Powder question
 

I've been thinking about dipping my toes into the pool of reloading. As with everything esle I know about hunting and guns and stuff, I learn by doing a lot of reading and asking a lot of questions. And I love this place because I know I will get a lot of answers.
Okay the question. Out of all the componets that go into making a good shotgun shell, would I be correct to say you start with the choice of powder your gonna use and then every other component has to be matched to that powder??:corn:

The starting point is determining the type of load you are most interested in loading. If the gauges and types of load do not differ too much, you may be able to make one powder serve all your purposes. If you choose to use, let's say, an Alliant powder, get the Alliant manual in front of you to select some loads that may be suitable for one powder, or maybe two.

Yeah, right, but after you chose the powder then everything else feeds off of that???

Kind a. Never thought about it. I shoot just clays, so all my loads are less than 1oz. And of course because I shoot just old SxS's they're low pressure loads. They're easier on the gun stocks and breech. I've always used the IMR powders [ but there are many others to serve the same purpose ] and there are many low pressure loads with 700X, PB, and 7625 just to name a few. This is for 12ga. Clays or Clay Dot is good in 12 or 20ga for low pressure. It's a combination of powder, wad, and shot volume. Any primer but Federal is mild and about the same. If you want to save some money use Promo, it loads the same as Red Dot and is about the cheapest. It is the same as Red Dot only dirtyer. Clay Dot is next for price. We also use Claybuster wads because they're cheaper than factor wads and do as good. www.hodgdon.com will give load data and www.claybusters.com will also give data. You want to shoot black powder use only paper wads and get them at www.circlefly.com - hope this helps. Cheddite primers will sub for Win, Rem, or CCi's. They're also cheaper. Good luck - any questions let us know.

I'm sorry, the Claybuster web site I listed isn't for Claybusters itself. http://www.claybusterwads.com/ is the correct web site.

Angel don't mix and match your componets. Compression formed hulls such as the Win AA and Rem STS are pretty much the same but the Win HS hull uses a special HS wad. Shotguns arn't as finickey as centerfire cartridges but if you going to load low pressure shells than a change in primers for example can change pressure.

If your going to load 2 1/2 inch 16's for your hammer guns i can pass along some usefull information. Also there is a web site devoted to the 16ga, it's called the 16ga society and they have a lot of good info.

I'm currently loading low pressure 2 1/2 12's,16's & 20's and working on a low pressure 2 3/4 inch 20ga load using Alliant 20/28 powder. If I can be of any help just let me know.

Thanks Rich. I will take you up on the offer when the time comes. I did check out the 16ga society.

Rich is right about the Win HS hulls - they need a different wad. The Claybuster web site shows which of their wads will replace factory wads and save you about 50%. Their wads usually produce a lower pressure than the factory wads they're replacing. And when loading low pressure loads there isn't a lot of difference in pressure between the different primers if you exclude Federal or magnum primers. The Cheddite, Remington, Winchester, are all pretty close. If useing Federal hulls there are many low pressure loads useing Federal primers. Find a load you like and let us know.

In my experience, which is now going on 40 years of reloading shotshells my choice of components was driven by what I had or could get in the way of empty hulls.

Paul we do need to be careful with primer substitution. As you can see in the attached link a simple change from Rem 209P to Win 209 in one particular load resulted in a 2400 psi increase (7040 vs 9400 psi).

http://www.armbrust.acf2.org/primersubs.htm

Thanks for all of the good info guys. Pete, I made sure to pay attention to all the readings about what happens when you substitude primers. I know that's one thing I won't be doing. I'm gonna stick to those tables and formulas.