Case / Hull questions from Lyman #5 manual

[pmer]

Good morning I been looking at my manual and wanting to load some buck shot for coyote troubles. I have some #4 & 00 buck shot and a variety of hulls.

On page 357, Lyman lists Winchester HS or Compression formed Plastic cases. Are these plain Win. high brass 2 3/4'' hulls? I bought some Super X #4 buckshot and am wondering if theses hulls are what Lyman has in mind.

On page 352, they list Federal Plastic Hunting Cases Paper Base Wad. Is the base wad what I see when I look into the bottom of a Federal hull? Can most Federal High brass / Mid brass be used for these loads?

I'm a green horn so please feel free to cover the basics. I have some Federal Gold Metal Plastic Hulls I bought used and have done a little loading with these. Staying with published data only. Thanks any help or recommendations for the wily coyote.

[dsh1106]

Take a hack saw and cut one of the hulls down the center and compare it to the picture on pages 28 - 34 in the Lyman #5 Manual. You should be able to figure out which hulls you have by doing this.

for the federal hull here is some useful information.
https://www.federalpremium.com/on/de...ading-data.pdf

Scott

[centershot]

pmer, regarding the W-W hulls - "HS" and "compression-formed" generally refer to the double A (AA) target hull. This is a low-brass hull with an integral plastic base wad. I don't believe W-W ever loaded these hulls with field loads but I could be mistaken about that. IMO, the old style (not HS) AA hull is the best shotgun hull since the Activ hulls were discontinued many years ago. I wish I'd bought a truckload of them back then!

The base wad is visible by looking down into an empty hull. Those that are paper are not reloadable as many times as those with a plastic base wad, sometimes only reloadable once. Best reloading life comes generally from old style AA's (not HS), Remington STS's and Federal Gold Medal plastic hulls. You can obtain hulls from online vendors such as Ballistic Products, Inc. (BPI) and others;

https://www.ballisticproducts.com/By...partments/849/

New Fiocchi hulls should not be overlooked, good value for the price. Rio hulls are competitively priced but require Rio primers instead of the standard 209 primer used by everybody else.

Also, some hulls are tapered internally, such as the old style AA's, while others are straight. Some wads should not be used with some cases or improper gas sealing will result. The recommendations in your loading manual will keep you out of trouble here. Shotshell loads are also available on the powder manufacturer's websites.

Good luck, have fun, be safe!

[gpidaho]

With what you have on hand, I'd load the Gold Medal hulls. See the Lyman manual for load data. Gp

[pmer]

Thanks for the reminder about the first part of the book that has hull descriptions. And I have a better understanding about the hulls now. I was digging around in one of the sheds and found some once fired hulls for the Federal Plastic with paper base wad on page 352.

I had a tight shooting 00 buck that was a 2x5 stack in a 12S4 hull but I'm out of that powder. So it seems like I can use the this manual for 2 different hulls now.

[centershot]

I rally like the 12S3 and 12S4 wads, it's sad that Federal discontinued the 12S3. It's still available from another company, haven't used the replacement myself, I've still got 1000 of the Federal's in my hoard....err...ummm... stock!

[gpidaho]

Downrange has a replacement wad for the 12S3. One of my favorite wads. Gp

[centershot]

Downrange has a replacement wad for the 12S3. One of my favorite wads. Gp

Thank you for that! I knew there was a replacement available but couldn't recall the name of the company.

[pmer]

I did get to revisit that load with the 12s4 wad and the 2x5 stack of 00 buck. Federal Gold Medal hull and Universal powder. I had 18 pellets out of 20 on a 16 by 20" sheet of news paper, 2 shots at about 35 yards or a little more.
Not too many hits in the middle of the paper. Two wads where intact but the petals looked ruff with holes in them.

Should the wads look better or is that normal? The firearm is a Benelli M2 with a mod choke installed.