Lee key drive

[NSP64]

Anyone load these slugs using 2400 powder?
I see lots of loads using bluedot and 2400 is slower.

[NSP64]

I loaded some to shoot from my Norinco with screw in rifled choke.
Decided on unique under waa12(grey)wads. 18,19,20 gr.

First couple (18) only found 1 wad ,2 hit b37 @ 50yrds
19 was better found 1 wad, all tree hit target.
20 was better yet, found all 3 wads @ 25yds horizontal string 1 ft high of POA. 6" group(Horizontal string).

I will try a hard card under slug and graphite inside of wad to see if stickin to slug, and work up from 20gr

seems chrono was showing 1000 fps. Not punishing by any means.
:drinks:

Decided against 2400. I was thinking ignition problems in cold weather.
IIRC, I had to use mag primmer forbluedot serveral years ago.

[GBertolet]

I think you made the right choice abandoning 2400. That powder works best in shotguns with heavy payloads and near max charges, such as 3 or 3 1/2
" shells with 1 7/8 oz or more of shot. A one oz Lee slug won't offer enough resistance to burn properly. Blue Dot is an excellent choice for the Lee Key Drive slug.

[mac1911]

I have the one once lee key drive. I original purchased it to load slugs for our clubs slug shoot. My intent was softer loads to get through the 25 shot shoot.
I didn't find any accuracy until I got up past 1200 fps and best was not until 1350! Pretty much the same as Remington slugsters. I found little difference with any powder. All where in the higher velocity range before I got to minute of deer at 75 yards
My shotgun is rem. 870 express smooth bore "deer barrel"

[kullas]

Anyone use reddot with these slugs? Im wanting to load some and i have alot of reddot on hand

[aa1911]

I only have the 7/8oz slug right now so can't remember what the 1oz recipe was but Lee calls for 38gns of HS-6 and a WAA12L with WIN209 primer for the 7/8oz, all inside a Remington hull (STS/Nitro or Gunclub)

I cut the petals off the wad to get better finish and feeding of the shell, accuracy is consistent with factory slugs.

Very clean burning powder also.

I also use a 20g overshot card to try and keep the crimps more uniform and help keep dirt/debris out as sometimes the crimp will not go perfect and leave a small hole.

[Buttonbuck]

Just joined, A friend and I made up some on a Mec 650 using 31.5 gr of Herco 1MOA at 75 yards off a bench from his rifled barrel 870. with 1 oz slug. I just bought a Marlin 512 and am anxious to get a load worked up wondering if anyone has a pet load for this slug and gun.

[aa1911]

looked at the load data that came with the slug mold, looks like the 7/8oz and 1oz are both loaded to about 1500fps plus or minus 50 depending on powder choice. Recoil is not very much at all at least on the 7/8oz, pretty impressive load really. I'm curious to see how these perform for me when I get a rifled barrel for the 870.

I tried some Clays and 'duplicated' a standard 7/8oz shot load, they did very well but velocity of course was much less than HS-6.

Loaded a bunch of these last night again, got best crimping results without an overshot card this time, go figure. Used up about 3 pounds of my home-cast OO buck also.

my scanner isn't working but I'll see if I can find another copy of the Lee load data for these.

[aa1911]

that was easy, first google search...

http://www.leeprecision.com/cgi-data/instruct/SM%203529.pdf

[aa1911]

here's a pic of the loads I did last night, 8 pt rem gun club (green), a six point in black, and an STS hull. (same load data/size hulls). I cut the petals to make chambering easy, seems to not affect accuracy whatsoever.

I'm curious to try a card underneath this thing too, I was thinking a WAA12SL instead of the called for WAA12L wad with about a half of a 12g nitro card underneath the slug. Same wad just slightly more room and might keep the wad from mooshing all the way up into the hollow base; all of the wads I've recovered were fully smooshed into the base.

Pretty happy with these overall though, good slugs on the cheap!

http://i1010.photobucket.com/albums/af229/aa1911/P9161081.jpg

[lkeppinger]

I have been successfully loading 1 0z. Lee slugs using the following:
Remington Green Stu Hull
Win 209 primer
26 Grains of PB powder
Windjammer original light blue 8 petal Wad

This load cronys at 1410 f.p.s. very uniformly. Groups in 3" groups at 2 yards with my Rem 870 with a hastings 28" rifled barrel (same groups with the 20" smooth deerslayer barrel). The recoil is maderate, and the PB powder is about the cleanest burning I have ever used. The slug sits about level with the top of the wad petals so no trimming is necessary. No card wads used. Crimp is beautiful.

[lkeppinger]

I use Green STS Hulls, not STU hulls.

[JIMinPHX]

I had good luck with green dot, roll crimped win hulls & pink wads with the ears cut down.

[aa1911]

I'm itching to start roll crimping; just got a small drillpress last week, curious to try these with roll crimps. Do you need to trim any of the hull down to get a good crimp or are they seating properly with factory length?

[junkbug]

Hey AA1911;
Are you shooting these out of a Rem 870 with a rifle sighted smooth bore (Imp Cyl) barrel?

Thanks.

[aa1911]

I shoot them mostly in my newer 870 express, usually skeet choke. no rifled barrels yet but plan on getting one before long.

I've also fired them thru a mossberg 590 (cylinder bore), a stoeger coach gun (full/mod) and my older wingmasters (fixed skeet barrel). All handled them well and accuracy was what I would expect from a smooth bore and bead sight.

just ordered a roll crimper yesterday from midwayusa, very eager to start roll crimpin' everything!

[35remington]

Ah, aa, the slug is meant to be used with the wad having the petals still attached. It's a snug fit in the Gun Clubs as I have loaded them in this hull myself, but the slug is significantly under standard 12 gauge barrel diameter because it's meant to be used in an intact wad.

As it is, you've got a whole lot of rattly windage in the barrel as the slug is a lot smaller than the barrel. Measure it and compare to standard 12 gauge diameter. Accuracy will be better if you use the wad without snipping off the petals. Inspect the fired wads for signs of petal damage, and if it occurs you might want to use the thin card wad underneath the slug.

With the wad, best use is through cylinder or improved cylinder barrels. Accuracy is usable to fifty to sixty yards, usually.

The Winchester/Federal OEM wads usually do better in resisting damage than the less expensive Claybusters and other substitute "clones".

Since the wad seats stiffly in the Gun Club shell, you really can't feel the wad "bottom" on the powder. Best procedure is to use a witness mark on the wad ram (if loading these on the press) to know when the slug is at the proper depth. One of my four 12 gauge presses is an RCBS Mini Grand, and since the powder and wad stations are separate I can visually align a taped witness mark on the wad ram with the wad guide. Works well. This is my slug loading press as it's a little more forgiving then the MEC presses with slugs.

To improve wad petal survival, some use motor mica dusted on the wads (dump a little in the bag and shake). This eases the wad out of the shell on firing, it is claimed.

The el cheapo Universal red hulls are thinner and allow a "feel" for the wad bottoming on the charge when a slug is in the wad. The Winchester AA, save for a little tightness when the slug passes the mouth of the shell, also allow for "feel" when the wad bottoms on the powder charge.

Just a little experience from shooting a few. I've shot about 1100 this year alone. For practice I use the WAASL pink wad, the Lee one ounce slug, and usually 16.5 Red Dot or Promo. An equivalent amount of Clays works well too, and this gives about 1150 fps. Lots less kick than a one ounce slug and 49 grains of Blue Dot, for sure.

The 7/8 ounce slug works with the gray WAA12L wad as you have found, but leave the wad petals on this time.

[Buttonbuck]

35 remington what gun is this out of. I have a remington 870 with a smoothbore deer barrel and a new to me to be tested Marlin 512 rifled bolt action slug gun. I was going to try 31.5 gr of herco + and - .5gr and see what happens for groups off a bench at 100. after a 50 yard sight in. I am trying to keep to one pistol and slug powder, ideally herco or unique but ideals change in the face of lifes facts. like I said I am new to this.

[35remington]

Smoothbore and rifled Mossberg barrels, and smoothbore Remington 870 barrels. The smoothbores are cylinder.

Lee has a load using Herco. What wads and shells are you using? It matters, a lot.

[aa1911]

OK, I will try leaving the petals alone then and see if I can't get them to chamber better. Some if not most are just very tight to chamber. I figured I wasn't supposed to remove them as none of the data called for that but they seem to work just as well. I've been adding a 16g overshot card underneath the slug, have not shot those ones yet; curious to recover the petals on those.

Thanks for the advice, will have to revisit loading these with petals on again. The STS have just a fraction more room in them as evident when sliding them onto the MEC press to deprime/prime. I have some once fired STS hulls left (not many!) that I will try next.

For the crimp, I tried roll crimping yesterday when my tool showed up from Midway. Tried with a standard uncut hull and cut one down a bit, uncut seemed to crimp just fine and is about a 1/16" or so shorter OAL from a factory star crimped round.

BPI calls for removal of about 1/4" to rid the crimp memory seems like. They sell their gizmo to do it, I may just make my own. Any thoughts on roll crimping these slugs?

http://i1010.photobucket.com/albums/af229/aa1911/SHOOTING%20STUFF/P9211098_zpsc0aa2d42.jpg

http://i1010.photobucket.com/albums/af229/aa1911/SHOOTING%20STUFF/P9211099_zps4191fc34.jpg

[Buttonbuck]

I am using the wad combo that came with the mould, winchester AA Hulls, white winchester trap hulls, I used Federal primers but now have winchester. the load calls for winchester primers. I am using 31.5 gr. Herco, kicks about like a factory remington slugger. I loaded 20 last night to go to the range with the new to me 512. I was worried the gun was stiff but pleased to discover it was because of lack of use. Anyhow I got it shooting center at 50 yards 2"high using iron sights the slugs touched after a slight windage adjustment. I was all over at 100 and adjusted my point of aim for windage 20mph cross breeze. dead on at 100 adjusted windage on my sights and with my last shell of course made a perfect shot. I need to reload this again I will probably use the same hulls and see what I get only I will use the scale for each powder load that I drop using the MEC loader for 31.5 gr. I hope I do not spend a ton of time trying to find the mystery load. It is is sure nice to spend 20 cents for a slug instead of the 3.00 others I know spend.

[35remington]

Since the fold crimp is perfectly sound as a crimp for the Lee slug, I see no advantage to the roll crimp. Just simply use the path of least resistance. I roll crimp my Lyman slugs, as most of the data for them is roll crimp only. The Lee I fold crimp.

The Remington STS, while a very fine quality shell for shot loads, perhaps the best available, is rather tight with many wad/Lee slug combinations. You may wish to load only a small batch until you can judge loadability and wad survival. The trick is to produce a load that has the maximum preservation of the wad's integrity. That is, all wad petals intact, and the crush section undamaged save for the normal compression. You will find the wads will be deeply imprinted with the drive key rib on the bottom of the wad. That's considered a plus for rifled barrels.

While it might seem that rifled barrels would be harder on the wads than smoothbores, smoothbores can tear wad petals as well. Experiment with thin card wads to reinforce the base of the wad, and as mentioned see if wads dusted with mica survive intact better than those without.

Also, as I mentioned, experiment with the various hulls to see if any tend toward better results in wad integrity. The el cheapo Univeral Winchester hull, while not to be compared to the STS in terms of quality, has thinner walls in the shotcup section that has produced better results in terms of wad survival for me. I can get three or four reloads from these before they are getting compromised, and since they are free for the taking while dumpster diving I can get as many as I want.

Today I was out shooting my Remington 7 shot 870, the tactical-ish looking model with seven shot magazine that is all the way to the end of the 18.5 inch barrel. I prefer the simple bead front sight on my shotguns and it was no great trick to hold about five inches at the 50 yard line simply lining up the bead flush with the top of the receiver. As issued the gun shot low, so I simply added a Kick eeze cheek pad. This raised the point of impact and kept the 870 from chiseling my cheek as well.

I kind of have a problem with that and synthetic stock 870's. Maybe I have low cheekbones.

Anyway, I put the butt cuff five shell carrier over that and, combined with the ~1150 fps slug loads, made a (more) comfortable shooter for frequent slug practice. It is not hard to whack an 8 inch steel plate at 50 yards consistently with this setup, and that's good enough for me. The slug's point of impact is right behind the bead at this range.

[aa1911]

I've been scooping up tons of the cheapo Win hulls, they do have much thinner case walls and may do better for me. I also have a metric ton of the new Federals (top gun) as well as the old fiber basewad gold medals from about 10-12 years ago. May have to try the lee in some of those.

only thing that scares me about the winchesters is the separate base wad coming loose.

Thanks for the advice 35Rem, I need to sit down and do some more experimenting, I thought I had a decent combo down but I think I can do much better with these!

I've also been using nothing but Claybuster replacement wads, will buy some original winchesters to try out.

I did try some Downrange 7/8 oz wads (dark pink) that are close to the WAA12L grey ones, they seemed to be of much better quality. I'm thinking original win wads will be a big plus.

[35remington]

Everything but the Remington shells has a separate basewad any more, as do the Top Gun Federals. The Federal Top Gun shell, besides having a paper basewad, is Riefenhauser construction, which is a fancy way of saying the interior is not tapered. This shell has a larger capacity than the trapload type shells (I know you bought target loads with these, but they're not the same as a trapload case) which requires a little more powder to get the same velocity.

An advantage to them is that they accept more components, as in getting the same velocity for less pressure, or higher velocity for the same pressure. They also readily accept buffer in many loads because of this pressure/volume advantage. This is not as advisable with the tapered interior trapload case because the pressures are usually near maximum already with many hunting weight loads. With these hulls you must not use the AA type wads as they will allow powder to migrate past the overpowder cup with rough handling, and the powder will wind up in the crush section of the wad away from the primer flash.

Use Federal wads like the 12S3 and 12S4 with these hulls. I like them myself, especially for my hunting load of 1 3/8 ounce #5, 26.5 Herco, and buffer. These are kinda, but not exactly, similar to the Federal Gold Medal hulls, which do not have the paper basewad.

Simply inspect these shells for a loose basewad before loading. Do not use any that look like they may have been stepped on. Mec loaders tend to reseat the basewad in the priming step, but looking in the hull is no great cross to bear in your loading of these shells. I've fired a great many hulls that have separate basewads with no issues, mostly the cheap Winchester Universal, the AA hulls that have the separate basewad, and the Federal Top Gun. No problems with any of them so far. It's been a lot of shooting, too.

The Claybusters suffered from damaged crush sections and shotcup floors much more so than the Winchesters. I can't say about the Downrange wads as I did not try them. That's not a guarantee that the Winchesters won't lose wad petals, because they can and will with some load combinations, but the cheapo red Winchester Universal hull should minimize wad petal tearing for the most part. An intact wad will better center the slug in the barrel and obtain the most accuracy a smoothbore barrel can impart. Trapload equivalent loads of Red Dot, Promo, 700X, Clays, Green Dot, E3, etc. can be used. 1150 fps is a lot less painful than 1700 fps.

Then you'll really start motoring through the lead. My smoothbores with just a bead front sight will probably outgroup the average full size centerfire automatic pistol at 25 yards and they require a lot less concentration as to hold and trigger squeeze. If I can't get a group under 3 inches at 25 yards for five shots in my smoothbores I know it's because I've had too much coffee.

[35remington]

buttonbuck, don't substitute Federal primers for Winchesters if the Federals are 209A's. The 209A is a significantly hotter primer than the Winchester and runs pressure up with the identical charge of powder. The 209A is a great primer in the loads that call for it and works well with 7/8 and 1 ounce loads that are low pressure, as it bumps the pressure up and enables a cleaner burn to the powder when trapshooting in cold weather.

The light 7/8 ounce loads, whether shot or slug, and approximating 1150 fps are often pressure challenged in cold weather and this addition of the 209A makes the shell more reliable and the powder cleaner burning.

[Buttonbuck]

I know they are not the hotter Federal primers but I will use the winchesters on my next batch. This week I am going to cast lee slugs, 530, round balls and 600 roundballs. I like to have a couple moulds to work with if one gets too hot, This has not happened but.... Hunting season is upon us and I want to have some fresh slugs and roundballs for the season. Bow for Deer starts on OCT 1. So many fun things to do. I have 10 completed rounds with the federal primers when I reload the winchesters I will compare them at the range. I did weigh each powder charge and found the MEC with a 41 bushing was throwing between 31-32.5 I set it at 31 since this was the most frequent charge. The load Data I did read about using the federal primers was to reduce load by 1 gr. if using the hotter primers over winchester. I do not recall if it was from BPI or the lyman shotshell book. I believe they listed the same max load as Lee. I stick to the published data or 15% powder less to start.

[aa1911]

Winchester shot themselves in the foot I think with their ammo/hulls.

Remington's shotgun hulls are superior in every way over the new winchesters or anything else IMO; the biggest plus for me is the one piece construction.

I've got probably about 3-4000 federal top guns with the paper basewad, they load beautiful and do have more capacity but the new plastic they're using is failing on many hulls after only one or two reloads. Had one split 3 separate splits today on the first reload!

the old AA's and remingtons hold up forever it seems.

Thanks again for the input fellas, much appreciated. Going to tack on a bag of original Winchester WAA12L wads to try out instead of the claybusters on my next Grafs order.

[Buttonbuck]

I have slugs loaded and will compare the winchester to federal primers at the range I am a bonehead and used fed 209a's but have shot this load with good results in my 870 smoothbore and rifled marlin, I believe the data we used was in the Lyman Shotshell book or BPI I would have to ask a friend to look at his books. I just put 20.00 a rifle scope I can see the cross hairs fine with 4 inches of eye relief and the barska scope company said it was ok using the weaver mounts on my marlin I hope to get to get dialed up at 100 yards my luck the federal primer load will be the tack driver and I am out of those primers.

[Buttonbuck]

well I shot in a full value of wind and they were grouping good at 50 2-3 inch high and to the right by 3-4 inches. I think it needs a bit of work. The load was 31.2 of herco with the winchester primer AA hulls and white winchester wads chronogarphed about 1320-1400 FPS. I believe I can tighten them up by going up to 31.5. I am also going to use try the gun with remington sluggers to get an idea of what the gun will do with a known load.