verytricky

Going to add my name to the looking list...

In a word. Yes. At any opportunity. If I happen across a fox and I have the .410, I will shoot the fox. An opportunity is not seeing a fox at 50 meters. That is not an opportunity, so it does not count. But for any opportunity - Yes - Definitely.

I think the biggest baddest you can get at the moment is probably the BB 3.5 inch 63 gram Mamoth cartridge. But they hurt when you shoot them. You have to be very extreemly careful asking advice when looking at the boundaries of legality, as you have seen from this very page, the information given us often inaccurate or misleading. In addition, there are more laws that are in place to trip you up. It is not only what you may buy to shoot, but if you actually shoot it you then run into other legislation. Best advice: When you want to go to the edge of legality, ask the question of the BASC legal department. It is not a good defence in court to say you got your information from an internet forum.........

yes you are correct. it is not recoil on most autoloaders that causes the cycle. there is a direct connection to recoil and gas pressure, but it is not correct of me to say recoil when i mean gas pressure, so i should not have said that. residue gas is the gas not pushing out the projectile ( or the gas bled off this process to reload ). my understanding was that the pressure of the residual gas has to operate a piston or some other form of mechanism to move the breach block backwards to eject the previous cartridge and re cock the trigger, usually a spring will load in the next cartridge. there is a force required to do this and to operate this mechanism there needs to be a certain amount of pressure in the gun. if you had very low pressure then then for example the projectile itself would not exit the barrel. if you add more pressure, you eject the projectile. add even more pressure and the reloading mechanism will operate. When building a gun you have to make assumptions about what cartridge will be fired from it. autoloaders usually are used for heavier loads, as they diminish the recoil. you can shoot a 63 gram 3.5" from some autoloaders. i would never attempt that from a fixed breach gun, as the recoil would hurt too much. so the assumption would be for a heavier cartridge, and the mechanism would be built for that load. so there would be a point where a small load would fire the projectile, but not have sufficient pressure to cycle the gun. i am guessing, but the low recoil cartridges produce lower recoil because they produce less pressure. this is because i think that pressures produced is directly related to the felt recoil. slower burning powder? less velocity? i am not sure how it is done at this time as i have never measured this. but i assume that if you have a marginal load, say a 28g load on an escort, or in my case a 32g high velocity - these just manage to cycle the gun. now reduce the pressure by shooting a XLR 28g or a standard velocity 32g in my case, and you dip below the required pressures to cycle the gun, and it stops cycling. This can usually be fixed by adjusting the gun to the new loads you are shooting, but then you can not safely go back to the magnum loads if you have adjusted the porting or gas mechanism for the light loads. so dropping down the pressure of the cartridge - usually to lower the felt recoil - especially if you use cartridges designed to lower recoil, and you are at a marginal point on the gun design, then it can fail to cycle.

Solway 3" magnum 50g BB works best for me.

I am quite new. But I am regularly ( each weekend ) shooting foxes on my farm at a range of 40 to 50 meters. I shoot one a night - almost two a weekend. Croydon Council like to release trapped foxes 'back in the country' right next to my farm!! The first thing they do is make for my chickens! There are three entry points to my chickens that the foxes can use, and my centre point where I can wait is 40 meters from one and 50 meters from the other two. I have setup low voltage lightbulbs at these points, and watch for the foxes entry into the area, and then shoot them. I found that they would bolt if they entered the area and there was any movement, whereas now, they reach the hole, pause and look, and that is when I can shoot them. Which is why I shoot at this range. I have tried Solway Magnum 50g BB; Gamebore Mammoth Magnum 50g '3' and Gamebore 3.5" magnum 63g BB I have settled using Solway Magnum 50g BB as my preferred shot. It has the same apparent 'kill' as the Gamebore 3.5" magnum 63g BB, but it does not hurt me to shoot, whereas the 3.5" does hurt quite a lot.

My understanding is XLR is designed for lower recoil due to lower velocity. Recoil is what is required to cycle the action? For example, my Mossburg will not cycle on 32g standard but will on 32g high velocity.

I have tried Solway Magnum 50g BB; Gamebore Mammoth Magnum 50g '3' and Gamebore 3.5" magnum 63g BB for foxes at a range between 40 and 50 meters. I patterned them all at 40 meters, and I did not like the 3.5" 63g pattern! It was lumpy in the centre and approximately 1.2 meters in diameter. I have shot at foxes with all three, and feel that the Solway Magnum 50g BB are the best for a clean kill at the range I am shooting at. With the '3' shot I had to dispatch a fox with a second shot, so have stopped using this load.