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What are those bulk skeet shells good for?

The slug wont fit in the old wad.
The nitro card keeps the powder in its own chamber in the shell so the slug will be propelled out.

Without that positive seperation between the 2 stages in the shell, the burnt gasses may slip around your projectile.
 
actually they fit back fine

There are two things being talked about, regular reloading with the Lee Key Drive, and then there is what the thread is about, melting target loads into slugs and putting them back in the original hull with all the original guts

When you reload these from scratch , if you are shooting through a smooth bore its better to have a nitro card under the slug the "key" doesn't engage the wad.

When you are reloading for a rifled barrel , you leave the nitro card out so the "key" engages the plastic hull. As the plastic engages the rifling it in turn spins the slug due to the key digging into the plastic

sometimes one needs cards to fine tune the shot column length so they can give a proper crimp

Basically for the most part if you are doing this , then just melt the shot , put back the slug and shoot. If you want to put a crimp back on them then you might have to use cards as a space filler to get the proper height shot column to crimp off of.

Do some searches around the net, this has been being done since the advent of the Lee slug mold and there is a ton of info out there on it but this thread cover it for the most part I think
 
Thanks oli! I read the entire thread several times and noticed the theme shifted from the origin to reloading spent shells. It became a little confusing.

At this point, I'm not going to attempt to do anything but what John A wrote at the outset.

For curiosity satisfaction, won't the wad make enough of seal to keep the gases behind the slug? Maybe I don't know enough about the process of moving the lead through the barrel? like sucking liquid through a broken straw?
 
PS: a little more confusion set in early on with some adjusting (cutting) the height of the plastic wads? Again, is this because of cutting the folded crimp as opposed to prying them open? I can see how either technique would alter the height of the finished shell!
 
The main reason why I use a 20 ga nitro card between the slug and inside the wad is to raise the overall height of the slug so when I roll crimp, it's tight and there is no rattling around.
 
Maybe it's beginners luck, but I haven't had any problems not using a shot card. Might be the length I'm cutting the shell at and also trimming some of the petals off the shot cup before I roll crimp them.???? Who knows.
 
I have a lead melter and Lee one ounce slug mold on order for delivery next week. I will play around with casting slugs. I think once I see how the slugs fit back into the shell, I should be better able to figure out the next steps. I truly have no desire to blow myself up! :)

I do like the idea of shorter finished shells. I was holding off ordering the roll crimper until I get a better feel for the fit of the slugs to see if I need cover cards or nitro pads and order them together.

Thanks for all of your help. This sure has been a long project, especially for you folks hanging in there for us coming in late. This learning session has been fabulous!

Doc
 
Doc McGlock said:
I have a lead melter and Lee one ounce slug mold on order for delivery next week. I will play around with casting slugs. I think once I see how the slugs fit back into the shell, I should be better able to figure out the next steps. I truly have no desire to blow myself up! :)

I do like the idea of shorter finished shells. I was holding off ordering the roll crimper until I get a better feel for the fit of the slugs to see if I need cover cards or nitro pads and order them together.

Thanks for all of your help. This sure has been a long project, especially for you folks hanging in there for us coming in late. This learning session has been fabulous!

Doc
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All the help you need is here for ya Doc. Plenty of helpful folks.

As far as shorter finished shells I am able to get 1 extra shell into my 500, making it a 9 shot 500A.

The Lee slug is on the right.

shell length.JPG
 
Hey guys, again, thank you all for such a welcome. Reading all of your posts, I feel like I've gotten to know all of you and I am impressed with your willingness and PATIENCE to answer questions. This is usually a sign of maturity specifically and generally, respect for firearms. The old guys got it right and shotguns have been at the fore front of our wonderful country. The way things are heading, we might all need to return to our roots one day in order to just survive!

Mossy, in this picture above, the shell on the right appears to be about a half inch shorter? That would end up around 2 1/4 inch? Did you just return the slug to the wad or did you put a nitro spacer in between? I also remember someone (I believe you) mention using a homemade crimper that was found on another forum? Would you care to share as your crimps look quite adequate!

Would any of you attempt to reload these shorter shells or are they toast after their reduction in OAL? How short can you actually go for consistant functionality as well as being safe? Thanks!
 
After I cut and roll crimp the shell it is about 1/4" shorter.
I cut the original shell using the pvc jig i made. dump the shot,take out the shot cup and trim the petals just enough so they don't interfere with the roll crimp(maybe 1/2"". Put the shot cup back in then the Lee slug then roll crimp it. Wind up with a $1. slug for .24 .:)
Forgot to mention, no spacer used.

As far as the roll crimper I use a nylon low speed one. It is used in a variable speed hand drill. Works great for me.
here's a link for the crimper,,,,,good people.


http://slugsrus.com/store/index.html


I might add a big thank you to @John A. and others who helped me through the process.;)
 
I forgot to mention I found the Remington shot cups were to small to fit the Lee slug into. I played around with a few and found the Federal target load worked best for me.
 
What about RIO Brown box 7 1/2 & 8 shot? I've got around 1K rounds of it? Guess I'll be doing some experimentation! :)

Words can't relate how much I am looking forward to doing this! In my past dental career, early on, I used to fabricate gold crowns and inlays using the lost wax technique. Centrifuge, crucible, air torch, wax patterns, gold.....etc. With the advent of advanced plastics and porcelain, this technique went the way of the buggy whip!

So sad! Gold work in dentistry, has no rival in long time quality when done properly. Even today! I have good work in my mouth threat is 35 years old and still is in great shape! My teachers and mentors were master craftsmen and are now lost to the ages.
 
Rio should work fine for ya. Inside they are about the same as Federal target loads which are good to work with.
 
Not all hulls are made the same internally.

Instead of copying/pasting a bunch of different photos', here is a google link.

https://www.google.com/search?q=sho...Wv1aTLAhUGkoMKHdSMCm4QsAQIKA&biw=1280&bih=546

Since now you know that not all hulls are the same, that goes without saying that not all wads and loads are compatible with all brands and makes of hulls either.

Even a slight change in anything internally can change the pressure of the powder and why I used all the factory components and only changed shot pellets to slug payload.
 
Thanks John. What is the garden variety quality price of lead these days? I know that many have access to private sources, but I'm sure many of us do not and may need to purchase some.

What is a fair rate in general and is this something that we should consider having a supply of?
 
Doc McGlock said:
Would you care to elaberate what good insides might be?
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Sorry Guys I just saw this.

I was referring to the shot cups, some are shorter,taller,wider,ect. I looked for the one that the slug fit into the cup the best without doing a lot of cutting.

JMO
 
Doc McGlock said:
Thanks John. What is the garden variety quality price of lead these days? I know that many have access to private sources, but I'm sure many of us do not and may need to purchase some.

What is a fair rate in general and is this something that we should consider having a supply of?
Click to expand...

Roughly about $2 a pound is the going rate. And to be honest, what I have read says that almost all lead production is done in Europe, so it's not a bad idea to have some available for casting later if there is even a possibility that supply may be cut off or diminished. Here are a few companies.

http://zipmetals.com/Certified-Pure-Lead-Bullet-Casting-Alloy-Ingot-999-Pure-5-pounds_p_155.html

http://www.rotometals.com/product-p/leadingotpure.htm

I have only a few pieces of commercially produced ingots that have been found or given to me. The rest has been recycled from lead wheelweights.
 
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