Pumpkin balls/in a shotgun.

[Ithaca Gunner]

Here's a 50yd. target shot with my favorite Ithaca M-37 with a smoothbore Deer Slayer barrel. The Deer Slayer barrels are .700" straight bored and handle a standard .690 punkin ball nicely using BPI light brush wads that just cradle the ball. This target was actually a buck and ball target, 3 LEE .31 balls nested under the ball. The small circled holes are the buck, 50% hits at 50yds.

[Ithaca Gunner]

Cut shells

https://youtu.be/k3M46XVfVOU

[725]

I knew "cut shells" as those in the above video. As far as cutting an "X" across the face of a slug can only be an unnecessary effort to mimic an old, old, tactic first started in the Dum Dum Arsenal, India, to make a more effective anti-personnel projectile. "Dum Dums" were rifle rounds with an "X" cut into the face of the bullet to make them expand in flesh. I don't think a shotgun slug needs much improvement. Further, I don't think it would work, anyway.

[Ithaca Gunner]

More fun from Barry and his shotgun.

https://youtu.be/crOg6YvBeXk

https://youtu.be/VhqosJmUS-0

[longbow]

Round ball loads that fit well, either a ball in a shotcup or bore diameter ball, can be very accurate out to 50 to maybe 70 yards or so. My good loads give groups of 3" to 4" at 50 yards. Much beyond 50 yards groups tend get undependable though as the balls start to pick up a spin from air drag then tend to veer off in random directions.

I have not done this with 20 ga. (don't own one) but others on the site have. If you get good fit with a snug fit of ball and shotcup to bore accuracy should be good. Pull a shotcup then put a ball in and push the works through the bore with a dowel. It should be a snug slide fit. If too tight you need a smaller ball or thinner petal shotcups. If too loose you can patch the ball up with paper or thin cloth.

Another option is if the ball is too big for shotcup but too small for the bore then you can cloth patch the ball into the hull. I would not have thought the patch would stay with the ball as it left the hull and made the jump through the forcing cone but some here say they have cloth patched balls that way for both smoothbore and rifled guns and it works well so worth a try and that allows much more latitude for ball size, just used whatever thickness of cloth works for snug fit to bore.

I find I get best results if I add a nitro card wad or two into the shotcup and a scoop of Cream 'O Wheat before adding the ball ~ just enough to form a nice seat under the ball. That keeps the shotcup from trying to form around the ball. I use 16 or 20 ga. in my 12 ga. shotcups, not sure what would fit 20 ga, shotcups but you can buy a gasket punch or make a simple punch and make your own from HDPE or stiff cardboard.

A bore size ball on a hard card wad column also does well for me and this eliminates the variable of shotcup petal thickness but I have to make up wad columns using a plastic gas seal over the powder then waxed hard card wads topped with nitro card wads.

I suspect that the ball in shotcup would work best in your situation. Factory rounds can be opened up, shot dumped and round ball added. The ball can also be patched with paper or cloth to suit the shotcup petal thickness and make a snug fit in the bore. I used cloth patching on the 0.662" balls in my 12 ga. and that worked very well. 0.678" balls fit about perfectly as is.

I can't help with exact sizing for 20 ga. but I know others have done it so there should be posts here if you do a search and a good source of info like that is from Ajay Madan (VDOmemorie was his handle). Ajay posted lots on fit for both 12 and 20 ga. Those posts will be several years old but should still be here if you look.

I am sure other 20 ga. users will chime in too.

Longbow

[17nut]

I have shot a lot with a Brown Bess wich is a smoothbore frontloader.
Because it has no rifling the ball will start spinning in every direction imaginable and what is a group at closer ranges will suddenly be a pattern.
At 25m~27yds i could hit 9 or better on a UIT target
At 50m~55yds i could hit 3 or better on a UIT target
At 75m~83yds i was hard pressed for luck to have 50% hit the target at all.

So the notion that the cut X would stay pointed forwards is a nice thought but only that.
Why would you want a 3/4" slug to expand and not just plough through the animal?

[Ricochet]

One time as a young teenager, I gathered up all the old paper hulled 'pumpkin ball' loads my old man had laying around and went out and shot them all at fence posts with my old single shot 12 gauge. At the dinner table that night I was describing that ballistic experiment in detail- how well they cracked open locust fence posts- and Pop blew a gasket. Who would've thought he cared about a handful of old shells...

Old post, I know, but it brought back a memory. Many years ago I was at my Uncle Vaughn and Aunt Sally's house out in the country. With a modern "1895" Marlin 45-70 loaded with a 400 grain Speer soft point over 54 grains of 3031 I shot a power pole. It was an older power pole smaller in diameter than current ones, but it shocked me when that bullet went right through it taking a big chunk out of the back, and the pole with its wires leaned over at about a 15 degree angle! I didn't say a word about it to anyone! ~45 years later I went back there to visit. The house is gone, the wires are gone, but that old pole still stands there leaning at the same angle!

[Chev. William]

What about an Lee Round Ball (lead) diameter .562" in an 20 gauge shotgun as an slug?

Will be a kind of George Washington musket load. As I remember the smooth bore shotgun is nothing else then an modern musket. I believe the Brown Bess (english musket) was an 10 gauge, the french frontier musket was an 20 gauge and the american musket was an 12 gauge (if I remember well). So the shotgun is an modern slide action cartridge musket.

Only if it is Straight Cylinder with No Choke to it.

Any Choke messes it up.
Chev. William

[waksupi]

What about an Lee Round Ball (lead) diameter .562" in an 20 gauge shotgun as an slug?

Will be a kind of George Washington musket load. As I remember the smooth bore shotgun is nothing else then an modern musket. I believe the Brown Bess (english musket) was an 10 gauge, the french frontier musket was an 20 gauge and the american musket was an 12 gauge (if I remember well). So the shotgun is an modern slide action cartridge musket.

.562 would most likely be very undersized. I shoot .595 and .600 in my fowlers.

[Guido4198]

I have a box of Peters 20 ga "Punkin Ball" shells on the shelf. 2-piece box. I wouldn't try to shoot them though. Part of a lot of old ammo I inherited from Dad.

[Hanshi]

I like my .62 flintlock smoothbore with prb. Just a plain .600" patched ball over 70 grains of black has done on the deer I've shot what Thor's hammer might do.

[Drm50]

Never shot a Pumkin Ball out of anything. In ML I guess it's safe any going down muzzel will work. I know a guy who blew the bolt lock on a Moss 500 fooling with balls in 12g. His home made wad/ sleeve system must have wedged in full choke barrel. Barrel buldged and cracked, warped action bars when it blew the bolt back like an
autoloader.