From what I could find there is very little data on smokeless loads for brass shells. I wanted to use smokeless due to less fouling and I wanted brass hulls so I could reuse them over and over. I wanted to hand load hunting rounds for ducks, geese and turkeys. I wasn't going to be shooting high volumes like I would at trap or sporting clays. I developed a load which worked very well for my gun "Buster" the grade 2 top lever 10 ga hammer gun and it was proved on geese. Here's what I did:
1st - I ordered 20 brass hulls from Track of the Wolf in 2 7/8" They have the Parker head stamp. I also ordered their instruction manual "Hand Loading 10 Gauge Brass Shot Shells".
2nd - I found and purchased 10 ga hand loading tools on eBay consisting of primer punch, wad ram, powder-shot dipper, wad funnel and primer capper.
3rd - I bought the exact loading components listed in the instruction manual. The wads, nitro cards, over powder cards all come from Circle Fly Wads and the brass hulls are machined to fit them precisely and tightly. The primers are large pistol from CCI
4th - I decided to use PB powder because I had plenty on hand and that's what I use for my 12 gauge plastic hulls.
5th - I bought #1 Bismuth shot for water fowling because that's all I could find
I studied the manual to learn the proper sequence for building the wad - shot column. The manual is based on black powder loads, but it works the same for smokeless.
I cleaned and primed the hulls. I started with 20 grains of PB as that is my 12 gauge load I use in plastic hulls. I poured the powder into the hull and seated a 9ga over-powder card tightly over the powder. I tightly seated the ½” cushion wad on top. Next, I rammed down an over shot card then, I poured in 1 3/8oz of shot. On top of that I seated another over shot card and sealed with hot melt glue.
Test fired and as expected it was a very puny load for Buster. I began increasing by 3 grain increments until I got up to 40 grains. At 40 grains I was getting a good sharp report and recoil was manageable. I patterned the load at 40 yds and was confident it was sufficient to kill. There was still almost ¾” capacity left in the brass hull so I decided to try adding a second ½” cushion wad to bring the column up near the mouth. When I did that pressure increased somewhat and the pattern tightened significantly. I now felt I had a very good smokeless load for brass shells.
This load worked for me using my gun that has excellent Damascus barrels. I make no claim nor do I recommend anyone else use this load. I only list the procedures I went through to develop a load that worked for this specific gun. Good luck in your endeavor. MF
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