Finally .690 RB success !

[centershot]

Darn balls shed velocity quick, don't they!!? Looks like it goes sub-sonic just past 50 yards, hope that doesn't booger up your accuracy. My loads from a smoothbore barrel are 4-5 inches at 50 starting at 1290 fps. I never considered them anything more than 40-50 yard ammo. I gotta' try this load!

[longbow]

Round balls do shed velocity fast. They also tend to pick up random spins when shot from smoothbore which is why they cannot be depended on for tight groups at long range. In my experience round balls can shoot very well and dependably to 50 yards for sure and likely out to 70 yards or so with fair accuracy but groups tend to open up and accuracy becomes less dependable much past 50 to 60 yards.

Depending on launch velocity, if shot at supersonic velocity, they will go transonic around 50 to 60 yards which may result in enough turbulence to disrupt the ball and cause spins.

I haven't done any subsonic shooting to check if long range accuracy is better or not for balls at subsonic velocity. Not sure if supersonic/subsonic flight has any effect on random spins picked up through air friction.

I suspect that you will find that accuracy will not hold up to 100 yards. Some groups can be pretty tight but the next group may be poor or have a flier or two way out of the group.

My experience anyway.

Longbow

[.30-06 fan]

Round balls do shed velocity fast. They also tend to pick up random spins when shot from smoothbore which is why they cannot be depended on for tight groups at long range. In my experience round balls can shoot very well and dependably to 50 yards for sure and likely out to 70 yards or so with fair accuracy but groups tend to open up and accuracy becomes less dependable much past 50 to 60 yards.

Depending on launch velocity, if shot at supersonic velocity, they will go transonic around 50 to 60 yards which may result in enough turbulence to disrupt the ball and cause spins.

I haven't done any subsonic shooting to check if long range accuracy is better or not for balls at subsonic velocity. Not sure if supersonic/subsonic flight has any effect on random spins picked up through air friction.

I suspect that you will find that accuracy will not hold up to 100 yards. Some groups can be pretty tight but the next group may be poor or have a flier or two way out of the group.

My experience anyway.

Longbow

Thank you

My personal goal for accuracy is M.O.D. (minute of deer) at 100 yards.

We will see.

[.30-06 fan]

Darn balls shed velocity quick, don't they!!? Looks like it goes sub-sonic just past 50 yards, hope that doesn't booger up your accuracy. My loads from a smoothbore barrel are 4-5 inches at 50 starting at 1290 fps. I never considered them anything more than 40-50 yard ammo. I gotta' try this load!

Let her rip!

I may have to increase the powder to 35 grains.

[longbow]

If you plan on hunting with smoothbore and round ball out to 100 yards I suggest shooting many groups to ensure you are not getting fliers and inconsistent groups.

I've had some nice groups of around 6" at 100 yards using 0.735" round balls but shoot again and find that one or two are out of the group by 3" or 4" then shoot again and get a 8" to 12" group instead of 6" to 8" group. Too inconsistent for my liking.

One fellow on nitroexpress.com refers to smoothbore round ball trajectory as a "trombone trajectory" which is quite fitting. The balls seem to fly very well to 50 or 60 yards but groups start opening up much beyond and get exponentially bigger at longer range due to the random spins picked up from air drag.

Longbow

[.30-06 fan]

If you plan on hunting with smoothbore and round ball out to 100 yards I suggest shooting many groups to ensure you are not getting fliers and inconsistent groups.

I've had some nice groups of around 6" at 100 yards using 0.735" round balls but shoot again and find that one or two are out of the group by 3" or 4" then shoot again and get a 8" to 12" group instead of 6" to 8" group. Too inconsistent for my liking.

One fellow on nitroexpress.com refers to smoothbore round ball trajectory as a "trombone trajectory" which is quite fitting. The balls seem to fly very well to 50 or 60 yards but groups start opening up much beyond and get exponentially bigger at longer range due to the random spins picked up from air drag.

Longbow

I'm probably on mission impossible, but at 100 yards a 6 inch group with two shots is all that I require.

[Ginsing]

As longbow said round balls tend to get a little squirrelly past 50-60 yards out of a smoothbore. Not terribly inaccurate but more erratic.
I had the opportunity to shoot some of my slugs and balls yesterday at 35, 50 and 100 yards.
My round ball loads won the day at all ranges through one of my shotguns.
I am loading .690" ball in a gold medal or cheddite 2 3/4" hull.
33.5 gr hs-6
12S3 wad trimmed to equator of the ball with a 1/8" nitro card under the ball in the wad.
Star crimp
50 yards average was about 3" 5 shot group.
Had one group 4 holes touching 1 shot opening the group slightly.
I fired about 35 of these loads with no erratic shots. They all went to within 4" of each other absolutely destroying the plywood backing in that area. You could easily drop a softball through the hole.
At 100 yards everything changed. Most went into about a 7" area however lots of floaters and flyers opening groups up to 12"-14".
I would not feel comfortable hunting this range with a round ball.

[.30-06 fan]

As I said, I'm probably on mission impossible. But I will try, and after post the results here.

[Ginsing]

It will be a fun mission for you.
I could think of worse ways to spend my time for sure.
Do keep us all updated and post your results.
I will be trying your method of wad stacking next in my experiments. Consistency is the key I am discovering

[Gray Fox]

I use Universal Clays for clean burning revolver loads. What load do you think would equal the 30 grains of HS-6? GF

[.30-06 fan]

I use Universal Clays for clean burning revolver loads. What load do you think would equal the 30 grains of HS-6? GF

You can look at the slug data on the Hodgdon website. http://www.hodgdonreloading.com/data/shotgun

and also the lee VOLUME MEASURE DENSITY (VMD)
http://leeprecision.com/cgi-data/instruct/VMD.pdf

23 grains of Universal Clays and use the Fed. 12S4 wad which will give more space for the bulk of the Universal Clays powder.

[.30-06 fan]

It will be a fun mission for you.
I could think of worse ways to spend my time for sure.
Do keep us all updated and post your results.
I will be trying your method of wad stacking next in my experiments. Consistency is the key I am discovering

Looking forward to hearing about your results.

[Ginsing]

Grey fox:
I have tried 24 and 25 grains universal with the .690"
2 3/4" cheddite hull or gold medal hulls if you have them. Win 209 primer and 12s3 wad.
Components fit fine for crimping. Only had a chance to shoot a few. The accuracy was good from my 870 pump (skeet choke)
My winchester did not like that combo though

[mehavey]

If you plan on hunting with smoothbore and round ball
I've had some nice groups of around 6" at 100 yards using 0.735" round balls

I was going to try a .735" ball through my 870's rifled choke.* Given a cushioned wad column that meets the req'd crimp dimension (instead of a plastic wad), any reason not to run 23-24gr Universal as others have done with .690 ball and plastic cup?

* My lyman cast foster slug is .730 and slips through the choke rifling. The .735 ball, however, has a decent interference fit.

[longbow]

Can't say about Universal as I hav enot used it but I have shot 0.735" RB's through a fully rifled barrel and they were pretty impressive accuracy wise. One issue with rifled choke tube is that some have reported that the tubes cranked down so hard into the thread from reactive torque that a gunsmith was required to remove the choke tube.

I think you should check load data. The 0.690" RB is about 1 1/8 oz. where the 0.735" RB is more like 1 3/8 oz. ~ considerably heavier.

If your Lyman foster casts at 0.730" That is 0.025" larger than mine casts (0.705" out of the mould). I'd say I'd like to try some but I have a mould that casts at 0.730" now so no need.

Longbow

[mehavey]

FWIW: Rem 870 TAC with rifled choke*

Loaded a 2-3/4" Winchester Super-X (slug) case w/ a 209/34gr BlueDot (safesidestart) under a
- Cut-down AA cup concave downward basewad, then
- 1@ 0.125" heavy card
- 1@ 1/2" cushion wad
- 2@ more card wads for height under
- The 0.735" RB I use in the Bess -- then a roll crimp = 2.5" overall. (Hey! 1st trial )

1,044 fps over the Oehler (w/o any skyscreens since I already know what BPCR grease wads do to screens/supports)
Now that have a velocity/(assumed)pressure baseline, I'll kick it up to 36gr/1,200 and go for group.



*choke unscrewed just fine afterwards

[longbow]

It may depend partly on choke tube design. If the tube has a shoulder I'd think that would stop it from torquing down and jamming threads. Not having tried it I don't know but good yours is working well.

It'll be interesting to see what sort of groups you get. The modern choke tubes have a fast twist for balls but if the ball doesn't skid or strip in the rifling it should do okay.

Longbow

[mehavey]

For the search engines:

Ran:
- Ran the Bess 735 ball. Never tried small as intent was to use same ball as the Bess
- Ran pure lead & Lyman#2. Settled on pure lead/600grs/1⅜oz
- 34 to 40 grains/BlueDot. Settled on 38 grains/1,153fps. Recoil just a big push vs a nasty snap with commercial 1oz/1,610fps Foster slugs
- Sprue up, down, and as-is (vs) smoothed. Settled on Up/as-is
- Discovered that the cushion wad was was a PITA to get past the case mouth -- until I found the MEC-600 Jr's wad guide fingers worked perfectly fine using the press as normal
- Also discovered that the load shot rather high/past point of lowering rear ghost ring at 50yds. Hence put on an old Weaver 1-3X scope that I had in a drawer.
- RE-discovered the Group Law known as "...there's always shot #5..."