Getting back into shotgun slugs

Tomme boy

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
Well if i don't have enough projects already, I am close to having everything to start loading 12ga slugs again. A few weeks back I stumbled onto a heck of a deal for a rifled barrel with the cantilever scope base. These things are scarce and expensive when you do find them. I got this one for $165 shipped. And it looked almost new or as close to it you can get. Not a single scratch or wear mark anywhere.

I ordered one of the Russian slug molds off The reloaders network. I got the Botfly segmented hp. It has a hole down through the hp to screw a wad to the slug to help stabilize it. I have been watching these molds since they made it here a few years ago. Some seem to shoot really well. Others just ok. But the more I am looking into why some of these don't shoot the greatest. What I am finding is it is mainly the person loading the shells are the fault.

So, WHY? The main reason I am seeing is the tail wads are not installed right. If you watch some of the videos the tail wad is making the slug unstable. The gas seal on the wad is usually the cause It is getting blown out. If you watch some of Leons (Bloodshot) videos he is stacking them at 50 yds into one hole when the wads are not getting blown out.

So to try to get the slugs to launch straight and not blow the wad out I want to try loading them with a BP gas seal that is designed for mag loads and slow powders. Then I have about 10K waxed paper hard wads in different length. And nitro cards. I want to try to make a tail wad out of a nitro card then a hard wad, then another nitro card. Then screwing and glueing them to the slug. Basically the same as a brenneke slug of the past. I asked around about trying to shoot these with no tail wad. Everyone said they could not get them to group. They all say because of the slug is tail heavy. Being shot out of the rifled barrel should stabilize the slug.

so what do you think if the slug should stabilize without the wad?
 
CWLONGSHOT

CWLONGSHOT

Well-Known Member
Hello Tomme!
Happy New Year man!!

This is my "next thing". Im havin fun with the 410 but wanna expand to the larger gauges.

Got HUGE HELP this last week as two of my buddies had vacation and donated me a day each and HAMMED OUT my loading room
Expansion!!! SO these projects are Allot closer to reality!!

Therapy tomorrow will have me under the ice so nothing likely tomorrow.

Nice molds!! Who knows but mostly the slug needs balanced weight or forward weight to shoot even in rifled bore.

I just rescoped my cantalever Remington slug bbl this weekend. My slug guns where H&R USH but I havent used in over 5 years so I put them up on GB.

I know your onto something with wad square.
CW
 
Tomme boy

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
Mold showed up today. Fired up the pot and cast a few. I got the botfly mold. I took a few and checked the weight. They were coming out at 456gr. I was freaking out that they were too light. I swear I seen they were supposed to be 540gr. So dumped all the lead out and started over with the lead you sent me CW. Cast a few more and then weighed them. 452-456gr again.

Now I was trying to figure out what is wrong. So I go and get on the web and guess what? They are supposed to be 463gr. The other version of this slug was the 540gr I was thinking of. So mine are slightly over 1oz. I would rather have it this than the heavier slug. It will open up a lot more data.

But i got a few that were ok. The face part of the slug is ugly. The rest of the slug looks great. No wrinkles anywhere except the face. This is the portion that is contact with the pin and fins. And it forms the round hump on the face. This mold is weird how they are doing these HP's. The face is outside the mold. The pin is dished. So when you pull it out the slug face is outside of the mold.

After I cleaned the mold I went right to my can of felpro moly spray lube. And sprayed the pin. Everyone was saying the pins stick bad and you need to do as I did or smoke the pin. Well I think that is what is giving me the imperfections in the slug. I think I might go soak it in some carb cleaner and see if it will come off.

I have to get everything I need done tonite. I have to head in for surgery on my left hand to have 2 trigger finger releases done. And I am a lefty. So I will be done for at least a month or so.
 
CWLONGSHOT

CWLONGSHOT

Well-Known Member
I also really liled that mold and wondered how much of a POA it would be to cast from.

Been there done that!! Good luck brother!!
Prayers for you and the Doctors!!

CW
 
Rally

Rally

NC Minnesota
I also have a pair of the Russian moulds in the mail, one in 12 ga. and one in 16 ga. I've been playing with the 7/8 oz Lee and learned pretty quick that despite what it says on the internet, a 20 ga. nitro card under the slug doesn't help much. I found a 16 ga nitro card under the slug, and inside the wad also makes an additional gas seal, keeps the slug square, and wad damage was almost eliminated. The nitro cards are hard enough they won't form to the inside bottom of the slug and blow through/ into the bottom of the slug. The 20 ga. cards can often be found inside the slug base and wads were badly deformed, with obvious blow by. The 16 ga. nitro cards fit the inside of the wads ( 12 ga. WAA12F114 or Clay Buster copy)like they were made for that purpose, and recovered wads show they also formed an additional gas seal there, with much cleaner wad petals and little to no deformation. Soft fiber wads are great fillers but need nitro cards between them and the powder, and between them and the bottom of a hollow slug, or they will deform and push into the hollow of the slug base. The difference is even audible.
I looked at the Botfly model, but I don't want a fragmenting slug for my use. I'm not sure the way it is designed, with the two rings, one top one bottom for bearing surface, would make much difference in a rifled barrel, especially with a pure soft alloy. I'm too cheap to buy the wads to fill the hole in the center of that slug also. My youngest grandson and I have been having a ball shooting the slugs (Lee) at rocks and pieces of clay pigeons lately. I'm using Clays for a powder and a 7/8 oz slug at 1360 Fps, my grandson can shoot them all day. Clean burning fun.
The problem is finding 16 ga. Nitro cards at .125, which is what I used until I ran out of my stash. BPI used to sell them but now only has .70, so I'll use two.
 
H

hrpenley

Active Member
Good to see this new thread, due to the primer shortage I am back to shotgun slugs again myself, Lyman, Lee, .690RB, .600RB and a few other variants. I am currently working on using some 350,400,450gn .50 cal slugs but I can't find any sabot's in stock for less than 17.00+ for 50qty, Not willing to pay that much, have any of you guys worked up any .50 cal loads and if so what did you use for a wad? (If not the standard non-available sabots). So far everything I have is loose fitting, (I have about 40 dif styles of wad's including a couple types of GS's, and brush-wads) thought about packing them or oring the top to provide some centering/stability during barrel time. I also have an old work buddy that has a 3d printer, I even thought about going that route but I think the cost there would be almost as much as the high priced retail market ones.( not sure how much the plastic feed line cost for those things or if it would even hold up under the blast) I have a few ideas I am working on but any personal experiences would be greatly appreciated.
 
H

hrpenley

Active Member
I found just a dab of tin and they will fill out a lot better, have done with pure lead + tin and ww+tin, works with the 1oz also. Pure lead runs a little hotter anyway to get good flow.
 
Will

Will

Well-Known Member
Actually lead temperature has little to do with it. It’s all about mold temperature.
Cast you some bullets with different mold temps and check them with a mic. 900 degree lead still doesn’t make good bullets in a cold mold.
 
Tomme boy

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
Hand is feeling good. Hardly any pain. It actually has less pain than before the surgery. Just can't bend the fingers.

Still waiting on my Ballistic Products order to ship. Tomorrow it will be 2 weeks since I ordered the wads and a couple other things. They must be really slow. 3/4 of everything they have listed is out of stock. And has been for months. There is no way they can have too many orders to take this long to ship.
 
H

hrpenley

Active Member
I made a BP order Monday for some in stock wads and some 20g Rio's, order had a note on it saying 10-14 days for processing and I have been waiting on brass from the brass exchange since Nov 17, (they were at 28 days then) They said it was shipping yesterday but I will believe it when I see the tracking. However East Coast Reloading and Precision Brass both received within a week.
 
Tomme boy

Tomme boy

Well-Known Member
I did not get that note when I ordered. From what I am hearing on a few other boards it is normal to wait a month with BP.

Was trying to clean up the pin last night. I found it is able to be completely disassembled. The HP and fins are a one piece part. There is a bolt that threads up from the wood knob that screws the whole thing together. Looks like the fin piece should be able to be swapped out really easy with other pieces to change the design. Pretty smart to make it universal between molds.

This is the core pin. And the fin part that can be changed. I was playing around trying to check the balance of the slug last night. It seems to balance a little more towards the front using the middle band as a balance point. This should fly just fine in a rifled barrel by itself.

Now I just have to pick which case to start with. I found my win AA hulls last night. 4 lfrb of the old style red AA hulls. I know I have at least a garbage bag of mixed AA in different colors at my mothers house in the shed. I never got around to sorting them. I also have about the same with Remington gold an green Premier hulls.

I am not going to hot rod these at all. I found when loading the Lyman pellet sabot in the past that 1250ish area seemed to be the sweet spot accuracy wise with all the powders I tried.
Botfly-2.jpg
 
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