CAVEMAN wrote:Just a play thing at the moment, but hopeful more so for pigs or similar... Id ultimate like to get a decent pattern at 50m that would be suitable with buckshot or smaller depending on target.
Hey mate, didn't see the above. 50m is very, very optimistic for anything but a known quantity of heavy shot/slug. Lets get into shot sizes - a slug is usually around the 1oz / 28g mark. You can get all sorts, but 7/8oz or 1oz are most common. They're usually reasonably accurate to about 50m but you need to get a combo that works with your gun. By 'accurate' I mean you'd likely be able to hit a stationary pig sized target if you have patterned your gun beforehand with that load. Obviously you're going to leave a nice big hole in whatever you hit as most slugs designed to work with a shot cup are around the .680" diameter. Casting your own and reloading target shells is a cheap way to make slug rounds, by the way.
Now onto shot. '00' Buck / 00-SG is .33 calibre and '000' Buck / LG is .36 calibre. You'll get roughly 8 or 6 (respectively) in a modern cupped 12G round of 2 3/4" length. This varies with manufactuer and cup design. Youre going to be looking at these for pigs IMO.
#2 Buck / SSG is a .27 calibre ball and #4 Buck is a .24 calibre ball. Even close up I wouldn't go smaller than a #4 Buck or you're likely to have a big, angry pig turn on you. Most people would say this is on the small side, too, unless you're right on top with a modified or full choke to tear a ragged hole into something. You'll get about 20 #4 balls in a standard shot cup, again depending on design may be less or more.
The thing with patterning your shot is that once it starts to spread you will end up with gaps in the pattern. The less balls of shot you have the bigger the gaps. At a certain distance the gaps will be large enough that your target animal may be missed completely, and ideally you want at least a few on target. You can go to more of a smaller shot, but depending on the game you're after it may not be effective on it so (assuming you're already using a full or tighter choke) you're just going to have to move closer.
And the birdshot? Well, you have a ton of small pellets that you want to disperse rapidly because you're shooting at small rapidly moving targets. You don't want a tight shot pattern in close or you'll blow the thing to smithereens and have nothing left for your effort... assuming you want to use the game for meat. If not, load and choke however you want. For reference, the common 7 1/2 target shot is about a .090" ball and theres 410 of them to the ounce. This goes to #7 / .095" / 350 and #6 / .102" / 270 for the common shot sizes. Aussie BB's are about .16" with 72 to the ounce.
You can buy target shells cheaply and reload with whatever shot/slug you want to good effect, just remember to pattern before taking to the field! See
TAOFLEDERMAUS on youtube for more of this kinda thing.
So, thats shot in a nutshell. Happy hunting
- boingk
