• Mossberg Owners is in the process of upgrading the software. Please bear with us while we transition to the new look and new upgraded software.

New Personal Defense Minishell Loads!

DefenderTacticalTX

DefenderTacticalTX

Sponsor
Sponsor
Premier Member
Howdy all! As the developers of the Universal Cartridge Adapter, we were pretty excited to come across these new Personal Defense Minishells from Federal. Much like a frangible round, the 6X 00 Buck pellets split into two pieces on impact, creating another wound channel. Though we have not had a chance to try them, we think this says a lot about the future of minishells!

Now are these a gimmick? We cannot say for sure until we've done some more testing, but a high-end manufacturer like Federal putting in time and money for minishell R&D certainly grabs our attention. There are some early test results online, but we plan to do some testing on our own. What do y'all think about these?

Splitting Personal Defense Load, 6-Pellet 00 Buck
307466419_175704368312176_4748906281995047448_n.jpg


15-Pellet #4 Buck
307281963_175704311645515_3718549239697186686_n.jpg


Federal Minishell Loads vs. Aguila
307434396_175704378312175_7450235410122261057_n.jpg
 
You have my attention!!

Funny, I was never a fan of the mini shells early on but have grown to like them.

Or I should say my shoulder has grown to like them.
 
MikeD said:
You have my attention!!

Funny, I was never a fan of the mini shells early on but have grown to like them.

Or I should say my shoulder has grown to like them.
Click to expand...
I’ve never shot them from my shoulder lol just from the finger tips of one hand and the palm of the other hand, since I only have a shockwave. I’m hoping that my custom MPSA will help in that regard if and when I ever shoot it again with full size shells.
 
MikeD said:
You have my attention!!

Funny, I was never a fan of the mini shells early on but have grown to like them.

Or I should say my shoulder has grown to like them.
Click to expand...
We are hoping that with our new adapter and newly developed mini loads, a lot more people will come to the conclusion you did! We don't think a lot of people realize that though they provide significantly less recoil, the shot in most loads still has the same energy coming out of the barrel. (Less powder + Less shot = Same Energy)
 
Several of us folks here load their own. I'm sure that something similar could be made. Just have to look around and find a wad you think would work. Or look around and find a wad you can cut/trim/modify.

I'm not a huge fan of launching pellets down my bore that are not encased in a wad. Because from the looks of it, only the buffer media is used around the payload.

But at any rate, @DefenderTacticalTX you are correct about shot. Just because a shell is short (or long) doesn't mean much, when the payload stays the same.

1250 fps (just a random number example) pushing the same 1-1/8 oz payload (another random number example) is going to have the same external ballistics as whatever else launches 1-1/8oz payloads at 1250 fps. The hull/shell length is largely irrelevant.

Another thing that could change the way the gun feels upon recoil, is powder change. Some powders burn faster or slower, which changes the perceived recoil some. Some powders are better for handicap (low recoil) loads than others. Like clays or even titegroup.

I think some magnum powders would royally suck in a weapon such as this. Like Longshot for example. They just kick a lot.

So that's a part of the process when working up a load like this, is to be able to use it in the gun you're wanting to use.

I'm not sure what kind of forcing cone is in the 590. But, if these barrels were made with long forcing cones, would also decrease the perceived kick better too.

But, back on the topic at hand, If anyone has paid attention to most shells that are 2-3/4" length, the wad usually just has a long extension between the base and the shot cup. The short shells just mostly remove the long extension from the wad and have the base to push it down the barrel.

Anyone that has actually loaded their own, realizes that with different hulls and wads, you have to play around to get the correct/proper height from your combination in order to properly crimp them using shot cards and other things. This is just normal procedure for different loads. The short shotshells just don't use the long wads and is more akin to loading black powder shotguns. It's not really new or revolutionary. Just a different way of doing it than many people are accustomed to.

I certainly understand how gaining an extra couple of shots per full mag could be beneficial. Or even just preferred.
 
nitesite said:
Thank you for providing the link. Appreciated.

WOW. Four dollars per shell when you add shipping!

I think the other less fancy Federal mini-shells I was looking at on their website were about $1 per shell with shipping included.
Click to expand...
Yes, definitely a punch to the wallet on the PD loads... Hopefully as loads like that become more popular the prices will drop. But as it stands, definitely not something to plink around with!
 
John A. said:
1250 fps (just a random number example) pushing the same 1-1/8 oz payload (another random number example) is going to have the same external ballistics as whatever else launches 1-1/8oz payloads at 1250 fps. The hull/shell length is largely irrelevant.
Click to expand...

Relevant thread LINK from earlier this year...

minishell.png
 

Attachments

  • minishell.png
    minishell.png
    190 KB · Views: 1
That is absolutely correct about the shotgun originally using black powder.

And you're correct. It had to have more powder to achieve the velocity that it needed back then. And also needed the longer barrels to give it enough room to burn the powder out.

But, that's not necessary today while using smokeless powder. You don't gain absolutely anything from a function standpoint by using those really long barrels with todays smokeless powders. That's why I cut all of my barrels down to 18 and 20 inches and thread them for chokes. Because it's easier to carry a shorter gun through the woods than it is one half as long as you are. And it's lighter too.

There's some who say having long barrels helps their swing when shooting at birds and clays, but after having been using the shortest allowed barrel that I can for a while, I have to call bullshit on that claim. If you can't swing a shorter barrel, you're not going to swing a longer one either.

About the only thing you do gain from a longer barrel is longer sight radius, which may help it be a little more accurate for turkey hunting or something (MAYBE--notice the emphasis on maybe), but at the end of the day, it's a shotgun. It's not like you're using it to snipe off long range anything with it.

But, neither the longer hulls or barrels are necessary for todays smokeless powders. Which is some of what I was getting at in my earlier reply. I'm glad you caught onto that Bobster.

Smokeless powder tends to burn faster and thus, will generally burn out within the first 14 or 16 inches of barrel typically. Of course even with smokeless powder, there are different burn rates, but I'm speaking generally. Those long 32 and 36 inch long goose gun barrels just aren't necessary today as they were back in the late 1800's and early 1900's when shotguns were first being sold.

Another thing on the topic of shells I would like to mention is high brass and low brass (I'm talking about the physical brass rim on shotgun shells).

With modern plastic hulls, high brass case rims are entirely unnecessary. You can load even low brass modern hulls with the same smokeless powder charges that "high power--high brass-magnum" or whatever you want to call them without worry and be able to reload that same shell a lot of times. I have some hulls that I'd be shocked if I haven't reloaded probably 8 times or more and it still would be OK to load and shoot more. But high brass was first used to prevent the paper hull form burning and blowing in half with the black powder. It was essentially not much different than sticking an 1/8 stick of dynamite down in the barrel. So, they used high brass rims around the shell so you could pull it out.

It's just that the market over the last 100+ years almost demands that high brass hulls still exist because people have become accustomed to looking at the hull and being able to tell how that shell was loaded. It's certainly not necessary from a manufacturing viewpoint.

Anyway, this has been a fun topic.
 
John A. said:
That is absolutely correct about the shotgun originally using black powder.

And you're correct. It had to have more powder to achieve the velocity that it needed back then. And also needed the longer barrels to give it enough room to burn the powder out.

But, that's not necessary today while using smokeless powder. You don't gain absolutely anything from a function standpoint by using those really long barrels with todays smokeless powders. That's why I cut all of my barrels down to 18 and 20 inches and thread them for chokes. Because it's easier to carry a shorter gun through the woods than it is one half as long as you are. And it's lighter too.

There's some who say having long barrels helps their swing when shooting at birds and clays, but after having been using the shortest allowed barrel that I can for a while, I have to call bullshit on that claim. If you can't swing a shorter barrel, you're not going to swing a longer one either.

About the only thing you do gain from a longer barrel is longer sight radius, which may help it be a little more accurate for turkey hunting or something (MAYBE--notice the emphasis on maybe), but at the end of the day, it's a shotgun. It's not like you're using it to snipe off long range anything with it.

But, neither the longer hulls or barrels are necessary for todays smokeless powders. Which is some of what I was getting at in my earlier reply. I'm glad you caught onto that Bobster.

Smokeless powder tends to burn faster and thus, will generally burn out within the first 14 or 16 inches of barrel typically. Of course even with smokeless powder, there are different burn rates, but I'm speaking generally. Those long 32 and 36 inch long goose gun barrels just aren't necessary today as they were back in the late 1800's and early 1900's when shotguns were first being sold.

Another thing on the topic of shells I would like to mention is high brass and low brass (I'm talking about the physical brass rim on shotguns).

With modern plastic hulls, high brass case rims are entirely unnecessary. You can load even low brass modern hulls with the same smokeless powder charges that "high power--high brass-magnum" or whatever you want to call them without worry and be able to reload that same shell a lot of times. I have some hulls that I'd be shocked if I haven't reloaded probably 8 times or more and it still would be OK to load and shoot more. But high brass was first used to prevent the paper hull form burning and blowing in half with the black powder. It was essentially not much different than an 1/8 stick of dynamite down in the barrel. So, they used brass rims around the shell so you could pull it out.

It's just that the market over the last 100+ years almost demands that high brass hulls still exist because people have become accustomed to looking at the hull and being able to tell how that shell was loaded. It's certainly not necessary from a manufacturing viewpoint.

Anyway, this has been a fun topic.
Click to expand...
...then the Engineers left the room, and the Marketing guys came in....
 
I don't know about Aquila or other minis but the Roosky shells linked above spec at Slug: 1oz@~1330fps, "ought" Buck: .63oz@~1380fps and #9 Bird: .85oz@~1380fps. The slug is a 438grain projectile :eek: at about double 10mm weight and a tiny bit faster. It would be interesting to see how they perform in a semi-auto... :) Note that these specs are from the box and haven't been chrono-ed, weighed or verified...
 
Bobster said:
I don't know about Aquila or other minis but the Roosky shells linked above spec at Slug: 1oz@~1330fps, "ought" Buck: .63oz@~1380fps and #9 Bird: .85oz@~1380fps. The slug is a 438grain projectile :eek: at about double 10mm weight and a tiny bit faster. It would be interesting to see how they perform in a semi-auto... :) Note that these specs are from the box and haven't been chrono-ed, weighed or verified...
Click to expand...
We don't know of a semi-auto or minishell load that will work together. Aside from the issues you see in a pump action model (shells flipping, etc.), they just don't provide enough recoil/gas to cycle the action. Again, this is just to our knowledge so if anyone knows different please let us know! If there is a platform that can have the action cycled, maybe we could come up with a solution to fix any feeding issues...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top