12ga smoothbore round ball accuracy?

[faustus]

I would be curious to hear what kind of accuracy you folks are getting with cast round balls out of a 12ga smootbore.

And of course I would be interested in hearing about your recipe .... what size of round ball ... what wad combination ... what choke ... what velocities ... etc.

Feel free to post pics as well ....

[Barry54]

Do you have a scope or red dot? What set up do you have for accuracy testing?

[faustus]

Do you have a scope or red dot? What set up do you have for accuracy testing?

Well, I have rifle sights and ghost rings ... and I can consistently shoot 4" groups with factory Federal Truball ammunition at 100 yards/meters.





100 yards/meters group with ghost ring sights:



50 yards/meters group with rifle sights (a 2.5" group):




But I now want to develop a round ball load that will squeeze through a turkey choke .... and I am wondering what sort of groups people get ... and what sort of accuracy I should expect as reasonable or acceptable with round balls ....

And of course I am interested in hearing how you folks achieved that round ball accuracy ....

[Barry54]

I sent you a pm for some .600” roundball samples and Rex-24 wads.

@Longbow I believe it was, who said it was fairly easy to get good smoothbore groups at 50 yards or so with roundball loads. I don’t remember what distance, but somewhere between 50 and 100 the groups will fall apart.

[45workhorse]

Faustus
Nice gun porn.
Groups look good to.

[longbow]

Yes, in my experience good loads should produce 4" +/- a bit groups at 50 to 60 yards. In the past mine have typically run between 3" and 4" at 50m. Much beyond that groups tend to open up exponentially... or at least average groups. I have shot some 4" groups at 100 yards but that is not the norm, groups tend to run around 6" to 8" with fliers so maybe 3 or 4 into 8" and 1 or two out around 12".

The best description I have read refers to smoothbore round ball flight as a "trombone" trajectory. The RB's pick up a spin from drag (or that is my opinion anyway) and act like a baseball thrown as a curve ball with spin on it. Once that spin gets hold the RB will curve off course.

I have read of smoothbore musket shooters using tightly patched round balls being competitive with patched round ball rifles rifles out to 100 yards. If the ball is launched with no spin on it then it should fly pretty true.

Here is an article by a smoothbore shooter who is getting rpetty good groups from a loose round ball and wads:

http://home.insightbb.com/~bspen/SmoothboreLoads.html

If he can do it then we should be able to do it!

If the ball is firmly centered in the bore and launched with no spin it should do pretty well to at least 50 yards.

So, how did I do it? I have had equal success using a 0.662" Rb cloth patched into a shotcup and also with a 0.735" RB over hard card wad column.

The 0.662" RB was cloth patched into a shotcup seated in a hull very much like loading a muzzleloader. I cut square patches and wrapped the ball then pushed into a shotcup and pushed the combination through a piece of shotgun barrel. I chose the cloth thickness to make for a firm push through the bore then ran hulls through my press, deprimning, priming, powder charge then seated the trap wad followed by the cloth wrapped round ball. That worked very well.

The 0.735" RB was obviously over bore diameter so to be sure I used a dowel and mallet to drive one into my shotgun bore. It took very little effort to swage that small contact area down to fit the bore then it slid through easily. After that I was not worried about the balls being a bit oversize.

Both of those resulted in 3" to 4" groups at 50 yards. I'd say from memory that the 0.735" RB's produced better average accuracy at 100 yards but there were still fliers and groups were undpredictable at 100 yards.

I would say both should provide hunting level accuracy out to about 75 yards. I would load and shoot more to confirm that though should I decide to hunt with them. I would be confiedent in hunting level accuracy to 50/60 yards.

I think if the ball is centered in the bore and the wad leaves without inducing much spin these 0.600" or smaller RB's should work as well assuming everything else is consistent. Getting consistent ignition/burn/velocity may take some playing about with such a light payload but a fast burning powder like Bullseye, Red Dot or some other fast powder should work.

The steel shot wads have very thick petals but 0.600" or smaller is pretty small. You may have to patch to get good fit or use a donut wads inside a shotcup. Something easy to try is Randy Buchannan's idea of a felt wad in the bottom of the shotcup with the RB pushed into it hard to compress the middle and keep the ball centered. The wadss that Barry54 is using for 0.600" Rb's seem to be working well for him.

What you might run into though is that if you get a snug fit to bore then squeeze down through a tight turkey choke the wad petals may extrude or shear wich may hurt accuracy. A "rattle" fit to bore and using a donut wad or round bottomed wad may work better or cutting the petals down to 1/2 the loaded ball diameter.

Those are pretty impressive groups at 100 yards Faustus. I am jealous! I have gotten similar, though somewhat larger, 100 yard groups using factory Foster slugs but not with home cast and loaded slugs. My quest continues! AQ slugs home loaded produced 6" groups at 100 yards but again, I haven't been able to repeat groups that good with my home cast and loaded slugs... yet.

To be honest, I have not shot many slugs in the last couple of years but have a bunch loaded and waiting for me to take them to the range. Got to get my butt in gear!

Longbow

[faustus]

Thanks Lonbow for chiming in.

So, then 3” to 4” groups at 50 yards is the consensus on accuracy? Has anybody gotten better groups with a round ball out of a smoothbore?


I am thinking about trying a 58 cal round ball out of my 12ga.

A couple of years back I played with 690 round balls that sits in the cup of an LB12 wad. And the acceleration would push the ball into that cup … and that cup would center the ball in the bore.

690 round ball:




I think I will try this again …. But this time with a 58cal ball and the cup from a BW20 wad. That 20ga cup and ball fits nicely into a couple of 12ga wads that I have here. The snuggest fit is with an LBC30 wad.

58cal round ball:




And I have a couple of different full, super full and turkey chokes here …. I think I will give it a try and do some testing.

[Barry54]

I found that adding the right amount of shot buffer underneath the ball, fills in that air-gap and keeps the wads from blowing out like those in your photo.

Keep us posted on your results. I’ve got some of those 20 gauge wads I could sacrifice and a new 0.575” mold I need to break in

[longbow]

Aaaahhh, yes... I neglected the cushion under the ball! Thanks for brining that up Barry!

In my early RB shooting I was finding erratic accuray and recovered wads tended to be in poor shape. It was pretty obvious that they were forming around the ball under pressure. These were typical trap wads with flat bottomed cups, mostly Winchester cushion leg wads. A nitro card wad and some COW under the ball solved that and made a big difference in accuracy.

If the wad has a hemispherical or thick cup bottom in it (steel shot wads?) that may not be necessary.

Another point is the cushion leg. For several of the common cushion legs I have found that they do not necessarily collapse evenly so have taken a page from Ranch Dog's Lee slug load development and cut the cushion leg off then replaced with filler wads so the shotcup becomes simply a cup sabot. That is just something else to try if you ahve wad problems.

https://www.lee-loader.com/viewtopic.php?t=3024
https://castboolits.gunloads.com/sho...-Tail-Feathers

The Lee slugs benefit from using a nitro card wad under them as well as the round balls.

I think I'd start with a 16 or 20 ga. nitro card wad in any flat bottomed standard shotcup then a donut wad or a scoop of COW or buffer under the ball. For steel shot wads, if flat bottomed, a 28 ga. nitro card wad might be a good fit with the thicker petals.

Anyway, just some more things to try if you run into wad trouble.

Yes, it seems that in my exoerience and posts from others 3" to 4" groups out to 50m is what a good load should produce from smoothbore. It may be possible to do better as the smoothbore muslets seem to shoot tighter than that but 3" to 4" is my epxerience so far.

Longbow

[dsh1106]

I went down this rabbit hole a couple years back, lots of casting and trips back and forth to the range.

The best I could accomplish was 5-6 inch groups at 60 yards. I was using .662 diameter ball sitting in a federal wad, I would have to do some digging to find the recipe. I repeated this with .735 diameter ball sitting on a custom built seal and wad column, same results. I was using M500 with 18 thru 24 inch barrels.

I finally went and bought a browning rifled barrel bolt action - the above mentioned loads will shoot 5-6 inch groups at 90-100 yards, there are still a lot of fliers.

Scott

[longbow]

Another good point!

I get best accuracy from my old single shot Cooey. I bought a Mossberg Slugster smoothbore and it won't shoot nearly as well as the Cooey. I noticed that the barrel was quite sloppy in the receiver so I made a brass shim to tighten the fit up and that helped but it still won't group as well as the Cooey with anything I have shot through it.

Many years ago I borrowed a rifled Remington 870 and shot some of my 0.735" RB loads through it and got groups or 2" +/- a bit at 50 yards and that was 3 froups of 5 shots each with open sights. I didn't shoot it at 100 yards as I had been shooting heavy recoil rounds all day and this was the finish so 15 shots at 50 yards.

There some folks here that have gotten very good accuracy with round balls in rifled guns... 725 for one. Do a search for his popsts on his 0.702" Rb in shotcups with rifled gun.

But I digress, thjis is a smoothbore thread so I'll shut up now.

Longbow

[Fitz]

following

[faustus]

Ok, so I loaded up 2 different loads with 58cal balls and Clays powder. I guess we will see how this goes …. there is only one way to find out.

I think I will shoot those through a Remington Turkey Super Full choke (.665).

And, at 310 grains for the round ball ….. this is a light load …. recoil should be nice ….

Load 1:




Column:
1. Cheddite 2 3/4” hull
2. Chedditte 209 primer
3. Powder (Clays)
4. PT1215 wad
5. 2x 20ga .125 Nitro Cards inside the wad
6. BW20 20ga cup (cut from a BW20 wad)
7. 58cal round ball
8. Fold crimp


Load 2:




Column:
1. Cheddite 2 3/4” hull
2. Chedditte 209 primer
3. Powder (Clays)
4. BPGS gas seal
5. FS12 gas seal
6. 20ga .125 Nitro Card
7. LBC30 wad (3 rings cut off)
8. 20ga 1/8 Felt Cushion
9. BW20 20ga cup (cut from a BW20 wad)
10. 58cal round ball
11. Fold crimp


Once I have a chance to test those …. I will report back here.


p.s.: Now if I could only find more Hodgdon Clays powder ... Seems to be gone from the shelves here up north ....

[Loudenboomer]

Good thread Faustus. Fine looking slug gun too!

[Barry54]

I heard from a reloading/gun shop owner who went to the shot show, that the equipment to produce the Clays line broke down. They are so busy making other powders, it will be a long time before they take the time to fix it and produce those powders again.

I’m depending on Longshot and the new Perfect Pattern for the bulk of my shotgun loads currently.

[Half Dog]

I heard from a reloading/gun shop owner who went to the shot show, that the equipment to produce the Clays line broke down. They are so busy making other powders, it will be a long time before they take the time to fix it and produce those powders again.

I’m depending on Longshot and the new Perfect Pattern for the bulk of my shotgun loads currently.

I currently use Clays too. When I heard that powder wouldn’t be offered anymore I searched and tried several powders to see what would work for me. I found Alliants Extra-Lite to be just about as good as Clays.

[Tripplebeards]

How about using some egg sinkers? I powder coated a bunch of mine. I’ve never loaded slugs before, but I bet you they would probably work pretty darn good sitting in a plastic shot cup wad. Someday I might have to try them and if I do I’ll make sure not to put the metal rod through them so they’re solid eggs.

I talked to a YouTuber that said he tried 2 oz eggs. Here’s a batch of mine. I made a few years ago. You can see I made a few extra…lol.