Lengthen forcing cones or not?

[Flinch Morningwood]

I am the semi-proud owner of a new Stoeger Coachgun I am sending out to have an action jon on.

I bought it because I could never get 16GA shells to shuck from the Hammer Double 16 now on sale in the classifieds...

My questions is:

If I want to use the gun for BP and am shooting STS hulls with 1/8" over powder and lubed 1/2" fiber wads, should I get the cones extended?

From what I have been able to research so far on this board, it would seem not the thing to do..but I thought I should ask straight up.

[fourfingersofdeath]

The forcing cones on new and recent guns are set to work best with plastic wads as that is all that is used in factory ammo now. I would see how your loads pattern before I modified anything.

[hellgate]

If you do not use some form ofd shot sleeve you may still have shucking problems as the shot/wad column may iron out the case mouth and have it drag during extraction. I use a Stevens 311 and a Stoeger coach gun. The tapered hulls of plastic cases and long forcing cones can combine to allow blow by of gasses past the wads. The tapered interior can size down the OP card & wads and the thin mouth of the hull and long forcing cone creates a wider chamber that the wads may or may not be able to flatten out to expand and seal the chamber so well. What I do is forget about OP card wads as a gas seal and use them wherever as a filler wad. Get any number of plastic one piece wads like the various AA style wads. They have a deep over powder portion that can squinch down into the bottom of the case but also swell as the diameter of the case and chamber increases and effectively seals all the gases under the wad column. Sometimes the best of both worlds is a combination of fiber fillers and plastic. I often take the top & bottom of a plastic wad and cut out the "legs" of a AA wad and replace them with a filler wad. That way I get a shot sleeve that protects the mouth of the hull from being ironed out and the fiber swabs the barrel for less fouling build up.

Otherwise just use the AA wads for everything and figure on having a black "skin" of snot in the barrel upon cleaning. My gamer load is a STS hull with 55grs FFg, AA white wad & 7/8 oz shot. Works great. If you want a little more powder, cut the wad in half through the middle of the "legs" and rotate one part 90 degrees and press back together fo0r a medium high wad. If you want even more powder or shot cut the legs out entirely and just use the OP bottom part and the top as a shot cup and you are good to go for any heavy knockdowns.

[Lucky R. K.]

Al,

I have been shooting Remington STS cases for some time now in my Stoeger with black powder and fiber wads as you describe.  My cushion wad is lubed with Emmerets lube.  I have had no problems with the shells coming out of the gun.  The chambers have been honed with a brake cylinder hone and I use a bore mop to wipe out the chambers after three or four stages.  I have also shortened the hull a bit and use a roll crimp.

The plastic in the STS hull gets very rough at the mouth after a couple of loadings and does not shuck as well.

I would not think about using plactic wads with black powder.

Lucky 

[fourfingersofdeath]

What are SPS hulls?

The actual forcing cones on older guns are different aren't they? I was under impression that the modern (post 1960s?). From memory the modern guns are tapered and the old guns are stepped. This would seem to indicate the an old gun can be cut to the new system, but not the other way around? Am I on the right track here, or wandering around in the rough?

[hellgate]

4 fingers of death,
You are correct. The older guns (like my 311) have a short, or as you say , stepped forcing cone for the use of paper hulls that abruptly end whereas the IGA Stoeger and new guns have a longer tapered forcing cone for the plastic wads in newer commercial loads. The 311 was made for paper, thick walled, non tapered hulls using card & fiber wads that do not expand in diameter very much. When shooting modern one piece plastic wadded shells in the older guns there is apparently more recoil as the charge must suddenly be swaged down to bore diameter in the short forcing cone. I believe that trap shooters who shoot many rounds in a day can feel the difference and thus the newer long throated chambers that lessen recoil with the newer plastic wads & hulls.

If you were to do any modifications to the gun it would be to lengthen the forcing cone on an older gun so it works better with modern components but I can't tell any difference between the handling of the 311 and the IGA coach gun with my BP loads but I don't shoot several hundred shotshells in a day either.

[Steel Horse Bailey]

Little Al - As Hellgate has mentioned, the newer guns (mostly) already have long forcing cones because most modern shotshells use plastic wadding.  I had a Stoeger 12 ga. Coachgun for my first CAS gun; it already had forcing cones as long as can be done.  Stoopid me, 'tho ... I didn't KNOW that I would get bad performance using my BP all-brass loads with paper/card wads.  Since I didn't KNOW I'd get "bad performance" (all the experts have said so) I didn't get bad performance.  I never "papered" my shootgun to see the patterns, but I got 100% knockdowns where falling targets were used and 100% hits (when I did MY part) when stationary plates were used.  Silly me.

[fourfingersofdeath]

If I was going to use the gun on bird or rabbit hunting or on clay targets, I'd go the distance and pattern it, etc. If just for cowboy, plates and knockdowns, if it was hitting and knocking them down, good nuff'.

I saw an interesting article (probably here) where a guy said he went to the junk/charity shop and bought old sheets. He marked the middle and put 10 shots into it. Then studied the holes left. When finished, they made shop rags.

[Flinch Morningwood]

Thanks folks!  All good info and I appreciate it.

Steel Horse - Ain't it amazing what you can do when you don't know no better...

[Steel Horse Bailey]

Thanks folks!  All good info and I appreciate it.

Steel Horse - Ain't it amazing what you can do when you don't know no better...

Yes indeed! 


They say that ignorance is bliss.

If that is true, I must be deliriously happy!

[Paladin UK]

Steel Horse - Ain't it amazing what you can do when you don't know no better...

See..........Done told ya`ll that thar edjakshun dont do no good 

Paladin (  ) UK

[Steel Horse Bailey]

       

[hellgate]

All you need for patterning is a cardboard box, a roll of butcher paper, stapler or tape and a pen to mark an aiming point and for lableing the target. Get 10 paces away, aim at your mark and blam away. If your shotgun has chokes there will likely be no problems. With cut barrels like my 311 too much powder and no shot cup can blow doughnut patterns. I often use steel shot cups to tighten patterns in the cut down barrels. You may also find the barrels are not regulated. I had a walleyed IGA Stoeger coachgun that shot left barrel high & left and right barrel low & right. Couldn't understand how I was getting misses til I patterned it.

[rickk]

If the STS hulls and 12 G fiber wads do not work out,  try Brass hulls as Steel Horse Bailey suggested.

What you get out of this is not only cool looking brass hulls, but tighter fitting 11G wads.  (yup, 11 g over power and filler wads, and a 10 G overshot wad). The bigger wad is a significant variable change.

Rick

[fourfingersofdeath]

Still in the dark, what are STS hulls?

[Lucky R. K.]

Still in the dark, what are STS hulls?

STS hulls are a very smooth plastic hull made by Remington.  They shuck very well.

Lucky 

[Mako]

Still in the dark, what are STS hulls?

Like Lucky said, they are the Remington Hulls.  Technically the STS are the "Green" Hulls and Nitro 27 Hulls are "Gold".





Except for color they load and perform the same.  I like the Gold because the look good on the shell belt.

For those who don't know the internal differences between the Remington and current Winchester AA hulls here it is:

A pair worn Remington hulls after a few reloads (smokeless only).  STS on left, Nitro 27 on right (note they are the same construction)


The new Winchester AA hulls in both red and black.  While they are not the true Reifenhauser style as I said in an earlier post, they are now a 2 piece design.



I'm not bad mouthing the Winchester design, they just aren't the "one-piece" compression formed hulls that the Win AA made it's reputation on.  The new design which is protected by patent is not the sometimes problematic Reifenhauser design it is a two stage compression formed and fused hull.  Internally the new Winchester hulls are more or less identical to the old one piece hulls.  The disadvantage for us as BP shooters is that there is apparently a change to the polymer alloy that allows the two pieces to fuse together under heat and pressure.  That same trait makes them burn and melt more easily under the increased heat from BP.

With the ubiquity of AA hulls and the fact you can pick them up everywhere, you could use them once and throw them away.  Even so, I still think the Remington hulls shuck better even after the first reload with BP.  Maybe someone will do some controlled friction tests between the two, but it needs to be done as soon as the gun is fired and allowing them to slide out at some controlled angle.

Regards,
Mako

[Mako]

Little Al
It's already been said, but to reinforce it, here goes...

The longer forcing cones are a benefit to modern plastic wads ONLY.  They can be detrimental to fiber wads.  The plastic wads control the column and the base is flanged to seal against the bore.  Fiber wads expand some but do not expand to fill the bore just in front of the mouth of the case.  If you have a "modern" shotgun with a long forcing cone, then the card/wad won't seal and it allows the gasses to push by. This causes the fiber wad to blow through the pattern creating a hole in the center. Modern barrels also usually have a "looser bore" since the wad controls the column, the choke lead is usually gentler as well.

With Fiber wads the shot column strings out  in a long forcing cone and has to be "cleaned" up as the wad hits the throat of the forcing cone.  It never quite gets there and most people find they don't get the pretty patterns they get with plastic wads and a long forcing cone.

A short forcing cone and the tight bore ensure that the card wad seals well and you don't get blow-by.  The old forcing cones and chokes work very well with card/fiber wads.  Modern guns and especially those with 3 inch chambers really don't do well with fiber wads.  If people really test them the way a serious clay shooter would it immediately becomes apparent.  The 3 inch chambers exacerbates the problem by just giving you more free bore allowing blow-by until the wad/card get enough constriction in the forcing cone to seal the column (by this time the gas has already churned your column in front of the wad).

Modern shotgunners want long forcing cones, "loose bores", gentle choke throats and often "back boring" between the choke and forcing cone.  Modern wads take advantage of these features giving you "shorter" less strung out shot patterns and very even shot distributuion.  The standard bore size for a 12 gauge is .729 thousandths and with a full choke tube size of .690  you will have .039 thousandths of choke. When the bore size is enlarged by back boring even more, say to .742 thousandths then you would have .052 thousandths of choke with the same .690 choke tube.  Anything above .04" of constriction with a 12 gauge is considered to be an Extra Full choke.  So factory tubes that have been back bored have larger choke diameters to keep the choke constrictions the same.

If you want to shoot Fiber wads then a older shotgun is the most appropriate.  If you have a modern shotgun and especially one with a 3" chamber then fiber wads are not ideal no matter how much we wish they were.  There is one, and only one advantage to fiber wads with modern chambers, forcing cones, bores and chokes.  They don't put plastic in the bore.  Plastic is not the monster that some make it out to be with BP.  It cleans very easily and if done correctly takes no more time than fiber wads.  Simply spritz with moose milk, let it sit   while you clean other weapons and push out a snake skin sleeve with a wadded up 1/2 of a paper towel. Then run a patch down the bore with Ballistol on it and you are finished.

If you have a modern shotgun with the longer chambers, etc. and want to shoot tight dense patterns with Brass hulls then you will have issues.  I typically shoot a Colt '78 reproduction with 3" chambers and  basically no choke.  I get weak patterns with Brass cases and fiber wads.  Since there is so much empty case it is a simple matter to add a plastic wad in the case and even just a gas seal under the fiber wad if you just can't kick the habit.  Here is the seal:



http://www.ballisticproducts.com/Powder-Cup-Gas-Seal-12ga-250_bag/productinfo/3221223/

The seal behind a fiber wad doesn't work as well because you still have a very long forcing cone and no constriction.  A plastic wad on top of an 11 ga nitro over powder card can be used to assure a full seal between the thinner case walls and the powder.  A lot of wads will spread their flange bases and seal against the sell walls with a bit of pressure, but they tend to push back up since there is no friction between the shell walls and the wad.

Well now I'm boring everyone...

Regards,
Mako

[hellgate]

The newer AA hulls tend to crumple or collapse a bit when crimped due to the thinner walls down by the base wad. The Remingtons of all colors seem to hold up better for reloads.

[fourfingersofdeath]

Well now I'm boring everyone...

Not me! Just trying to figure out how to print this for future reference.

I think what has come out of it is the fact that if you are deviating from the norm at all, eg; using fibre wads, black powder, etc, you really need to test if those pretty little smooken boomers that you have loaded actually perform worth a spit.

Thanks, great post.