Lyman round balls.

[Harmon_Greer]

a .662 ball seems like it would be a rattletrap down the bore of a 12 gauge, even in a wad. a .690 ball in a shot cup will pass through a full choke. it just cuts the petals off the wad at the OD of the ball.. winchester WT12 wads are thinner than the waa12 wads on the petals. they work better for me. I load mine in federal game/multi-load hulls, they are thinner than the compression formed hulls and have a good internal volume, plus they are everywhere at the range.

all that being said i am really partial to the .735 ball loaded to 1400 fps.

[longbow]

Harmon:

The 0.662" ball is quite undersize in standard shotcups but I find that loading a ball into a shotcup is easier than building wad columns. If the ball is patched into the shotcup it stays centered well and shoots well for me.

I have been told they are a perfect fit in some steel shot wads but don't have any.

I tend to agree with you on the 0.735" ball but most of my loading was hand made wad columns using a cut off gas seal then hard card wad column under the ball. They shot very well but I found the loading a little more work than I wanted to do. I did try the 0.735" ball on a cushion leg with petals cut off but didn't get good results so didn't pursue it. If I got good results from a shotcup with petals cut off and a nitro card wad under the 0.735" ball that would be an easy load to assemble much like ball in shotcup..

How do you assemble your 0.735" ball loads?

Are you shooting them in smoothbore or rifled barrel?

I have been loading RB's mostly in Fiocchi low base hulls. Do the Federals you are using have the fiber basewad? I have a whack of those too but haven't used them yet.

Longbow

[MBTcustom]

Thanks fellers! Good info. I am curious to know what your answer will be Harmon.
What about cutting wads with this cutter I have?
Is leather acceptable?
What else could one use?
How do I make those thick compression wads? You know the ones that are dark brown fibrous material?

[MBTcustom]

I dont know what the deal is, but I am getting a definite bulge in the hulls right where the perimeter of the ball is located. I am trying to load the .735 balls in remington STS premier hulls. I dont know if its because the walls are thicker on these hulls or what. (they are supposed to be one of the longer lasting hulls for reloading, maybe its because of this thicker wall.) That would explain why I was getting a decent fit in the .662 balls and a good tight fit with the .678 balls.
I used red AA wads and I cut the pettles off of them like was suggested. I had 3.1cc of powder (30 grains) and 1.9cc of COW.

[MBTcustom]

Well, its definitely the thick hulls that are the problem. I dug through my bushel basket and found a few federal hulls. The ball seated in there just fine, but Hodgdon's web site only lists universal powder for that particular hull.
I dug a little deeper and found a winchester AA red hull. The ball was a loose sloppy fit going down that hull. Unfortunately, I think I only have a handful of these and they have all been shot at least three times as the crimps are in realy rough shape and they look old and dirty.
The good news is that I have discovered why it is so critical to get you components lined up with the published data. The amount of COW that it took to boost the ball up high enough for a good crimp varied widely between these three hulls. The federal hull actually took two 1.9cc scoops of COW to get the ball up there. That's a big difference in space!

[longbow]

Sorry goodsteel, the only load recipe I can find that is close using MOST of the components you have is a 1 3/8 oz. shot load using:

- Rem 2 3/4" STS hull
- Win 209 primer
- BPGS+BP12 gas seal/wad
- 28 gr. IMR4756
- pressure = 9800 LUP

Not sure how the Win 209 compares to the Rem 97 but the Win 209 is a fairly mild primer.

As for your hull bulges, yes, the 0.735" ball is large and obviously over bore diameter so no surprise if it bulges a hull a bit. I wouldn't worry about a bulge as long as the recipe is good and the loaded hull will chamber okay.

Again, another benefit of a smaller/lighter ball is that they are undersize so fit into shotcups and are of weights suitable for easy shot equivalent weight substitution and also many more slug loads are available for slugs of 1 oz. to 1 1/4 oz. than heavier.

The IMR4756 is a good choice for heavy slugs of 1 1/4 oz. and up. The Unique, Green Dot and probably Clays will be good with the 0.662", 0.678" and 0.690" RB's. I have recipes for 0.662" and 0.690" RB's but not using Rem STS hulls.

I have an article written by Ross Seyfried on loading for a 12 bore Paradox gun using 750 gr. bullets over 21.5 grs. of Unique. I do not have any other references using slug or shot weight over 1 1/4 oz. using Unique though.

Not a lot of help but that is all I got.

Longbow

[MBTcustom]

I ended up digging deeper in the bushel basket of shells. There were so many in there from 10 years ago that I had reloaded 5-6 times and they were on their last leg. I threw away about 100 of the old blue peters hulls(they were my favorites), and all of the federal hulls like the one I ran onto (I'm not going to buy another powder just so that I can use a certain hull). In the course of doing this, I found about fifty of the Winchester AA hulls. I pitched about 20 of them because they were split or the crimps were toast etc, but I was able to get 20 of them that I wouldn't be afraid to load up one more time (even if they are as ugly as homemade soap) I ended up finding a load on Hodgdons web sight that used a winchester hull, a remington primer, a federal wad, 1 1/4oz projectile, and SR-4756.
What a dad-gum Frankenstein of a shot-shell!
The load called for a 1 1/4oz package but the ball actually weighs 1.333oz so I dropped the powder charge from 29.5grains to 28 grains. That should do fine I think. If I'm still a little high on the pressure the gun should be able to handle it being a 3".

[sparky45]

I cast roundballs for my 12 gauge USH, using lead that's come from old sewer connections that I get from a local plumber. It seems very soft for my .690 roundballs. I remove as much of the sprue as possible, then roll the balls individually on a steel plate using a hunk of 2X4 to do the rolling. The sprue is greatly reduced in size. I mark the remaining sprue with a magic marker and load it in the up position. I found my best accuracy (1" at 50 yards) with a roundball vs. Lee Key Drive and Lyman 525 (about 3" at 50 yards). This past season, I took deer with the .690 roundball and got complete pass throughs at 50 yards with the entrance and exit holes about the same size. The roundball proved to be much less destructive than the Lee or Lyman slugs with which I also had success. I plan to only load roundballs come next deer season.

Could you describe your load in detail? I'm very interested.
Thanks
sparky45

[excess650]

Thanks fellers! How do I make those thick compression wads? You know the ones that are dark brown fibrous material?

I haven't used those thick, brown wads (celotex?) You can get most anything you need here:

http://www.ballisticproducts.com/

I've been loading some 12ga shot loads with blackpowder and just use 1/8" nitro cards and the thin over shot cards from Circle Fly. Cork would be good.

[longbow]

On the fiber wads ~ so far I have had better results using hard card wads than fiber wads. Not sure why because I would have figured (did figure actually) that they would simply compress and form a nice saddle/cup but accuracy was not good so I went back to hard card wads.

So, my load go powder, gas seal, hard card wad/wads, COW, ball or

powder, cushion leg wad (with or without petals), nitro card wad or two, COW, ball.

That works best for me.

Longbow

[TRG3]

Sparky 45...As per your request, the following is my .690 roundball load which works great in my 12 gauge rifled H&R USH: (please use with caution)

New Fiocchi 2 3/4" hulls with their primer
27.0 grains of Herco
Thin overpowder card (to keep powder from moving past the wad)
Federal S3 wad with 20 gauge .125 hard card (inserted on which the roundball will sit in wad)
.690 lead roundball (from sewer pipe connection) with sprue rounded off by rolling until nearly gone and then marked with magic marker so as to be loaded in the "up" position
Roll crimped

Again, this load works fine in my thick-walled shotgun barrel.

[Harmon_Greer]

i use cut down claybuster 12r wads with a scoop of cornmeal under an alox lubed .735 round ball. blue dot powder and winchester or cheddite primers. i extrapolate the data from lyman 525 slug data and it does really good.

it doesnt have to be more complicated than this but it can be if you insist. i fold crimp once fired hulls and roll the new stuff.

i have also loaded a case nearly full of 777 powder and a ball on top then roll crimp. no wads, just an alox coated ball. it makes a wonderful boom and still shoots good.

[sparky45]

Sparky 45...As per your request, the following is my .690 roundball load which works great in my 12 gauge rifled H&R USH: (please use with caution)

New Fiocchi 2 3/4" hulls with their primer
27.0 grains of Herco
Thin overpowder card (to keep powder from moving past the wad)
Federal S3 wad with 20 gauge .125 hard card (inserted on which the roundball will sit in wad)
.690 lead roundball (from sewer pipe connection) with sprue rounded off by rolling until nearly gone and then marked with magic marker so as to be loaded in the "up" position
Roll crimped

Again, this load works fine in my thick-walled shotgun barrel.

Thank you very much, gonna try me some of those.

[MBTcustom]

I got my chokes! They fit perfectly. I wanted to ask about the cylinder choke though. I measured its I.D. as being .730. The balls I am casting are .735and slightly egg shaped to .737. Will that be dangerous to shoot through this choke? Seems like .006 is not much considering the size of the ball, but I dont know.

[longbow]

goodsteel:

You will get some differing opinions on 0.735" RB in 12 ga. Some say they are too big and raise pressure but I have had no problems with mine.

I was a little unsure when I got the mould since it is about 0.006" over bore size, so I cast some and dropped one into the chamber, got a wood dowel and mallet and gave the ball a relatively gentle tap. It swaged into the barrel quite easily so I did a few more just to be sure. These were all ACWW. All took very little effort to push into the bore so I quit worrying.

There is very little meat around the equator of a ball so not much metal to push around. A bore diameter "square" boolit (as long as it is in diameter) at 0.001" over bore diameter has to have more friction in the barrel than a ball and much more metal to swage ~ especially when shot in a rifled bore. Like I said, I quit worrying about it. I would not shoot one through anything but cylinder bore choke though. I/C choke might be okay but I would rather use an undersize ball through any significant choke constriction.

Something you might consider if you haven't, is a rifled choke tube. There have been a couple of posters that claimed quite good accuracy with 0.735" RB through a rifled choke tube.

I can't recall what powders you were talking about but my standard load has been with Blue Dot up to 38 grs. under a 0.735" RB in Fiocchi hull (straight wall, large volume hull). I based the load on a published pressure tested load using a 610 gr. full diameter slug over up to 44 grs. of Blue Dot at 12,500 PSI in a fully rifled gun (a little high for my liking). I found recoil to be quite punishing in a light gun so had no desire to load heavier. In fact I find 36 grs. of Blue Dot to be a "nice" load.

The round ball loads showed no signs of high pressure and I am quite confident they are safe. I did have some full diameter slugs of around 600 grs. over the same load give sticky extraction so decided there was some reason for higher pressure and didn't shoot anymore of those.

Longbow

[MBTcustom]

Thanks Longbow, I was hoping you would throw me a bone on that one.
Where did you get the "published info" on those fiocchi hulls?
The powder I loaded these up with was 28 grains of SR-4756.

[longbow]

The published data was from Precision Rifle for their Keith style full bore solid Piledriver slug of 610 grs. if memory serves but 600+ grs. anyway. I printed it off and have the load info in my gun room where I am not now. They stated it was for use with any new large volume plastic hull. A little vague but...

I think their starting load was 36 grs. and top end was 44 grs. Pressure ran to 12,500 PSI which seems a bit high to me. In any case, as I said, that solid full bore slug has to have more bore friction and swaging going on than a 0.735" round ball. I found that 38 grs. under the lighter 0.735" ball (about 585 grs.) was as much fun as I could take much of so no need to explore upper end loads.

I also have a load recipe recommended by someone with far more experience than me for a 615 gr. slug load over 33 - 38 grs. of IMR4756. I have not used this load myself yet but now that I have some 4756 will be planning to give it a go in some large volume straight walled hulls shortly.

Your load of 28 grs. of IMR4756 seems okay as a starting load depending on other components ~ based on info I have but again have not tried. Have you checked for equivalent weight shot loads? If it matches or is low with same components then you are safe. I am assuming you based the load on some established recipe.

Longbow

[MBTcustom]

I made it out to the range today, and blew off all of those round balls.
The .662s were the most inaccurate (no surprise) but would sorta kinda cover a paper plate at 50 yards. Recoil was tame. Really tame.
.675s were definitely the most accurate with 50 yard groups inside a CD sized circle on the paper. Again recoil was tame.
.735s were fun. Recoil was still less than store bought target loads, but definitely more than the previous two. Almost as accurate as the .675s but seemed to stray some. (it could have been me but I doubt it) groups were average about a 6" circle.
I liked the .675s best but they were slow.
I returned to the laboratory and commenced to do some testing. I found that the .675 ball inserted into a WAA12 wad and measured around the perimeter gave me a measurement of .722 Hmmmm.
I have one more mold to try which is the .690. I have held off on that one because
1. nobody seems to have a lot good to say about it and
2. of the 4 molds that L Ross sent me, this one is by far the worst.
I had to push the pins out a little bit, flatten the burrs off the faces gently with a stone, ream the pin holes a little bit, flatted the top of the mold, stone the burrs off of the sprue plate, and scrub it over with a bronze brush and clean it with carb cleaner. I am happy to say that I did get it working and it actually casts a good looking ball that by some miracle is round.(big sigh of relief! I cleared it with L Ross before I did this, but I was sweating boolits the whole time, none the less!)
I measured the balls that dropped from this mold and found out that it drops them at .685. inserted in the shotcup and measured, the perimeter is .733. This needs trying!
I looked over the load data again and decided to load a maximum charge this time. I loaded 20 grains of clays this time which I have no doubt will be just fine for the .675 balls.
I am a little concerned about the .685s though. I measured the ball along with the metered scoop of COW and it weighs 1.1oz. That's closer to a 1 1/8oz package on that ball, but they dont have data for that weight using the combination of components that I have so its a little bit of a gamble. I'm going to be careful with this one and watch for pressure signs. If it works it should be stout.

[excess650]

A CD is ~4.5" in diameter, so that size group from a smoothbore with roundball sounds encouraging.

I checked my 20" double and both bores appear to be .725" with no restriction at the muzzle end. A Lyman sabot slug in a Federal FC-1 is a snug push fit down both bores. RBs from my Lee .690 mold cast .690"-.693" so too tight in any wads that I have (FS-O, FC-1, FS-3, FS-4, AA12R, AA12 Y, and RP12).

I loaded a few rounds with the next largest RB that I have (.615") with FC-1 wad and a carboard sleeve(single wrap) around the inside of the shotcup. Its a nice fit. Its slightly under 2/3 oz, and the lightest data I have is for 7/8oz, so I'll start there.

The double weighs in at 6-1/4# and has no recoil pad, so it should be interesting. Its a much quicker handling gun than my 20" 870.

FedEx dropped off a package from BPI yesterday, so I now have some gas seals and waxed nitro cards to play with as well as some the RSS-12 sabots.

[MBTcustom]

If I were you I would load up a few more with a scoop of COW under the ball for a side by side comparison of accuracy.