Slug inaccuracy

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The Accountant

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I've been getting horrible accuracy with my 7/8 oz Lee slugs.

  • Shooting at 25 yards
  • 7/8 oz lee slugs
  • Claybuster lightning wad with trimmed petals to fit hull
  • Smooth bore 14 inch barrel

Not sure if cutting the petals of wad is the culprit.

Thank you
 
I'm pretty sure you need spiraled slugs for a smoothbore to get them to spin. Or try a rifled choke if you can. My slug gun sports a rifled barrel and my cast slugs stack up beside each other at 50 yards,
 
The Accountant said:
I've been getting horrible accuracy with my 7/8 oz Lee slugs.

  • Shooting at 25 yards
  • 7/8 oz lee slugs
  • Claybuster lightning wad with trimmed petals to fit hull
  • Smooth bore 14 inch barrel

Not sure if cutting the petals of wad is the culprit.

Thank you
Click to expand...

Weird at 25m I clover leaf with mine.

All I do is I got a special cutter that cuts the inside of the rolled crimp out of trap loads. I dump the shot, throw in 2 cardboard spacers, then toss the shell in a mini press and press the slug back in.

Is the slug getting stuck to the wad? Are you putting a spacer? The 7/8oz slugs are shorter than 1oz and it could he moving around in the wad.
 
I’m doing some experiments with my own Lee 7/8 slugs and, like you, I trim the petals on the wad. No matter if you put cards behind the slug or not, I think the petals should be cut to end where the slug’s ogive begins. I think this gives the petals some additional stiffness which prevents them from deforming unevenly when they blast through the crimp. (But I may be misguided.) One thing that I should have done - but have yet to do - is buy a box of commercial ammo and establish some sort of reference point. At this early stage though, my biggest impediment to accuracy is consistent ignition.
 
The "Spiral" of the Foster slug is to allow the slug to "swage itself" into the barrel for a snug fit, NOT to impart spin. My 14" smooth bore pump Turk gets 6" groups at 50yds with just the front bead. I use a 6-o'clock hold on the bull.
 
Buck1950 said:
The "Spiral" of the Foster slug is to allow the slug to "swage itself" into the barrel for a snug fit, NOT to impart spin. My 14" smooth bore pump Turk gets 6" groups at 50yds with just the front bead. I use a 6-o'clock hold on the bull.
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This. ^ As for the Lee 7/8 oz jobs, a much better performing slug is the Lyman 525 gr in a 1 oz Win AA wad cup.
 
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I've only tried the Lyman 525. I melted down a bunch of SSG, #2 and BBB shot to make them. I use a 12S3 wad with 1/8" 16 or 20 gauge (not sure) gauge shot card at wad base in a Remington Gun Club hull and fill the slug base with wax. I then sand the wax in the bottom waxed filled portion flat. Regular crimp on a mec. 36gr Longshot. Wear a mouth guard but they are extremely accurate. I'm talking I shot a 8" inch 3 shot group at 100 yards off a bench with iron sites and a rifled barrel with no aiming point other than a big piece of paper. At 50 yards they are almost touching. I'm sure if I used a scoped gun and weight sorted the slugs, it would make these a real deadly combo at 100 yards.
 
I keep the petals in tack on claybuster 7/8oz grey wads. I simply empty the shot hopper on my loader and press fit the slug in during that stage I can't match factory accuracy but some guns close others not so much. 4-6" groups at 50 yards fired off hand with a bead sight
In my muzzleloading 12ga I seat them on a nitro card drop the slug down the barrel and seat another nitro card on top. I get 4" groups with each barrel at 35 yards with is fine for deer hunting. Accurate enough to shoot a coyote in the head at 20 yards
 
Grin said:
Don't cut petals, slug alone is too loose in the barrel
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Trimming the petals means cutting off the excess, not removing the petals completely. Inspection of spent wads clearly shows (in my case at least) rifling grooves by either the rifled choke or rifled barrel. My slugs are snug in their cups.
 
I’ve now decided that bringing the slug forward with a couple of cardboard discs in the wad cup is better than trimming the petals. Another development in my trials is that Remington Gun Club hulls (green) are a bit thicker so that the Lee 7/8 oz slug, in a Winchester grey wad, is snug enough to obviate the need for any crimp. There’s a slight, but noticeable, bulge in the finished shell so, depending on the gun, feeding could be difficult. I got a just-under-4” group at 75 yds with 28 grains of Herco - out of a rifled barrel. I’m not sure of the speed but the recoil is less (way less) than the common Winchester 1 oz slugs.
 
Lee 1oz @ about 70 yards. 2" duct tape

begEt5h.jpg
 
This is a 50M group, using Challenger 7.5# shot trap shells with the shot dumped out, and replaced with a Lyman 525grn slug.

But this was my first time really going out with it, and shooting slugs in years ( So I expect to have a tighter group with more practice )

I have some 7/8" Lee Slugs cast that I'm going to redo the test..

277540601_285815593725114_5909812172770376760_n.jpg

I use these tools to make my prepper slugs. Which I purchased directly from the youtuber on ebay.

 

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The Accountant said:
I've been getting horrible accuracy with my 7/8 oz Lee slugs.

  • Shooting at 25 yards
  • 7/8 oz lee slugs
  • Claybuster lightning wad with trimmed petals to fit hull
  • Smooth bore 14 inch barrel

Not sure if cutting the petals of wad is the culprit.

Thank you
Click to expand...

What powder are you using? 7/8 Lee slugs like green dot.
How much powder are you using?
Before you discredit your current recipe try shooting it in a different shotgun.
Also buy at least 2 kinds of pre rolled slugs to try in your gun kinda give you a base line of standard accuracy.
14 inch smooth bore will be worst (poorest accuracy not necessarily bad) barrel choice. Longer smooth bore barrel or best option fully rifled barrel will improve things quite a bit. Chamber length can effect slug accuracy sometimes, 2 3/4 slug in a 3 1/2 chamber is 3/4" jump. Some might call bull#### on that but when I matched up 3" slugs to 3" chamber my groupings got smaller. Someone else said cardboard under the slug which I agree with. Put a loose slug in a loose wad and push it through your removed barrel, add/remove cardboard one piece at a time,repeat.
 
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