Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by Ranch Dog »

Been a while, but I haven't given up. I put this on hold while I prepped my centerfires for hunting season.

Honestly, I'm scratching my head. I bought the components that match the BPI recipe, and like the Lee data, the stack doesn't work out within the confines of the hull. It's been a very frustrating process.

Yesterday, I went back to the bench on my own and will try to take a few days to work it out. I doubt the Lee slug is going to deliver 2.5 MOA I'm asking. They will shoot through the same hole at 25-yards, but you need a yardstick to measure the groups at 50-yard. Just to take a guess out, the same hole at 25-yards is not an important measure as my Mossberg 500 with a cylinder barrel shoots them the same.

Off and on over six years, I've spent a similar amount of time with this and never reached a successful conclusion. I've also spent a lot of time on the search forums and youtube but never seen anyone come up with a successful measured conclusion. It seems most are happy just solving the column stack and I have never seen anybody post results that measure up to modern ammunition.

So far, this is what I've used to achieve my best results, 3.3 to 3.5 MOA. I said best, but not acceptable.
  • Hull length matches chamber length, don't create freebore with a shorter hull.
  • The column wad petals are not to be longer than the start of the ogive radius of the slug. Trim them if needed. The nose of the slug must completely open the star crimp before the leading edge of the petals encounters the star.
  • A 16 or 20 gauge card wad is needed between the slug and the column wad cup.
  • Use a six star crimp vs. an eight.
I've made some adjustments to my latest effort and will shoot them today. If unsuccessful, I will make sure the SG is sighted in at 100-yards with the 3" Lightfields and leave it at that.

Oh, I figured out the magazine issue with the Lightfields! The previous owner must have taken it apart to clean it and reassembled it wrong! There is the limitation notice for the Marlin 512 Slugmaster in the period catalogs, but the Lightfields squeak by!

I plan to continue searching for an acceptable projectile that I can cast from home. The fellow that owns NOE Moulds is a friend of mine, and we reviewed the Lee Slug at length. It all comes down to the Key Drive pin design. It needs to be slightly shorter so that more lead remains in the nose of the foster design and it needs to have a slightly greater final outside diameter which will deliver a thinner skirt. Both of these changes would move the center gravity ahead of the center of pressure/lift. On a tabletop and if set on its side, the one-ounce slug would demonstrate the same characteristics of their 7/8-ounce slug. It would roll over on its nose. I also was going to change the "Key". Rather than cut the hollow base in half, I was going to make quarter the base with a "crosshair" key. This would support the column wad cup and eliminate the need for a card wad between the slug and cup.

The idea was that NOE would offer a replacement key pin for the existing Lee mold rather than cut a new mold. The snag is that the Lee Key is patented. Oh well.

NOE is going to start offering the Lyman style, the shuttlecock design, for both 12 Gauge and 410 Bore. He is going to be sending me the 12 Gauge in a few days for testing, but it will be a little late for my hunting trip.

I've been also pondering the Accurate 73-470S, a full-bore slug. It totally eliminates the column wad issue. Waxed Nitro over powder cards are used to obtain the length and a roll crimp is used to secure it in place.

I will see what today brings and report back.
Last edited by Ranch Dog on 29 Oct 2018 06:00, edited 1 time in total.
Reason: Updated my "must have" list to include a six star crimp vs. an eight.
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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by Ranch Dog »

Yesterday, I started to take everything down and move all the components back to storage. I stood there staring at everything and decided to deprime a fresh hull (shotgun primer sticks above the bottom of the hull) and work backward with it for one last push. The idea being that this might be the best way of determining the toughest part of loading a shotgun hull, the 100% compression of the stack.

I filled the hull with what has worked best:
  • Lee 1-ounce slug
  • One BP 20-Gauge Nitro Card
  • Federal 12S3 Column Wad with the petals trimmed to the aft edge of the slug's ogive.
  • BPGS Gas Seal.
Next I measured from the mouth of the hull, down .470" and marked the hull with a fine Sharpe. the .470", represents the length needed to fold the star crimp to center plus the length needed for the material that is folded over into the hull with a flush star. Then,
  • I placed the hull on an electronic scale and turned it on to get a "tare" weight (zero).
  • Then I filled the hull with distilled water to the marked line. I use distilled for an H20 value as its specific gravity is a constant.
  • Then I reweighed the hull which gave me the H20 grains. That value is divided by 15.432 to get the volume of the water expressed in cubic centimeters (cc).
  • Next, I divided the available cc by the VMD of all the appropriate powders I have available.
I have a list of all the maximum charges that I've found for these powders. My idea is that max is almost a constant as there is no way to compress a charge with a star crimp, it will unfold. Sure the different components will produce different amounts of drag, but I just don't think it matters in the sum of pressure with a star crimp.

Comfortably inside the max charges sat 25-grains for International with none of the others; Clays, HS-6, Unique, and Universal near enough. That made me smile as I have 4 lbs of International that was sent to me by mistake, a powder that I've never found a use for other than with my 25 Auto. The 1-grain charge was never going to consume that jug. I've always loved the "camo" appearance of the International grains. Perfect for hunting!

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Anyway, I loaded up three fresh hulls, once fired but conditioned, and shot them from at 50-yards. Holy smokes, see the group in the upper left of the target. Velocity was 1615 FPS, which is impressive with a one-ounce slug.

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I went back to my reloading room and pulled the components from 4 loaded shells that I was not going to shoot; I didn't run them back through anything, just loaded them up. It is the larger group in the lower left. I'm blaming the performance on the fact that the crimp wasn't solid, I should have run them back through all the steps needed, I have a tool that irons out the folds in a hull; I should have started fresh. The velocity, 1550 FPS, is probably a product of the opened and refolded star crimp.

Of all the column wads I have on hand, the Federal 12S3 has proved the most valuable. This wad was discontinued some time ago, but there are clones available from some sources; Claybusters, MEC, and others. With them, you must be certain they are a perfect clone, not just diameter and length, compare the strut and make sure they use virgin plastic. I've always found the 12S3s laying in a pile downrange at about 27-yards, and as long as the petals are trimmed, they are always intact. The petals always show great contact with the bore and the base of the cup is never distorted. The latter has been a problem with some of the clones. Here is the 12S3 vs. the MEC 100T4 which was offered as a clone, not close in appearance and performance.

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I went ahead and shot the 100T4 yesterday as well, and the group was minute of yardstick (MOY). Notice that there is no evidence of the rifling engraving the petals and they always have at least one petal folded back. There is also a bit of flow off the base of the cup into the slug, not much, but it is evident. The 12S3 is as solid as it was when loaded.

The component stack...

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Here is how I get a good, uniform, petal cut with the column wads. I use five 20 gauge Nitro Cards compressed into the cup with a finger against them. It is very quick, marking the petals with a fine Sharpie as I spin the cup on my finger. I use surgical scissors to cut the petals.

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For now, I'm still planning on using the Lightfields for my hunt and I'm not changing the scopes zero from that ammo to the Lee handloads. I do have several weeks and will give the load a chance, if it is tight with new hulls and consistent, I will use it. I'm out of the clear hulls, but at least I have the stack solved and will move on with new hulls and update my results soon.

Oh, in my previous post updated my "must have" list to include a six star crimp vs. an eight.
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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by Macd »

You seem to be getting there. The top group is definitely a good one.
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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by akuser47 »

I like seeing this progress +guns
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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by Ranch Dog »

Looks like the Lee slugs are going nilgai hunting!

Yesterday's effort, the three shots through the bull. The target doesn't say it, but this was at 50-yards. Three shots do not a group make, but it offers me the encouragement to continue. All the blue tape represents my previous effort.

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I also made one more stab at using 2 3/4" hulls vs. 3". The shorter in the 3" chamber is an absolute fail and reinforces the rules I've come up with for the Lee slugs.

As I mentioned before, I've not found one post or video concerning these slugs that have documented acceptable accuracy with the slugs and how they achieved it. It seems nimrods are just happy with them exiting the barrel. Lee hasn't helped with this. The mold instructions make it seem that there is nothing to the effort and their data is limited and dated.

I believe that getting a saboted Foster slug out the barrel with acceptable hunting accuracy, 2.5 MOA or less, takes discipline with attention to detail. It took 104 shots prior to that last three shot group to get it right. I've spent a lot of time with each three or five shot group, thinking about what went wrong with the string. Attention to detail is everything, these loads cannot be thrown together. I've added an additional step based on what a friend with a lot of experience offered.

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Indexing the fold in the center of a four petal wad ensures that a six-star crimp fold does not match the split in the column wad petals. Here is my revised list of rules I'm sticking with.
  • Hull length matches chamber length, don't create freebore with a shorter hull.
  • The column wad petals are not to be longer than the start of the ogive radius of the slug. Trim them if needed. The nose of the slug must completely open the star crimp before the leading edge of the petals encounters the star.
  • A 16 or 20 gauge card wad is needed between the slug and the column wad cup.
  • Use a six-star crimp vs. an eight.
  • Index the center of a petal with the fold of star crimp.
Continuing with attention to the details, I think the Lee Load-All II is probably the best (affordable) press for this effort if all you are going to do is load slugs, but the problem is that it has been designed for 2 3/4" shells. More specifically, the crimp starter and crimp folder are perfect when the press bottoms out. Lee claims that you can work with 3" shells "by feel", but my effort has not been successful. The image provides a bunch of details.

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I've removed the "feel" from using the press with 3" shells by using a 1" spacer, a socket that met the diameter and height requirements, and use it to bottom out the press what working with the fifth and six stations (the star crimping stations). Lee could solve this issue for everyone by offering a 1" spacer based on the Sizer ring which is 3/4" in height.

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From here, it is on to 75 and 100-yards. I probably will just shoot about three rounds a day, I've been limiting it to twelve because the effect on the body is a bit brutal after what I've shot.

The latest ballistics.

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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by orerancher »

I'm gonna give away My Shotgun.....So I can never get the urge to work up a Slug Load for It.... :D
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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by larryw »

Nice!! As always, excellent write up, thanks RD.
PS, See, we all knew you would get there, we got faith in 'ya.
One thing is for sure, NO shotgun loading for me...
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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by daboone »

I'll buy a the Lee loader and sell the MEC but only after you make a video of your mods and operational procedure :!: :!: :!: ;) :lol:

My sons really want me to get after shot shell reloading.

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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by Ranch Dog »

orerancher wrote:I'm gonna give away My Shotgun.....So I can never get the urge to work up a Slug Load for It.... :D
Come on now, it's not that bad. Next up, being I have so many different components is a round ball in place of a slug and BBs.
larryw wrote:Nice!! As always, excellent write up, thanks RD.
PS, See, we all knew you would get there, we got faith in 'ya.
One thing is for sure, NO shotgun loading for me...
+corn
Nothing to it Larry, now that I have the kinks worked out :!: ;)
daboone wrote:I'll buy a the Lee loader and sell the MEC but only after you make a video of your mods and operational procedure :!: :!: :!: ;) :lol::!: :!: :!: ;) :lol:
I have the Lee Loader but I think the Load-All II is a better Loader for what I'm working on. Even with the K&M Arbor Press, the Loader isn't going to work. It doesn't have a positive stop on the star crimp.

I didn't mean to sell the MEC short by any means, almost bought one with my birthday discount at MidwayUSA. I don't shoot clays or trap, nor birds as we are off the dove flyway some 35 to 40 miles. A press in the price range of the Load-All II is the old Lyman Easy Shotshell Reloader. It is very similar to the Lee with one big difference; the Star Crimp die adjusts for the 2 3/4" & 3" and small adjustments for small deviations in hull length.

I do think the Load-All II would be great for the bird hunter that does a little practice during the offseason. The MEC I was thinking about was the 600 Jr. Mark V. Kind of the low end of things. For a guy not doing that much shooting, the Load-All II is $145 less ($54). Heck, Lee Loader kits go for that much.
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Re: Oh Boy, Gonna Get Busy With the Lee Slugs

Post by GasGuzzler »

I had a MEC 600 Jr. for a minute or two. Never tried to use it.
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