Spreader Results
 

I usually carry a few spreaders in my bag for those pesky close range rabbits. Lately the Parker of choice has been a 34" DHE choked .040 and .040. Figured I would see what sort of pattern enhancement I was getting with a spreader load so off to the patterning board with the aforementioned Parker.
Distance- 23 yards
First up my go to 1 oz Fiocchi #8 at 1200 FPS for comparison. Yikes, that's tight!
Next up the Poly Wad Spreader- Federal GM hull, 1 1/8 oz #8, 18.9 grs American Select, Fed 209, CB 4118 wad, 1160 FPS.
Next up the BP X-Stream Spreader-Same load as above.

The board is 30", while I did not measure the Fiocchi pattern I would say it is about 15" or half the board roughly. The Poly Wad stretches the pattern to just about the full 30" while the X-Stream remains a little tighter. Either one affords a little more room for error on tight targets but I like that Poly Wad personally.

My wife thinks I should find something more productive to do with my time now that I have retired. She's right so I started shooting my rifles more :)

You can not complain about that Randy! I've not messed with spreader wads.
This reminds me of a guy I knew in Colorado, he was a big goose hunter and the steel loads back then were not up to his expectations. He started loading his own ammo but he would cut a straw, fill that with lead shot and put the steel around the perimeter of the wad. If a game warden checked him a magnet would stick to his shells . His daily limit increased. He then noticed that if the straw was left empty it would compress and tighten a pattern some.

Impressive results

It's a shame that Poly Wad went out of business and their Spred-R insert is not available. It would be great if somebody would make it again.

Thanks for posting, good information.

Well, Randy, it's good to see you're are not vegetating in your retirement.:) I told you you'd be even busier. Strange thing about time.

Those results are impressive. I used the Spread-R back when I was reloading. I still have a very large stash of them for 12 and small gauge loadings. Based on your results, I just may unpack my reloading "stuff." My shooting needs all the help it can get.

I see lots of powdered clay birds in your future.:bowdown:

I’ve always had good results with the BP spreader wads and spreader inserts. I primarily use them on those same rabbit targets. Great minds….

Randy, I have been using polywad inserts for a long time, so far I haven't found anything that works better.

I use ballistic products dispersor-x spreader wads ,ez to load and make full choke into Imp/cyl

Great experiment and/or validation Randy with a super nice Parker. Spreaders make vintage guns so much more versatile and make a tight choked gun more appealing. No need to open chokes. I also like brush wads as well.

Perfect timing for this…I just hand loaded 100 hulls over the last two nights using the BP X insert. Hoping they will open up a F/F choked gun for me.

Chain reaction though after all that hand loading and my roll crimps being so terrible is I now have a Sizemaster on the way lol.

They work. I have loaded those to occasionally shoot sporting or skeet with a short ten. They opened the pattern from Remington 1894 that shot 92/93% at 40 yards to 56%.

I had a 28 that could shoot thru a Cherrio without scratching it, and Jay gave me a handful of 28 ga brush wads. They seemed to work pretty well. I had also tried using overshot cards divided evenly over each 1/4oz of shot (3/4oz loads) with noticeable opening. I can't say it didn't open up some holes in the pattern, not having shot them at the patterning board.
Some time ago, Frank Srebro posted a picture of a plexiglass template he had made for drawing a patterning paper. That could be handy if he could post it again.

Checked the garage. Bought these 1984. https://i.postimg.cc/0ykb5vxq/DSC00886.jpg https://i.postimg.cc/fRRRnvjQ/DSC03955.jpg

Edgar, I'll see what I can do tomorrow.

Edgar, I asked Frank about his template. I remembered it but wasn’t exactly sure on the details. He is going to look for it but he said it was like a donut and thinks the OD was 30” and the ID 18”. He’ll probably reply here.

Here are pics and a description of the template I had made up in prep for my article "Too High Still" in Volume 28/Issue 3 of the Double Gun Journal. For those interested the article compared three long range duck guns to include a Super-Fox, Winchester 21 Duck, and a Winchester Model 12 Heavy Duck. All 3-inch chambered and tested with lead shot and a variety of non-tox shot. The template is made in two parts with transparent packing tape as a hinge for easier storage. Made of 1/8" transparent plastic and donut shaped; I don't know the type of plastic. The two pieces were laser cut by a friend in industry. Outer diameter is 30" and inner diameter is 20" to check the "hot core" of the patterns.

In use the pattern paper is put up on a backing at 40 yards and a sticky note, green leaf or similar is attached to its dead center as an aiming point. An aimed shot is fired and the template is put over the paper on a table and the actual point of impact (POI) is determined by eyeballing the template over the densest part of the pattern. Usually the POI doesn't coincide with the aiming point at center of the paper. Then the pellet counts inside the 30" and 20" circles are divided by the total pellets as were counted inside the shotshell to calculate the patterning efficiencies (percentage) within those circles.

Template is equally useful for checking actual POI and pattern percentage at closer range or at ranges beyond 40 yards. Spreaders will often have a hole in the center of the pattern and I highly recommend checking yours on paper at various yardages before heading out to hunt.

For info, the first pic posted here is a factory 3IN. Super-Fox with 1-3/8 ounces of Kent TM at 60 yards. Template is shown in the second pic.
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Are their any spreader inserts for 28 ga loads?

Polywad made 20/28 spreaders that worked very well if you can find any. Unfortunately they are out of business.

My VHE 28 gauge skeet is bored .000 and .000. It is my "spreader" 28 gauge. Obviously, it was ordered by someone who understood what a skeet gun should be. Another of my Parker 28s is a VH bored .000 and .020, obviously ordered by someone who knew what a quail gun should be.

Yesterday 7/2/26 I finally got around to putting together some spreader loads . I made 10 gauge using some of Harold’s WIN hulls . It came to my attention the Dryloc hulls and the regular WIN 10 gauge hulls have different base wads . The Dryloc hulls are equal base wad wise to the Cheddar Cheese hulls so those were no problem the others however I needed to shim my cutter up a bit to get the correct height . So I loaded 7 or 8 using each hull with my regular SP-10 , 1 1/4 ounces shot and 30 grains of SR7625 . The Dryloc hulls required a spacer the other hulls didn’t . The yellow spreader things came to me in a bunch of 16 gauge stuff I purchased on GunsInternational 5-7 years ago . In 50 plus years of loading this was my first try at loading spreaders . Now I need to go somewhere and try them .

So now you are all set for that 10ga quail hunt.:)

No I load ounce loads for that and use a hammer gun that’s factory original 26” C/IC or an EH that’s factory 28” IC/F !

For quail?

I no longer have a lot of choices . All my 12’s are 32” tight and tight , only other things I have are 10’s of which three on 2 frames have factory short barrels and open chokes .

OH the humanity of it all. :crying: My dearly departed mentor on quail was 98 when he died, was on a minesweeper the night of June 5, 1944, and would give me grief if I showed up with a 12ga. I was only 20 and just wanted to kill birds. Gentlemen, he would say, would never pursue dem birds with a cannon.:) But if that's all you get then that's all you got

To each his own of course . Far be it from me to question anyone’s else’s choices or them mine . I use what’s available or I have period .

Just yanking your chain.:)

Those reloads look good, glad you could use all that stuff