 410 Beretta.

But, paper shells are nostalgic and IINM THATS what JW was wanting.

CW

 

[Joshua]

That’s an interesting perspective. We do have quite the collection here. Mad Scientists, MacGyvers, Traditionalists.

 

[Ian]

Yeah, Jim is the real deal. He has built some works of art with just a file and scraper. He also powder coats for some of his cartridge milsurps, so one could say he's more of a Renaissance Man.

 

[obssd1958]

It's too bad that shipping is almost impossible. I have more than 5k of the Alcan G 57 primers.
In a pinch (world falls apart, normal primers not available, etc...) I figured that I could drill out the primer area of the Berdan style primed cases, and substitute the 57 - with the appropriate basic load work. Could also sleeve standard shotgun hulls - maybe.
Otherwise, they are no good to me.

 

[RicinYakima]

obssd1958, I do that for 209's to prime 577/450 Martini Henry cases.

 

[fiver]

the newer hulls don't take either 57, 97 or 109's, they take 209's like everything else.
besides, if they used to take one of the smaller diameter primers it takes nothing more than a post from the top type seater to fix that problem.


i'll explain the shotgun throat thing.
in the olden days shotguns had very shallow and short throats so that the cork and card wads had a better chance of sealing the bore.
they however were not overly efficient systems and leaked gas, throw in a roll crimp and pressures were even lower.
so you'd see loads of red-dot in the 20gr. area for a 1150 fps load.

now throats have been lengthened [some of the forcing cones now stretch like 6-8"s down the barrel]
you get away with the over sizing and still have lower powder amounts because the gas cup will flair out and seal the barrel.
your down to about 17.5grs of red-dot for the same velocity but with only a slight gain in pressure.

one other difference between then and now is the bore diameter has changed some.
back then 724 to 729 was pretty much the standard [and don't think barrels today are all exactly the same size, even on a 20+K over-under gun they will be about a tenth of a millimeter different]

now days???? well 740 is real common [most all your browning's and Remington's are 740 for example] and it isn't unheard of for a 12ga to have a .750 [10ga.] barrel diameter.
that's how flexible a gas cup is.

Jim this shouldn't be that hard they make roll crimp tools that fit your drill press if you want to go that way and they don't really cost that much [10-12 bucks for a plastic one]
you can get all the cards you want and even little ink stamps for the top cover [or even pre-marked ones if you want] black powder loads, smokeless loads, 2-1/2" hulls.
all of it is right there and pretty easy to get tooling to do for a pretty nominal cost.

 

[fiver]

since we're here I might as well mention that some of the less expensive shells hardly even use much of a shot cup anymore I have seen them with just a gas seal and a tyvek wrap [the real cheap Winchesters do this]
the top gun type [federal] shells used to just use a half length shot cup.
they both use real soft shot though which is where their pattern problems come from.
if you were blowing out your patterns with those shells blame it on the cheap ass shot.
try using a good quality target shell such as the STS or AA and watch your pattern density gain about 10%.

when I got the load dialed in for my SKB I ended up opening the choke up another .007 because I would literally shoot a smoke ball and only take out half the target.
I still make smoke balls only it's with the whole target now.