Sub gauge chamber inserts for 12 gauge guns.

[iron cat]

Thinking this morning ( I know, a dangerous thing!) About my Briley Side Kicks that I have owned for a number of years.
They were bought from a fella who won several State skeet championships with them until he bought a set of full length tubes.
I use them as a novelty , as well as in some of my vintage 12 gauge guns with smokeless 20 and 28 gauge loads and have guns them to be very effective.
I do like them in my vintage hammer guns that have 2 3/4" chambers to cut down on recoil to save the older stocks and actions.
HOWEVER, my thoughts are this:
1: through my limited research, the results from tests seem to be a mild increase in velocity.

2: I have often wondered just how much the pattern is changed at say, 30 yards.

3: how much dirtier ( or cleaner?)does your bore get when using them ?

I plan on doing some testing using a chronograph and pattern board to see if there is a big difference in choke, and velocity.
Anybody else use inserts or have any experiences good or bad with them?
Cat

 

[XLNC]

You'll likely find that youll get a much more open pattern than what your 12ga is choked for.

Yes, bore will get filthy using them. Very important not to let the carbon build up too much and then go back to shooting 12ga without cleaning.

 

[brybenn]

When i used companion tubes my scores and style of shooting did not change for skeet. Never chronographed them. My savage 410ers pattern very well from a 12ga. I loose about 100ft per second over a chronograph using them verse a full length actual 410. Factory ammo and reloads. The savage 410ers leave a bit of bowling in the barrel but the first 12ga round clears it out
For skeet id say theyre comparable but a thing further id want full length tubes with their own chokes

 

[iron cat]

When i used companion tubes my scores and style of shooting did not change for skeet. Never chronographed them. My savage 410ers pattern very well from a 12ga. I loose about 100ft per second over a chronograph using them verse a full length actual 410. Factory ammo and reloads. The savage 410ers leave a bit of bowling in the barrel but the first 12ga round clears it out
For skeet id say theyre comparable but a thing further id want full length tubes with their own chokes

I had a full length set of 28 gauge companion tubes in the past and really liked them.
As far as chokes go, I am pretty certain the patterns open up, but I am just not sure how much.
I have been told he some it doesn't change much , but those people never actually patterned their inserts.
It will be interesting to find out just how much the 7/8 oz 20's change as compared to my 7/8 oz 12 gauge loads
A few years back I loaded 4 boxes of #12 shot to compare and found tgst my scores on tge skeet field were exactly the same as my 7/8 ounce skeet loads of 8's
Cat

 

[brybenn]

I couldn't break clays with #10 shot even in the grass. Just knocked the paint off. What targets you use that break with #12?

 

[the spank]

I couldn't break clays with #10 shot even in the grass. Just knocked the paint off. What targets you use that break with #12?

He used them on the skeet field but what he left out was that he opened the door of the low house and shot the stack of them on the machine at point blank range and still only broke a 12/135!!

 

[iron cat]

I couldn't break clays with #10 shot even in the grass. Just knocked the paint off. What targets you use that break with #12?

White flyers or Caldwells, can't remember which we were using at the time , but it was with my 28 and I used some in the 410 as well
Cat

 

[stubblejumper]

I couldn't break clays with #10 shot even in the grass. Just knocked the paint off. What targets you use that break with #12?

I turned down some very cheap #10 shot, because I wasn't sure that one or two pellets would still break targets reliably, out of the 410. But #9 have been very reliable.

 

[iron cat]

I couldn't break clays with #10 shot even in the grass. Just knocked the paint off. What targets you use that break with #12?

I should also add that the test with the #12 shot was done using a 12 gauge hammer gun with 26" cylinder bores, and the 6" Briley Side Kicks in 20 and 28,.
The charge was 7/8oz of 12's and Longshot powder.
Cat

 

[brybenn]

We use lawry targets and even at 7 yards my Lil 9mm flobert with #10 wont break them on the grass orange facing me
Just speckles the target.
9s give breaks on the skeet field but 10s didnt. We could hear the pellets make contact with the clay though
On days where guys use alot of 9s I can walk around and pick up alot of targets with holes in them that didnt break. 1 2 or even 3 holes and still didnt loose a chip so I always shoot 8s or 7.5s. Loading 8s with my mec 410 loader is frustrating at times

 

[the spank]

I should also add that the test with the #12 shot was done using a 12 gauge hammer gun with 26" cylinder bores, and the 6" Briley Side Kicks in 20 and 28,.
The charge was 7/8oz of 12's and Longshot powder.
Cat

That would be a god awful pile of pellets!

 

[the spank]

We use lawry targets and even at 7 yards my Lil 9mm flobert with #10 wont break them on the grass orange facing me
Just speckles the target.
9s give breaks on the skeet field but 10s didnt. We could hear the pellets make contact with the clay though
On days where guys use alot of 9s I can walk around and pick up alot of targets with holes in them that didnt break. 1 2 or even 3 holes and still didnt loose a chip so I always shoot 8s or 7.5s. Loading 8s with my mec 410 loader is frustrating at times

I've been burning up some 1oz #9 challengers for my first shot in doubles I have a few cases of since we no longer have access to a nearby skeet field. They sure turn a White Flyer target into a rolling ball of soot. I use them occasionally on live pigeons too and inside of 20 yards they mess up a pigeon pretty good but once you shoot them 20 yards plus forget it! Better to use #7.5.

 

[brybenn]

My club switched from white flyers to lawrys 1 because it was killing the grass and 2nd better shipping as a member picks up the targets for us directly

 

[stubblejumper]

We use lawry targets and even at 7 yards my Lil 9mm flobert with #10 wont break them on the grass orange facing me
Just speckles the target.
9s give breaks on the skeet field but 10s didnt. We could hear the pellets make contact with the clay though
On days where guys use alot of 9s I can walk around and pick up alot of targets with holes in them that didnt break. 1 2 or even 3 holes and still didnt loose a chip so I always shoot 8s or 7.5s. Loading 8s with my mec 410 loader is frustrating at times

Myself and a few other members use #9 exclusively for skeet, and we pick up unbroken targets, and it is rare to find a target with holes in it, that didn't break. I also shoot a fair number of clean rounds with the 410, where there should be some targets that only get hit with a pellet or two. We use the standard White Flyer non bio targets, and they rarely break when thrown, yet break easily when hit. And we don't have any issue with the targets effecting our grass.

 

[brybenn]

Think it was the bio targets that killed off the lawn. We use lawry targets. They seem alot harder. When I shoot white flyers at various farms they tend to smoke alot more

 

[Mr Bill]

We ‘played around’ with the small chambermates, where you had to knock out the empties with a wooden dowel. 12g to 28g and we were still breaking 50% of trap targets from the mid handicap yardages with 7-1/2 reloads. But it was a PIA to reload. Thought about getting Brilley tubes like everyone else does at our club but just keep buying more and more and more 28g shotguns instead. In retrospect it would have been cheaper to buy tubes but less fun in the long run. Plus little 28g shotguns on a small frame are FUN !!

Ive tried #11 shot once… really sucks.
I’ve loaded 12g blanks with rice and at 7 yards wont leave an imprint on cardboard. Good for starting boat races.

Lawry targets are a bit tougher, I see tears and excuses when someone doesn't break a 25 straight because they weren’t white flyers. Rumours of Lawry using commercial grade JP weld as a bonding agent in their clay target aggregate mixture are highly exaggerated. lol

 

[iron cat]

We have used White Flyers, Caldwells, Lawrys, pretty much all the different brands oveer the years, and have never noticed our grass having issues with the bio targets.
My personal thought on hard targets not breaking is this
If I am losing a bird or two due to only one or two pellets in the clay, I need to concentrate more on my shot.
Everybody is shooting the same clays.
More importantly for me however, is the fact that my clay shooting is done in practice for hunting , and one or two pellets is not what I want to put into a bird!
Cat

 

[stubblejumper]

Think it was the bio targets that killed off the lawn. We use lawry targets. They seem alot harder. When I shoot white flyers at various farms they tend to smoke alot more

I agree that the WhiteFlyers break easier, and I consider that a good thing, a hit should be a break.

 

[iron cat]

So, the other evening I went out but was only able to get one full round in before it started raining, but was happy with the result , limited as it was.
The pattern was obviously far more open than the LM/F chokes that the gun is choked for , and showed very good breaks with the 20 gauge Side Kicks in the 12 gauge barrels of the 3200 trap gun.
The biggest issue obviously was the way I shoot that gun as compared with my vintage field guns as my POA and POI are much higher on the trap gun so I had to consciously adjust shooting POA , which can be done on a skeet field , but is not what I am looking for .
Next time I go out the Side Kicks will be in one of my field guns , and I fully expect to see much better results- as in or near clean rounds.
Cat

 

[brybenn]

This is just a small sample of what 9s do. Im sure i could easily pick up another 25 targets from each field