Improved powder selection

I was doing some target shooting with the 58 caliber round ball load that I developed. I could not reproduce hitting a target at 100 yards like I was able to do a previous week. (See the first posting.) Thinking about it I started to get concerned about the amount of "blow outs" the bottom skirt on the wad was experiencing. About half of the wads that I picked up off the ground had a split in the side of the skirt. One wad had the bottom skirt totally flipped up all the way around. I started figuring this would cause irregular velocity performance. It doesn't exactly explain why I didn't hit the target. There was also more wind that day but the round ball should not have been blown off that much.

Anyway I decided that for the slug load that the Nitro 100 powder may be too fast and that I would be better off with a slower powder. So picking from what I had on hand I tried Clays and Universal.

13.4 grains of Universal gave a speed of 1039 FPS but the inside of the barrel was very very littered with unburnt powder. This load was not going to generate enough pressure to burn that powder. So I did not pursue Universal.

Clays gave good clean burning results.
10 gr = 983 FPS
11 gr = 1120 FPS
11.4 gr = 1157 FPS
12 gr = 1196 FPS
13 gr = 1252 FPS

I ended up settling for the time being on using 11 grains which was basically a 1.6cc scoop. From a test firing I recovered 4 wads. Two had pin holes in the skirt and two were ok. So this was better but still a little suspect.

My next test would be to use 700X. However, I was trying to get ready for a youth deer hunt at Fort Knox last weekend that at the time would be in a couple days.

The irony is that, after having gone, I have decided that early October Youth deer hunts are a waste and you get realllly chigger bit! It was too warm and hardly anyone saw a deer. During the regular gun season, off post, he can use a good .223 round that is good for deer size medium game. So I may not end up ever using the 20 ga slug load I developed. We'll see. I have a couple more children that are still too young to hunt that in future years may want to try something on post during the regular quota hunts

So this next Saturday morning we will go squirrel hunting. We are a lot more likely to get a squirrel. I am still unsure of what to do about a shot hunting load though. I think that I may add some more lead shot to the hollow butt of the gun to reduce the recoil of firing standard 20 ga hunting loads. Also he'll wear a shoulder pad.