Slug Hollow Base Fillers

[longbow]

Many years ago I tried using cornmeal as is in the cavities of Lyman Foster slugs. I turned slugs upside down, filled the cavities with cornmeal then pressed masking tape over and trimmed around the outside edges. That held the cornmeal in and recovered slugs had compacted cornmeal in the cavities but it didn't help accuracy any... or not significantly anyway.

[Ranch Dog]

Two sample runs ready to go test once the cold wind lets up a bit; the difference in them being the hollow base filler. One set is hot glue filled and the other, Plastic Wood. The hulls were loaded with the Load-All II, I used the press set the 12S3 wad, nitro card, and slug. The X12X gas seal in the priming chamber is still making an awesome and effective stop for folding the star crimp.

[Hogtamer]

RD, I see what you're accomplishing and they look nice. Just in case you don't know there is a single screw on the back of the aluminum post that attaches the wad guide and 2 holes. Screw in the bottom hole is for 2 3/4" and top hole is 3". This reduces travel to accomodate the longer hull. For the hot glue fill if you overfill them first, let them set till firm, then use a hot small blade to trim the overfill you get a good flush consistent base.

[W.R.Buchanan]

Yes as far as loading I used my Pacific DL266.

I feel it is necessary to resize the base of any shotgun hull as they will stick in a chamber if you don't.

Used the 3rd station where the powder/shot are dropped but charged the cases with measured charges. Seated the wad and then pressed the slug in until I got 50 lb of wad pressure which resulted in perfect fold crimps.

I used the blue Clay Buster Slug Wads for my loads as after doing a muzzle press test the Regular Clay Buster WAA12 clone was too big and wouldn't even go in the cylinder bore. The Blue Wads do, but are loose so maybe a wrap of tape or paper will be needed.

Surprisingly my .662 Pumpkin Balls with a 1/4" felt wad in the base of the WAA12 clone fit the muzzle of my house gun (Cylinder Bore .729-.730) perfectly. Maybe that's why they shot so well.

I've got to make a load block today as loading one at a time is slow.

For those that don't already know, Pacific DL266 are arguably the best single stage loaders ever made. There's plenty of them out there and I got mine for $50 off www.trapshooters.com . It works really well for short batch loading, or if you need to you can do 200 rounds an hour.

Keep in mind that you can reload 12 ga hulls with a nail and a piece of dowel, but you will make better ammo if you use some kind of single stage loader. Any old Pacific, MEC, C&H, Texan, Lee or a bunch of others that have come and gone, will do the job better than the nail and dowel. I have an early Lee Classic Loader that was made before Lee was Lee, and it does just fine. Plenty of those on Ebay, and plenty of the others as well.

Do yourself a favor if you want to load shot shells, get a shot shell press. I don't feel that a $25-50 investment is too much to support a hobby that you are this far into. Making good ammo is the whole reason people reload. You can't make good ammo without proper tools.

Randy

[gpidaho]

I'm a retired finish carpenter and have for years used a product called "Rage" it's a bondo type wood filler that is an epoxy mix. It bonds very tight to metal or wood and sands smooth very easily. My new Noe mould will be here tomorrow and one of my first comparison tests will be the Hot glue, bondo , solid base comparison test. Gp

[Ranch Dog]

RD, I see what you're accomplishing and they look nice. Just in case you don't know there is a single screw on the back of the aluminum post that attaches the wad guide and 2 holes. Screw in the bottom hole is for 2 3/4" and top hole is 3". This reduces travel to accomodate the longer hull. For the hot glue fill if you overfill them first, let them set till firm, then use a hot small blade to trim the overfill you get a good flush consistent base.

Thanks, I didn't think about the hot blade cutting the cooled glue. Other than the five I have loaded, I went back through my slugs and popped all the glue plugs out. None of them stuck.

My Load-ALL II is old enough, that I had to drill my own 3" hole in the square, upright tube. Because of it's age, it came with the primer feeder assembly which I consider a win!

[Ranch Dog]

Randy, how does your Dillon measure the column wad pressure applied? I have a 12 Gauge 3" Lee Loader, the complete kit, and the instructions state that if you want to load columns to a given pressure, to do the work on a bathroom scale, and seat thembetween 16 and 18 pounds. I think the Load All does a better job of all the reloading than does the kit. The Load-All Junior was an attempt to market a loader at the price point of the kit so Lee could move away from the Loaders.

My Load-ALL II is old enough, that I had to drill my own 3" hole in the square, upright tube. Because of it's age, it came with the primer feeder assembly which I consider a win!

My LA II (1996) is not old enough to have the metal base like Randy's. I think his press is the "Improved Load All". There was an update kit (#90073) that changed out the base to that of the II.

While on the Load-All II, I remove the hopper from the square tube to dump the powder. I always wondered why Lee didn't include this in the instructions nor their online FAQs. I went a step further and drilled a 7/16" hole in one corner of the Bushing Storage Box for use of that box/hopper cover as a method of dumping the powder. I have since seen where some press owers drill a small hole in the cover, but I'm glad I kept my top solid. I don't use the Bushing Storage Box except when emptying the hopper.





Here is a lousy, redneck video I made of removing and emptying the hopper.



After removing the hopper and before reinstalling it on the square tube, I take the opportunity to clean and lube the tube and pivot points on the handle and links. I use a very light amount of petroleum jelly.

I don't think I'm going to get a chance to shoot the NOEs today, the rain just keeps increasing.

[W.R.Buchanan]

Yes, setting the wad pressure was done on a bathroom scale. I never did do that. The main reason I think they stopped making the hand tools is because they are very hard to get a consistent crimp with. I finally got a MEC Wad guide and use that to insert the wads and a Crimp starter from I think,,, Lee. I can get good crimps as long as I get the same amount of powder and shot in the hulls which kind of defines the charge height which directly affects the crimp closing.

That Blue Press is a Pacific DL266 and yes it has a Wad pressure scale on the front of the machine . On the rounds I loaded last night I had to insert the wad then insert the slug using the press and then squish it down until I got to 50 lbs. I went to sleep on one of them and squashed the wad and slug way down and had to take that one apart.

I have a Dillon SL900 which I got for $250 but haven't used it. It is one of the best designed presses out there. This one is nearly brand new, and if I start shooting trap again I will fire it up.

Randy

[Ranch Dog]

My mold business allowed me the contact with Lee where I was able to ask a lot of questions about their products. The shotgun Loaders where incomplete for the task and the Deluxe kits where not profitable and so began the move to the Load-All (Junior, Improved, and II). It seems to me that the Loaders are just not made for new hulls and I understand that limitation within the price range. Starting a star crimp with the palm operated tool is easy as it "bottoms," and further pressure will crush the hull. The die and the closing tool just cannot form the crimp on a new hull.

I sure hope I can shoot the NOEs today, it rained all day yesterday and most of the night.

[Blood Trail]

I've played with the hammerhead slugs in both 12 and 20 ga quite extensively. I have both molds. They are one of the most accurate slugs I reload. The 12 ga shoots lights out with every powder I've tried. Shot sub MOA with 800x out of my USH. At the time, SlugsRus didn't have any data with Longshot, so I worked up some loads, tested them, and then submitted it to SlugsRus. They pressure tested it and it is now a part of their published load data.

The 20 ga takes a little more patience to find a load. This past weekend, i ran a few batches through my 220 with the Tarhunt barrel using Herco and Longshot. Both shot great, but showed signs of pressure in my 220 and USH. Neither gun would extract/eject the spent hulls.

As far as slug release from wads in slug in cup loads, have you tried dusting your wads with mica powder? I started doing that to help with the release.

[a danl]

i'm new here , but i'm not new to reloading and casting for shotguns. i have been reloading for over 50 years and and i have really enjoyed all the input, and many times i feel as though i could have been helpful with a few comments but was not registered. but now i am. so here goes... in reference to fillers i used to raise honey bees so i have a little supply of beeswax and that is what i have settled on as a filler. i also dust the bottem of the slug on the wax with a touch of mica and then an overshot card just to keep the wads from sticking to the slug because i seem to like my loads to be all alike. i use a lyman foster slug and i expand it to fit the bore of my 12ga rem rifled barrel. for me it has worked very well......comments please will be warmly accepted

[Blood Trail]

i'm new here , but i'm not new to reloading and casting for shotguns. i have been reloading for over 50 years and and i have really enjoyed all the input, and many times i feel as though i could have been helpful with a few comments but was not registered. but now i am. so here goes... in reference to fillers i used to raise honey bees so i have a little supply of beeswax and that is what i have settled on as a filler. i also dust the bottem of the slug on the wax with a touch of mica and then an overshot card just to keep the wads from sticking to the slug because i seem to like my loads to be all alike. i use a lyman foster slug and i expand it to fit the bore of my 12ga rem rifled barrel. for me it has worked very well......comments please will be warmly accepted

AD,

Welcome! I love hearing different people thoughts and ideas.

How did you get you foster slugs to swage out to bore diameter?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[longbow]

a danl:

Yes, the biggest issue I've run into for accuracy with the Lyman Foster slug is that it is way undersize for the bore. I recently post several comments on other threads about this since the Lyman Foster has come up a few times.

My take (just my opinion) is that the slugs cast undersize for a couple of reasons:

- Lyman was afraid of full bore slugs through chokes though some testing would have sorted that out quickly and since soft lead slugs obturate to fill the bore they wind up full bore anyway. Factory Fosters were apparently made undersize as well until a few years ago. Same flawed reasoning?
- Ideal/Lyman used to sell a swaging die to add rifling to the slug:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Lyman-12-ga...-/173613174727

My take on this (again just my opinion) is that if the lands swaged inwards then equal amounts of lead are swaged outwards so 0.010" lands displace lead outwards at 0.010" for total of 0.020" + 0.705" as cast = 0.725". I've never gotten to see the swage die or measure a slug but that makes some sense as to why the slugs are so undersize. Otherwise, I have no idea!

One of the old posters here said to put a copper washer under the soft lead slug so it had a hard even base to force it to obturate evenly. I tried that with no success. The only way I got accuracy of any sort was paper patching to bore diameter.

Yes, I am curious too in how you swage the slugs up to bore diameter. Do you have a cavity shaped punch to expand the slug into the piece of barrel or squish from the nose... or both?

Here's how another guy did it:

http://www.shotgunworld.com/bbs/viewtopic.php?t=132184

He says his slugs cast at 0.690". If so, I'd size down a bit to suit good wads. Likely easier than swaging up. Mine cast at 0.705" though and sizing down didn't work for me. Maybe too much in one go?

Anyway, I pursued other alternatives because I don't like the thin construction of the Lyman slug either.

The Rapine .730550 and .735600 were nice slug designs that sadly are no longer available. I had some .730550's to test out many years ago. They shot quite well for me and had a nice design with thick nose. They should shoot well from rifled gun as well as smoothbore. I'm surprised no-one makes a similar mould now.

Longbow

[GBertolet]

I have the Rapine 730550 mold. It is a well made mold. The slugs remind me of a flying trash can. Performance for me has been inconsistent. I made a smaller base plug for the mold, to make the skirt thicker, slugs now 625 grains. I tried various fillers for the base, including plastic balls. I tried liquid alox, and teflon tape on the outside of the slugs. I tested in 2 different shotguns. A Rem 1100 with rifled choke tube, and NEF slug hunter with rifled barrel. One outing the slugs shoots clover leafs at 50 yards. The next time a 6 inch group. I don't understand it, as the same loading procedures and components are used. The slug should be a real winner on big game as the sharp shoulder cuts a huge clean hole just like a wadcutter bullet does. A good close to moderate range slug, but I suspect stability issues at longer ranges.

I have the Lyman forster mold also. I tried hot glue for a base filler, and cut adhesive mailing labels, to paper patch the slugs. I made a trapezoidal template to cut the labels with, for a perfect fit. It gave an inconsistent performance. Good one time and bad the next. My slugs dropped at .706 from the mold. I finally put the mold blocks in my lathe, and with a boring bar, increased the diameter to a little over .730. It still didn't shoot any better. Recovered slugs show collapsed skirt walls. Looks like I will have to made a smaller base plug for that mold also. It's very frustrating, but still challenging. I keep going back to the .735 RB with 40 gr of Blue Dot, which is my proven and consistent performer.

[longbow]

I have had much the same experiences! Seems like there is a bit of black magic and/or holding your mouth just so as you shoot!

I have found best results with round balls out to 50 yards or so and attached wad slugs so far. No base filling there!

I am surprised you got inconsistent results with the Rapine slug. It appears to be a good design to me and the few I got to shoot did well.

Did you cast the Rapine slugs from soft lead or wheelweights? So far virtually all HB slugs I have shot show skirt collapse unless they are oven heat treated... doesn't mater how thick the skirt is up to 0.150" thick. I generally use ACWW for slugs.

Yes, the 0.735" RB is a substantial and dependable projectile. No doubt about it. I'g like to do some more shooting with rifled barrel. I am getting close to buying a rifled gun or at least rifled barrel for my new to me Mossberg Slugster.

Longbow

[W.R.Buchanan]

It is difficult top assess what a designer was thinking unless you can ask him directly I have ran up against this numerous times during my career trying to figure out why someone did what he did when it didn't make any sense to me.

Sometimes there was solid logic, sometimes not.

While playing with my new un-rifled Buck Special A5 barrel that I received yesterday,,, I found the muzzle was Choked to .715 That is -.015 or"Light Modified" choke. Assuming a .730 bore.

One of two things was happening here. Either Browning designed the barrel to shoot Buck Shot exclusively or it deliberately designed the barrel to swage the lands on Rifled Slugs, perhaps to get them to "bite" in the choke and impart spin to the slug? Without being able to talk to an engineer we can only speculate. I might add that the finish on this barrel is a mirror finish, and one of the best I have seen so whatever they did was done for a reason. We just need to figure out what the reason was.

Maybe an Inquiry at www.trapshooters.com will yield a plausible answer.

Randy

This barrel has marks in the muzzle that indicate slugs have been shot thru it. The Choked area is only about 1" long.

[6pt-sika]

It is difficult top assess what a designer was thinking unless you can ask him directly I have ran up against this numerous times during my career trying to figure out why someone did what he did when it didn't make any sense to me.

Sometimes there was solid logic, sometimes not.

While playing with my new un-rifled Buck Special A5 barrel that I received yesterday,,, I found the muzzle was Choked to .715 That is -.015 or"Light Modified" choke. Assuming a .730 bore.

One of two things was happening here. Either Browning designed the barrel to shoot Buck Shot exclusively or it deliberately designed the barrel to swage the lands on Rifled Slugs, perhaps to get them to "bite" in the choke and impart spin to the slug? Without being able to talk to an engineer we can only speculate. I might add that the finish on this barrel is a mirror finish, and one of the best I have seen so whatever they did was done for a reason. We just need to figure out what the reason was.

Maybe an Inquiry at www.trapshooters.com will yield a plausible answer.

Randy

This barrel has marks in the muzzle that indicate slugs have been shot thru it. The Choked area is only about 1" long.

I have a Belgium made A-5 12 Mag rifle sighted smoothbore buck barrel . It does very well out to 50 yards with factory loaded Remington 3” Foster Slugs , it however doesn’t do so hot with factory loaded Buckshot in 000 , 00 and #1 .

[GBertolet]

My slugs are usually cast of 50/50 WW and pure lead, even the 735 RB is. I was always fearful of heat treating the slugs, worrying over increasing pressures, especially in thin shotgun barrels. Maybe my fears are unfounded.

The attached photo is an old one. Left is the Rapine 730550 alox coated, a modified Lee rolled over a wood rasp to increase diameter, bare modified Lee, finally the Lyman forster opened up to .730+ diameter.

[longbow]

Let me qualify my comment about oven heat treating. All the slugs I heat treated were shot through a cylinder bore gun and were not much if any over bore diameter, most actually under bore diameter.

The heat treating was to stop skirts from collapsing after I recovered some HB slugs from deep snow and found all had collapsed skirts even though they were thick and the slugs loaded into cushion legged shotcups. Oven heat treating solved the collapsing skirts.

I would not shoot a solid full bore diameter heat treated slug through a choke of any restriction! I would not shoot a solid heat treated slug that was more than a thou or two over bore diameter in a cylinder bore gun or the same over groove diameter for rifled gun unless it had narrow driving bands that would easily collapse, or ribs like a Brenneke.

If the slug is bore diameter or a thou or two over bore diameter I do not think that heat treating will affect pressure in any way. Possibly a long bearing length hard and solid slug with no relief (lube grooves, ribs or hollow cavity) might be an issue if over bore diameter. There I'd prefer to play it safe and go no larger than bore diameter (groove diameter for rifled gun).

I am wondering if the reason for the rather odd shape of the old Paradox slugs with narrow driving bands and extremely large groove was to allow the driving bands to compress if the slug was ever shot through a smoothbore choked gun? Having said that apparently Paradox guns were choked to about typical full choke through the rifled section so again, I wonder if that is the reason for the somewhat unique design?

Having a solid full bore slug find its way into a full choked gun accidentally is a fear of mine. I would prefer a slug design that will squish through a choke without damaging it. Brenneke has managed it for over 100 years. Hollow or ribbed is fine as long as it is choke friendly.

Longbow

[Ganderite]

I have the NOE 680-500-HB with the hot glue plugs for testing after a cold front passage. What about other fillers. JB Weld seem like a pain, but how about something like Plastic Wood? Any others?

I pour in sealing wax. Ladle it in with a teaspoon. I colour each pot with a melted wax crayon to make the wax easier to see. It cools to be quite hard.