Round 2 - 12GA 2x5 00 buck loads

[bakerjw]

Just finished up a round of reloading more 12 gauge 00 buck loads and was quite pleased with the result.

To color code my loads, I laid out 10x10 overshot cards and lightly hit them with yellow spray paint. They are more of a moderate load IMHO so yellow it is. When I did the first run of the 2x3 00 buck loads, I left the overshot card white. In hindsight I should have made them pink as we call them girly rounds since they have less of a payload and are for my wife, sister in law and others who can't handle the heavy recoil.

I am using a run of the mill Lee Precision II reloader and BPI load BKL100302-1830
- 2 3/4" new Fiocchi hulls.
- 26 grains of Hurco. (the closest Lee bushing dumps 25.5 grains)
- MG42 wad.
- 2 x 5 stack of my own 00 buckshot.
- Overshot card

As I found with the first run, these new Fiocchi hulls crimp very nicely.
I am very pleased as you cannot find 00 buck shells anywhere.

[bikerbeans]

Target pic?

BB

[bakerjw]

Alrighty.... Time for some pics.
I had a pair of shells that compressed the hulls a bit when doing the crimp. Not perfect crimps but adequate. I also had one shell where the crimp die caught the steel base and deformed it a tad. Nothing too major but not worth reloading.

As mentioned in the OP, it is a well established load from BPI. Due to the bushing size, the powder measured at 25.5 grains rather than 26. In the future, I'll likely use an RCBS measure for my buckshot loads if I want to be dead nuts on target. The shot still had some flat spots on it and some sprue marks. These are not intended to be long range hunting rounds rather than wider dispersal defense rounds good out to 100' or so.

This was out of my wife's Mossburg 500 defense shotgun. The sight is shooting low so most of the impact was below the target.
I fired 3 2x5 shots on target at 30 yards.
Here, you can see 19 holes on target.


This was an oddity. I am not sure if it was the wad or not. It tore the target but did not penetrate the backstop.


Here you can see several holes where the shot hit below the intended target. As mentioned, I need to sight it in a bit better.


The rounds had a crisp kick as I expected from a 2x5 load. All in all, I am happy enough with the results.
Tip of the hat to BPI for the load...

[centershot]

bakerjw, if you have a vibratory tumbler toss in about 5 lbs. of buckshot at a time and let it run overnight, it'll be round by morning. What was the choke constriction on that gun, that pattern looks good for 30 yards, IMHO!

[bakerjw]

This is a Mossburg 500 defense which I believe is a straight bore.
I know that some loaders work on as tight of patterns as possible for hunting purposes but these rounds are meant for short range defense. We have no idea what the future holds but IMHO it is prudent to be prepared for bleak.

I do need to tumble my shot, that's for sure. I might chuck up a small drum in my lathe and let it idle for several hours.

[Powersgt]

I just recently assembled a similar load using Long Shot (29.0 grains). They make a great defense load out of my CZ 712 Utility shotgun. My buck shot was a tad heavier then the load listed in the BPI manual so I cut it back from 32 to 29 grains and checking patterns. The target picture is actually fired from a mod choked H&R topper. Out of the CZ it shot a 5” pattern at thirty yards.

[Hogtamer]

nice work Powersgt. That load will kill anything in these parts dead cleanly.