12ga Brass Reloading

Hotwheels81

Hotwheels81

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Curiosity has recently gotten the better of me and I have decided to play with my stash of FFg Goex yet again, I have a box of Magtech 12ga brass on its way here and my old faithfull Baikal SxS is cleaned and lightly swabbed with some bore butter...

Finding brass was the easy part, now according to my interweb research I must source some 11ga wads and cards if I wish to smoke out my friends on the trap line this spring, does anybody know where to find such items in the great white north? Or perhaps have some extras floating around they would part with?

This will be my first attempt at reloading black powder cartridge so I am open to any tips you all might have :)
 
Track of the Wolf or Buffalo Arms can send that to you in Canada. Bilzor near Calgary (use google) might have some.

Or go to a Princess Auto type place and find a 3/4" punch (might have to open it up a hair for a tight fit). Use Ten-test or fiber ceiling tiles for wads and different types of cardboard for over powder and over shot cards.
 
I bought a cheap set of punches and used them to make overpowder cards from stiff cardboard, wads from the felts of old Sorrel snow boots, and overshot casrds from thin cardboard. I have substituted felt wads with cat hair from my long haired cat - works suprising well. It is funny to see a wad of smoking cat hair going down range. Some people use newspaper for wading. Here is a ling showing how to load blacl powder shot shells (he reloads plastic cases but same procedure works for brass.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZ4IBv0Bg9U&feature=related
 
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I havve been shooting BP brass cases for quite some time, in 4 different gauges.
Will Bilozir ships quickly with no hassles and has everything you need.
There is no need to buy any fancy equipment , either.

What you DO need to do is to use pistol primers in your mag Tech brass instead of rifle primers , however.
A small punch and hammer will knock the used primer out - hold the cases in your off hand , feel for the flah hole with the punch, and a light tap with the hammer will knck it out.

I use a piece of wood with a counter bored hole deep enough to seat a loonie in it to seat my primers, with a piece of dowel and hammer.
Charge the case with a BP adjustable measure, .nitro card wad, lubed cusion wad, .035 overshot wad ( this stops the shot from imbedding in the fibre wad) apply pressure, use the same amount of shot as powder, and top it off with an overshot wad.
You can glue the wad in with any number of adhesives - I like barge cement.
When it's dried, take another overshot wad and right the charge on it, then set it on top if the first wad.
If you are going to shoot them right away you can dispense with the glue.

This is about as easy as it gets, but you can pattern the loads after and tailor it to your gun.

Cat
 
I got my 11 gauge circle fly wads from Dixie gun works a few years ago.I do not know if they will still send them to canada.
They suggest using white glue.
 
I use a fairly stiff beewax/olive oil mix to glue the overshot card on.
I just melt it and let a drop from a stick fall in then roll the drop around the edge of the card
 
Ahhhh thanks a lot for the tips...

I will probably rob some shot for the first dozen from some #8 trap loads I have here, should still have my BP adjustable measure somewhere in my possibles bag and I always keep a few thousand pistol primers on hand so I think I can get the ball rolling with that... Will contact bill soon for wads and such as building my own is a little too time consuming then I would like at the moment... I have so much reloading to do at the moment it's actually turning into more of a part time job then full time hobby!

Again, thank you all for the help!
 
catnthehatt said:
I havve been shooting BP brass cases for quite some time, in 4 different gauges.
Will Bilozir ships quickly with no hassles and has everything you need.
There is no need to buy any fancy equipment , either.

What you DO need to do is to use pistol primers in your mag Tech brass instead of rifle primers , however.
A small punch and hammer will knock the used primer out - hold the cases in your off hand , feel for the flah hole with the punch, and a light tap with the hammer will knck it out.

I use a piece of wood with a counter bored hole deep enough to seat a loonie in it to seat my primers, with a piece of dowel and hammer.
Charge the case with a BP adjustable measure, .nitro card wad, lubed cusion wad, .035 overshot wad ( this stops the shot from imbedding in the fibre wad) apply pressure, use the same amount of shot as powder, and top it off with an overshot wad.
You can glue the wad in with any number of adhesives - I like barge cement.
When it's dried, take another overshot wad and right the charge on it, then set it on top if the first wad.
If you are going to shoot them right away you can dispense with the glue.

This is about as easy as it gets, but you can pattern the loads after and tailor it to your gun.

Cat
Click to expand...

Thanks for the very informed respence Cat.
Any special needs or tricks for heavy buckshot or roundball BP loads?

Edit: I have limited exposure to handloading cast slugs into the modern 20 bore shell.
Is wad seating pressure only relevant to the fact that plastic hulls must have some compression, to make that star crimp fold over and fit over everything inside?

Cheers!
 
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I would talk to Will and get him so send you BPI's small bore shotshell loading manual for slugs and such!
You can buy special wads and round ball packages from him, and special slugs as well.
Cat
 
For most of my old doubles I load Federal paper hulls trimmed back and roll crimped with a old hand roll crimper.A square load,equal black powder to shot with fibre wads to build up the shot column to get proper compression for a 2 1/2"shotshell.
 
ratherbefishin said:
I'm intrigued with this -tradeex has a number of old doubles chambered for 2 1/2'' which I assume would be brass shells
Click to expand...

I got an old single from I don't even know where. A 2 3/4 wouldn't go in all the way. Bought 50 brass 2 1/2 from Buffalo arms and they fit perfectly. Got nitro/overshot/wads from them. I use a thin line of super glue on the over shot.

Been pissing with a #4 shot with IMR pistol powder. Makes a bang anyways. Kinda fun. I know those 2 1/2's can get reamed, but the brass shells are fun. I use a 12 gauge lee loader to hand load.
 
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