Round Ball Moulds for 16 & 20 guages

[casper_zip]

Hello there:

Need to know; best size of a round ball mould for my 16 guage, and my 20 guage. Want to go back into the "old timey" punkin ball days. Guess you could say reliving my childhood days in my golden olden years.

Appreciate any/all info. I am pretty impressed with 12 guage round balls, got them from a fellow member on here, and they are awesome, in power and accuracy is very pleasing, too.

Thanks and all the best,

Bob aka casper_zip

[6pt-sika]

I'd be intrested to know the size for the 16 gauge as well !

Might even intrest me to know the correct size for a 10 gauge .

For the 16 gauge I would want one that fit inside a Remington SP-16 gauge wad and for the 10 gauge one that would be okay inside the Remington SP-10 wad .

[longbow]

I won't be a lot of help here with the gauge info you want except that 16 ga. bore size is 0.662" which is exactly 1 oz. in pure lead.

I use 0.662" ball in shotcups in my 12 ga. with good success. 0.662" moulds are readily available. Not sure about bore size RB moulds for 20 ga.

I have also gotten good results using bore size balls over a hard card wad column.

So there are a few ways you can go:

- bore size ball over "custom" built wad column of gas seal and hard card wads
- bore size ball over a cushion leg shotcup with petals cut off and a nitro card wad or two and a scoop of buffer under the ball
- ball size to suit a shotcup with a nitro card wad or two and a scoop of buffer under the ball

So far though I have to say that loading slugs or balls into shotcups has been easier than building wad columns and generally more accurate. Good loads give me about 3" to 4" at 50 yards.

So, bearing that in mind, I recommend mic'ing shotcup petals then subtract two times thickness for ball size for CYLINDER bore. If you are shooting through a choke then check the wad in the choke for ball diameter + 2 x petal thickness at no more than about 0.003" over choke size.

Same applies to bore size ball ~ it should be no more than about 0.003" larger than the tightest bore constriction and bore size exactly is probably better (I shoot 0.735" RB's in 0.729" bore with no trouble).

Oh, this assumes smoothbore.

That is what has worked for me in 12 ga.

Longbow

[turbo1889]

Listen to what LongBow had to say in his post above. The only points where I would disagree and/or put in my own $0.02 would be that with a ball inside a shot-wad set-up using a ball that is considerably oversize by his calculations is not a safety concern so long as the ball itself will fit through the choke constriction by itself naked without the shot petals around it, been there done that, all it does is shear off the plastic petals. Can sometimes result in a reduction in accuracy but not a safety issue. Now with a bigger full bore size ball running naked in the bore without wad petals around it how much oversize you go depends on how hard of lead the ball is cast from. His +0.003" number is correct for a good hard WW alloy ball but you can go more oversize without problems with balls cast from softer lead.

For the 20ga. a 0.575" sized ball (cheap Lee mold) inside of a lead shot wad works well enough. A little more tricky for a full bore diameter ball in the 20ga. size since smooth bore 20ga. guns run all over the place for bore diameter. I've seen as small as 0.600" and as large as 0.630" for the internal main bore diameter on smooth bore 20ga. shotguns, not nearly as consistent as 12ga. guns which rarely have that wide of a variance and that isn't even discussing the choke constriction variances possible. Best thing to do is to measure your specific gun and go from there. I've used 0.625" round ball cast for soft pure-ish lead in most 20ga. smooth bore guns with no or very little choke constriction that didn't have overly tight bore diameters but that is not a common mold size. 0.610" is a common off the shelf round ball mold size and if your gun has a tight enough bore to use it that might be an option.

For the 16ga. a 0.600" or better yet 0.610" sized ball (cheap Lee mold and more expensive Lyman mold respectively) inside of a lead shot wad works well enough. And then for a full bore diameter ball the Lyman 0.662" ball mold casting the ball of appropriate alloy for your choke constriction (dead soft pure lead for chokes as tight as modified if its a good steel barrel that isn't too thin at the muzzle and hard WW lead for true cylinder bore guns with no choke constriction and add just a little tin for to pure-ish lead for a skeet or improved cylinder choke) should do the job.

As with all reloading you proceed at your own risk but that is what has worked for me. The load I'm most familiar with in this discussion is a 0.610" hard cast RB inside a wad for the 16ga. size. That's one of my standard loads for my classic SbS double.

[longbow]

No argument from me turbo. As you mention, I found that when shooting through a choke a ball/shotcup combo that was snug in the bore was too tight at the choke resulting in pinched petals and poor accuracy/

Not sure about the safety concern of being much over bore size. As I said, I have shot many 0.735" RB's from as small as 0.727" bore with no problems. These are all range scrap or ACWW not soft lead.

The old Paradox guns apparently used a choked rifling system where I have read that the slug of about 0.734" was swaged to 0.690" by the choke and I have also been told by one fellow that he has shot 0.735" RB's through a full choke with no problems.

On the other side of that coin, I have a Browning BPS slug and buck barrel with "tight" I/C choke that mic's at 0.710". I bought a Lyman 0.715" RB mould without checking that first so now have a ball mould at 0.005" over choke diameter. Being a bit concerned and not wanting to damage my choke I got hold of BPI to ask what they thought since they sell 0.715" RB's. The response was that Browning makes a pretty good barrel so it "should" be okay. I had other experienced slug shooters tell me not to try it as I will likely wind up with a split choke. I have not. My plan is one day to use a brake cylinder hone to open the choke up by 0.003" or 0.004". It may be okay as is but I didn't want to find out the hard way.

As for the 0.735" RB's, they are getting swaged down in the forcing cone as pressure is building, not slamming into a choke at full throttle. It is the impact at the choke that worries me.

Anyway, regardless, I have found so far that a barely dragging fit of ball/slug and shotcup works best for me so that's what I do. I know for rifled guns you need a tighter fit but I find in my smoothbores the tight fit doesn't work as well for me.

Longbow

[BAGTIC]

I use .735 in 12 gauge and .615 in 20 gauge all HTWW. I use a wad with the cups cut off as a gas seal and 'plastic peanut' packing material as filler to keep crimp from collapsing.