Tripplebeards
06-10-2024, 05:10 PM
Well, I’m still green as far as I’m concerned with loading for 10 gauge. Well, maybe a dull green to a brown by now…lol. Loaded a bunch of black powder loads for my old Damascus, but I’ve only loaded a few different loads for the modern 10 gauge and I’m still working on it. I ended up with some BPD-10 non slit hulls from an awesome member here. I did some reading and it sounds like I need to have some type of cushion in the base cup. I loaded up a 3 ounce load last spring and pattern blew out pretty good at 40 yards. I would say over 3/4 of the shot didn’t even hit my target. Needless to say it was a waste of shot. I didn’t use any buffer or any type of cushion wad inside of the hull. I had about a dozen of the multi metal and TPS wads I was also given that I tried with the 3 oz load. I only loaded up three of them in 3 oz using the multi metal wads with 3 oz of copper plated #5’s along with 45 grains of lil gun. ReCoil wasn’t even stout. I’m guessing because I had no cushion wad and no buffer in my load the patten probably suffered.
Well today I wanted to make some cushion wads to go inside the tuff wads. I found a piece of gas line pipe in my plumbing box. Also a piece of copper pipe I tried but measured to large. I had some Felpro cork/rubber gasket material laying around from an old gas tank project from years past. Figured I would use it for cushion wads. I would guess it’s almost an 8th of an inch thick. Two of them stacked together is closer to 1/5”. Three stacked is around 2.6”/2.7”. So little over a quarter inch with 3 stacked. To make the punch I used a piece of natural gas line and grind it at an angle till it had a sharp edge. The circles punched out from them were about 15.5 mm. I read that cushion wad punches (for 20 gauge) are 13 or 14 mm and used for the inside of 10 gauge shot cups. Well, I can tell you my larger 15.5 mm cork circles drop right into the base of my wads and are not wedged in there…or need force to squish them in place. They aren’t loose and rattle around. It’s almost like it’s a perfect fit, but they aren’t compressed in place. I can Turn my wide upside down and they’ll fall out. I would assume I don’t need them any tighter and they probably will work just fine? I also would assume I probably want to at least stack two on top of each other for a quarter inch. My guess is the quarter inch has more to do with filling in the base of the wide for proper height of whatever shot I’m using anyways and probably can get away with one, two, or more of the cork cushions depending on how much I’m going to use in my load for proper hull fill? I figure I’m gonna try 2 1/2 ounce loads because the tough wads say they can be loaded up to 2 1/2 oz. I’ll try it with the same load of little gun and see how it patterns. I still want to get some buffer before I load up this time around and see if it helps out as well. I do have corn cob media collecting dust in the garage I could use. I’ve read you can use flour, but I just don’t feel comfortable using it. I’d be worrying about if it’s gonna eventually get some moisture and harden up my shot like a solid slug.
So what do you think?… and How did I do? I can say after a couple hundred of them I only had to sharpen my homemade punch very lightly once and it sure mushroom out the top of the head from beating on it with a hammer….but it sure worked. That gasket material is tough as rocks. I made the mistake of punching five or six of them at once before I tried to drive them out with a 12 gauge shotgun cleaning rod. I ended up mushroom in the tip of it and doing so. It never hurt any of the wads though in the process. I made sure to punch wads out singly…or just two at a time after that.
You can see the end of the bar almost looks like a “T” from me pounding on it with a hammer after a couple hundred punches. They look like perfect circles until I zoom up on them here. I suppose cutting cork you’re never gonna get anything perfect. I would assume they probably don’t have to be perfect anyways. Guessing they just have to serve us a cushion at the base of my shot cup so pellets don’t deform and stick to the base?
https://i.imgur.com/QPOaGqP.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/UAOLYsa.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/3YDR2xu.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/BonjwWm.jpeg
I also have been doing reading on wad slitting in my mighty 10 gauge booklet. I want some super tight long range turkey loads like everybody else in the world….lol. Sounds like I need to try two slits for long range patterns and then three or four slits 2/3 of the way down and then load test. Anyone that’s experimented with wad slitting for super tight groups please chime in. I was going to try and make some “flight control looking air brakes” like federal did with their flight control wads.
Well today I wanted to make some cushion wads to go inside the tuff wads. I found a piece of gas line pipe in my plumbing box. Also a piece of copper pipe I tried but measured to large. I had some Felpro cork/rubber gasket material laying around from an old gas tank project from years past. Figured I would use it for cushion wads. I would guess it’s almost an 8th of an inch thick. Two of them stacked together is closer to 1/5”. Three stacked is around 2.6”/2.7”. So little over a quarter inch with 3 stacked. To make the punch I used a piece of natural gas line and grind it at an angle till it had a sharp edge. The circles punched out from them were about 15.5 mm. I read that cushion wad punches (for 20 gauge) are 13 or 14 mm and used for the inside of 10 gauge shot cups. Well, I can tell you my larger 15.5 mm cork circles drop right into the base of my wads and are not wedged in there…or need force to squish them in place. They aren’t loose and rattle around. It’s almost like it’s a perfect fit, but they aren’t compressed in place. I can Turn my wide upside down and they’ll fall out. I would assume I don’t need them any tighter and they probably will work just fine? I also would assume I probably want to at least stack two on top of each other for a quarter inch. My guess is the quarter inch has more to do with filling in the base of the wide for proper height of whatever shot I’m using anyways and probably can get away with one, two, or more of the cork cushions depending on how much I’m going to use in my load for proper hull fill? I figure I’m gonna try 2 1/2 ounce loads because the tough wads say they can be loaded up to 2 1/2 oz. I’ll try it with the same load of little gun and see how it patterns. I still want to get some buffer before I load up this time around and see if it helps out as well. I do have corn cob media collecting dust in the garage I could use. I’ve read you can use flour, but I just don’t feel comfortable using it. I’d be worrying about if it’s gonna eventually get some moisture and harden up my shot like a solid slug.
So what do you think?… and How did I do? I can say after a couple hundred of them I only had to sharpen my homemade punch very lightly once and it sure mushroom out the top of the head from beating on it with a hammer….but it sure worked. That gasket material is tough as rocks. I made the mistake of punching five or six of them at once before I tried to drive them out with a 12 gauge shotgun cleaning rod. I ended up mushroom in the tip of it and doing so. It never hurt any of the wads though in the process. I made sure to punch wads out singly…or just two at a time after that.
You can see the end of the bar almost looks like a “T” from me pounding on it with a hammer after a couple hundred punches. They look like perfect circles until I zoom up on them here. I suppose cutting cork you’re never gonna get anything perfect. I would assume they probably don’t have to be perfect anyways. Guessing they just have to serve us a cushion at the base of my shot cup so pellets don’t deform and stick to the base?
https://i.imgur.com/QPOaGqP.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/UAOLYsa.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/3YDR2xu.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/BonjwWm.jpeg
I also have been doing reading on wad slitting in my mighty 10 gauge booklet. I want some super tight long range turkey loads like everybody else in the world….lol. Sounds like I need to try two slits for long range patterns and then three or four slits 2/3 of the way down and then load test. Anyone that’s experimented with wad slitting for super tight groups please chime in. I was going to try and make some “flight control looking air brakes” like federal did with their flight control wads.