Interesting article on chokes

[Walker570]

 

Are you talking about patterning the 410 at 35 yards ? What sort of shot loads ?

I'm shooting 19grm in the 3 inch Fiocchis factory and 18grms in my ITX reloads in Fiocchi cases. The fibre wad Lylevales are 16grm. Getting adequate penetration which is the main thing with all of these loads and the majority of shot are in a 30 to 36 inch circle. How important are flat surface patterns ? That is very hard to draw conclusions on. I believe the main point on the plate is where your shot centres according to your aim. Put a biggish easily seen dot in the centre, mount your shotgun and fire at that dot as you would a clay or flying bird, don't aim it like a rifle. The same with running boar range targets. Because they are 'targets' you tend to aim the rifle when to be honest it is better to shoot the rifle like it was a shotgun at a rabbit, instinctively.

 

Remember the old Eley Impax 7s, they used to be the 'go to' best pheasant, partridge, game bird cartridge, what were they 7/8 ounce? A lot of game birds fell to that cartridge. How many pheasants/partridge a year do you clean. What are the average shot hits on each bird. I believe I cleaned in excess of 200 last season and it was only birds which had been shot at ridiculous close ranges which had more than one or two, some looked like they had died of natural causes :-)

 

Penetration is far more important than perceived patterns.

Edited October 26, 2016 by Walker570

[Glenlivet]

Well this article is discussing it in 4 dimensions... That's twice as good as 2d testing!

So PW IS the 4th dimension.......

[wymberley]

I'm shooting 19grm in the 3 inch Fiocchis factory and 18grms in my ITX reloads in Fiocchi cases. The fibre wad Lylevales are 16grm. Getting adequate penetration which is the main thing with all of these loads and the majority of shot are in a 30 to 36 inch circle. How important are flat surface patterns ? That is very hard to draw conclusions on. I believe the main point on the plate is where your shot centres according to your aim. Put a biggish easily seen dot in the centre, mount your shotgun and fire at that dot as you would a clay or flying bird, don't aim it like a rifle. The same with running boar range targets. Because they are 'targets' you tend to aim the rifle when to be honest it is better to shoot the rifle like it was a shotgun at a rabbit, instinctively.

 

Remember the old Eley Impax 7s, they used to be the 'go to' best pheasant, partridge, game bird cartridge, what were they 7/8 ounce? A lot of game birds fell to that cartridge. How many pheasants/partridge a year do you clean. What are the average shot hits on each bird. I believe I cleaned in excess of 200 last season and it was only birds which had been shot at ridiculous close ranges which had more than one or two, some looked like they had died of natural causes :-)

 

Penetration is far more important than perceived patterns.

200 birds is more than enough on which to base an opinion. Assuming 40 yards, that all things are equal and the birds are presenting 50% of their vulnerable are then with full choke and 19g of No6 you would have averaged 5 strikes for a cock and 4 for a hen. As you're down to 1 or 2, you're either shooting in excess of 40 yards or all things aren't equal. It might pay to pattern the gun.

 

Impax are 1oz.

 

Shooting at ridiculously close ranges was behind the introduction of the sporting mantra, 'Give it lore'.