Plastic Wad speed loads

[matttdalton]

I mean this as no disrespect to all traditionalist and just feel like I should share my few years of research and development to help any of my fellow shooters and hunters. These are in the spirit of the Eley muzzleloader shotgun cartridges and Col. Hawker’s paper/oakum cartriges, but with modern available materials. Half the idea came from the old, now extinct muzzleloadingshotguns.com website and the other from William Hovey’s books. These were originally intended for waterfowl hunting, but have other uses as well. These work well in my modern replica Pedersoli gun but MUST MUST MUST be pattern tested (5-10 shots) to ensure there is no balling or failure of the Wad to release the shot. I do not know if this will cause damage issues in older original guns. Here’s the recipe:

Plastic Wad shot cups are filled with a charge of shot to match your needs and Wad capacity. Bismuth, ITX or steel for waterfowl or lead for anything else. Plastic wads need to be a gauge smaller than your gun. I have a 10ga and use 12ga plastic wads. For a 12ga, use 16ga plastic wads.

An over-shot card is centered and taped to the top opening of the shot cup to contain the shot. The masking take strips are about 1/4” wide and made from horizontal cuts from plain brown masking tape 1 7/8” wide. The overshot card should match your bore: use 10ga overshot cards in your 10ga. They will overhang by about 1/16” on all sides. Some plastic wads prefer to be taped over the slits between the petals and others do not. I’ve found small shot is easier to handle with the slits taped if the wad releases the shot. You must pattern test because every wad and gun is different.

A felt Wad is centered and taped to the bottom/gas seal with the same masking tape noted for the over-shot card. The projectile section is now complete. The felt Wad should match your bore as the overshot card did and will overhang as well.

The powder container is made from cutting coin rollers in half, placing an over powder card near the bottom, folding and taping the end closed with masking tape. The over powder card should match your bore like the felt and overshot card. Penny rollers for 10ga and Dime rollers for 12ga. These can be reused many, many times.

Place your charge of powder into the coin roller. Hold the Wad over the tape near the felt Wad. Insert the felt Wad and plastic wad at an angle while twisting and gently seat onto the powder. You now have a complete speed load cartridge.

To load, hold the plastic Wad with the coin roller cup up. Pull the plastic Wad from the coin roller. Dump your charge of powder down the barrel and then insert the plastic Wad by gripping the tape near the felt Wad. Gently push the plastic wad into the barrel. It should slide easily until the over shot card. Short start the over shot card with your thumb/finger and ram the whole thing home as one unit. Prime and fire.

While using pyrodex, I can reload fast enough to keep up with 4 other modern shotshell shotgun shooters on the trap field....and no one has complained about the smoke and smell yet.

And yes there’s melted plastic fowling in the barrel. But nothing to hinder an outing. I get a round of trap in each barrel with another handful of shots at the pattern board in without any issues or cleaning. The Remington and TPS wads rinse out easily with hot water. Claybuster wads fowling has been clogging at the nipple threads and have been a little trickier but still rinses away with hot water.

Once I figure out how to load pictures, I’ll get them on here

 

[Feltwad]

Plastic wads in a modern muzzle loading barrel maybe ok .But in original Damascus barrels plastic wads are the first thing to ruin a barrel ,they are the main cause of barrel ripple and the built up of plastic in the bore can bulge the barrel , I have seen this happen many times on Damascus barrels.
Feltwad

 

[matttdalton]

Thank you for confirming this should NOT be used in original Damascus barrels. I have been safely using these in a reproduction Pedersoli 10ga with interchangeable choke tubes. My/my gun’s preferred load is using Remington R12H or RXP12 1 1/8oz wads and 75gr Pyrodex RS or RS Select. To help speed production and keep consistency, I use a Lee Load All 2 to dispense the powder and shot. DO NOT use black powder in the Load All, pyrodex or 777 only!!! The shot and powder are completed in separate sessions. I’ll fill the shot hopper and make all the projectile sections and then empty the shot hopper when complete. The Remington wads noted above match well with the 1oz shot bushing. Because the load ass was designed for smokeless powder, it requires a double or even triple drop of powder to get the proper volume. I’ll fill the powder hopper, use the 171cc powder bushing and drop the powder twice to get about 75gr by volume.

Here’s some pics of the completed pieces

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[BrownBear]

And yes there’s melted plastic fowling in the barrel.

You can beat that issue if you lube your felt wads. I've used mostly olive oil for lube, requiring that I keep the wads separate in a ziploc. If you used a firm lube, that would be unnecessary, and you could continue to load as you are.

 

[tenngun]

I get good results from traditional loading. Muzzle loaders are forgiving and like what’s you feed them as long as it’s a ml powder. It is a do your own thang sport as rifleman oft says.

 

[coloradoclyde]

Once I figure out how to load pictures, I’ll get them on here

Apparently Photobucket still isn't allowing 3rd part hosting unless you pay their blood money....Use a different photo hosting site.

Meanwhile I uploaded them to my imgur so others can see what you are talking about.

 

[matttdalton]

Thank you for helping to get those displayed. I'll find a better photo provider.

 

[matttdalton]

Thanks for the tip. I'm going to try some Crisco and see if that helps.

 

[Skychief]

May I suggest an 870?

 

[Lorne Johnson]

Thanks, Dalton. Interesting post! It involves a lot of preparation. I haven't had any plastic fowling on the nipple threads. For me 25 shots per barrel is about the sensible limit without cleaning. I've simply been loading using plastic wads at the skeet range and shooting 2 shots at each station. I keep up with a squad of 5 ok.

I also shoot 5 Stand at one place. It does slow them down, but since I do all the work to have it run, no one complains.

 

[matttdalton]

Yeah. Quite a bit of preparation to make them but the speed of reloading in the moment is fast enough to impress any Revolutionary/Civil War General.

The plastic fowling is in the barrel. It always flushes out through the breech when the nipples are removed when I pour hot water down the muzzle. However, the Claybuster wads seem to leave so much plastic in the bore that it clogs the breech. I don't know if Claybuster uses a different plastic or if the dyes used to color the wads hot 1980's pink cause this. The Remington and TPS wads are clear plastic and don't have that issue when cleaning.

 

[BrownBear]

Have you tried the WAA 12R? I've had great luck with no fouling when using the lubed base wad.

 

[Lorne Johnson]

The plastic in claybusters is softer than Winchester, so it may melt more. I've used both, usually 16 to 28 shotsfrom each barrel.

I pull the nipples, run a hard nylon brush up and down the bore, then blow the wad of plastic out of the bore using compressed air. (Lauren Bacall method, "You know how to whistle don't you? You just put your lips together and blow.")