Boss shotgun ammunition

KEOutdoors said:
Because it was too slow. They tried to push it at lead shot velocity (1200-1300fps) and it simply doesnt perform well. Theres a few really good articles out there on the history of the first steel shells and why they were so infective. When kent came on the market with fasteel, that changed the whole industry.
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Yeah we always shot cheap Wal mart shells. Usually winchester.
 
They also probably weren't loading steel with higher payloads and bigger cases. Since steel is less efficient, you need more payload to keep the pellet count up, and since steel takes up more volume, that means you need to put it in the 3 inch shell or even 3 1/2. Which I don't think it was as popular to have in guns yet.
 
LittleBigHorn22 said:
They also probably weren't loading steel with higher payloads and bigger cases. Since steel is less efficient, you need more payload to keep the pellet count up, and since steel takes up more volume, that means you need to put it in the 3 inch shell or even 3 1/2. Which I don't think it was as popular to have in guns yet.
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I dont know about popularity of 2.75 vs 3" at the start, however heavy slow payloads are what Winchester and federal tried to do. They were loading 2.75" 1 1/4 and 3" 1 3/8 at 1200-1250fps and they just didnt work well. If you have a lymans 5th shotshell book, i believe there is a good article in there about early steel that goes into this.

I remember shooting federal classic copper plated steel BB and 2s both 3" 1 3/8, wow were those crippling machines. You could hear the shot hit a goose and the goose just lock up and sail for 300 yards if you were lucky. Killed ducks sub 30 yards in the hole just fine, but so does anything.
 
KEOutdoors said:
I dont know about popularity of 2.75 vs 3" at the start, however heavy slow payloads are what Winchester and federal tried to do. They were loading 2.75" 1 1/4 and 3" 1 3/8 at 1200-1250fps and they just didnt work well. If you have a lymans 5th shotshell book, i believe there is a good article in there about early steel that goes into this.

I remember shooting federal classic copper plated steel BB and 2s both 3" 1 3/8, wow were those crippling machines. You could hear the shot hit a goose and the goose just lock up and sail for 300 yards if you were lucky. Killed ducks sub 30 yards in the hole just fine, but so does anything.
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I haven't done any goose hunting, but love using my calculator to try the predictions. BB at 1200 fps should be able to do goose, but only to 33 yards. A lot left to be wanted. 2s would only be good to 15 yards and yet 1 3/8 shot is 171 pellets which in theory patterns out to 42 yards out of just cylinder. Very mismatched there. You gain 73% more distance from that two by going up to 1600 fps (15 to 26 yards). And the bb gains 33% ( 33 to 46 yards). Although you do pay for it in recoil with 75% more recoil 28 vs 49 lbs in 6 lb gun or 18 vs 33 lbs in a 9lb gun.

But yeah, the speed is basically a requirement and it's so easy to achieve with steels hardness. I think I need to get into reloading so I can do a #10 shot of 1/2 oz TSS and push that at 1500/1600 fps. Using a cylinder choke in theory would put enough pattern on pheasant going all the way to 40 yards. Never would have to worry about choke selection again.
 
LittleBigHorn22 said:
I haven't done any goose hunting, but love using my calculator to try the predictions. BB at 1200 fps should be able to do goose, but only to 33 yards. A lot left to be wanted. 2s would only be good to 15 yards and yet 1 3/8 shot is 171 pellets which in theory patterns out to 42 yards out of just cylinder. Very mismatched there. You gain 73% more distance from that two by going up to 1600 fps (15 to 26 yards). And the bb gains 33% ( 33 to 46 yards). Although you do pay for it in recoil with 75% more recoil 28 vs 49 lbs in 6 lb gun or 18 vs 33 lbs in a 9lb gun.

But yeah, the speed is basically a requirement and it's so easy to achieve with steels hardness. I think I need to get into reloading so I can do a #10 shot of 1/2 oz TSS and push that at 1500/1600 fps. Using a cylinder choke in theory would put enough pattern on pheasant going all the way to 40 yards. Never would have to worry about choke selection again.
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Ive had some people tell me #10s will stop in the thighs and breast on a going away shot, and you dont want to try and pick out those... You cant even see the hole they make. Ive tried 1/4oz #10 tss 3/4oz #4 steel duplex but only at the patterning board, I was planning on using it for decoying ducks. You need speed with this stuff to get it to open up, but 1600 might be a little much. However be aware your cloud of 250 #10s are going to absolutely hamburger a pheasant sub 30 yards, even with cyl choke its not going to start opening up really until 30-40.

You might also look into #9.5, youll have 205ish pellets (similar to 1 1/4 lead 5).
 
KEOutdoors said:
Ive had some people tell me #10s will stop in the thighs and breast on a going away shot, and you dont want to try and pick out those... You cant even see the hole they make. Ive tried 1/4oz #10 tss 3/4oz #4 steel duplex but only at the patterning board, I was planning on using it for decoying ducks. You need speed with this stuff to get it to open up, but 1600 might be a little much. However be aware your cloud of 250 #10s are going to absolutely hamburger a pheasant sub 30 yards, even with cyl choke its not going to start opening up really until 30-40.

You might also look into #9.5, youll have 205ish pellets (similar to 1 1/4 lead 5).
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Yeah good point on not risking non pass throughs. Not worth gaining a bit more pellets, especially if you do end up taking a shot at the end of the range. Those 9.5# do look like the sweet spot if pushing 1500. Although I did find some factory loaded #9s for cheap (enough) and bought 6 boxes. Probably will run them first and see how I like it. No sense putting in the work to develop loads if I have something from factory.
 
KEOutdoors said:
140 sounded low to me as my rotometals is 163/oz. But sure enough 1oz of boss 4s was exactly 140 pellets. None of them are round by the way, in case anyone was wondering.
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So I've been shooting 1 oz loads of 4's. They've had 147 pellets per ounce & 149 pellets per shell, just barely meeting my self-prescribed minimum criteria of 150 pellets in the air for pheasants.

I've been all excited about their new 1-1/8 oz 16 ga. loads, & I recently received them. They're only 136 pellets an ounce & 157 pellets per shell!! So the 1/8 oz increase netted me 8 friggin pellets. Not impressed, but trying to look on the bright side, maybe they'll pattern beautifully.
 
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A5 Sweet 16 said:
So I've been shooting 1 oz loads of 4's. They've had 147 pellets per ounce & 149 pellets per shell, just barely meeting my self-prescribed minimum criteria of 150 pellets in the air for pheasants.

I've been all excited about their new 1-1/8 oz 16 ga. loads, & I recently received them. They're only 136 pellets an ounce & 157 pellets per shell!! So the 1/8 oz increase netted me 8 friggin pellets. Not impressed, but trying to look on the bright side, maybe they'll pattern beautifully.
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Something seems off... Don't they say about 190ish pellets for the 1 1/4oz? Based on your shells that isn't even remotely possible. But Joe Hunter's dissections show that his batch of 1 1/4oz loads did have the accurate # of pellets.
 
MNMEAD said:
Something seems off... Don't they say about 190ish pellets for the 1 1/4oz? Based on your shells that isn't even remotely possible. But Joe Hunter's dissections show that his batch of 1 1/4oz loads did have the accurate # of pellets.
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I'm starting to think there was a change to their pellets and we are comparing old to new stuff maybe. That chart you posted shows 158 #4 in 1 1/8 and 140 in 1 oz which matches A5's, newer stuff but not the old. For Joes the buffered (169 avg) was close to their 175 pellets in 1 1/4 load, but that difference could be the buffering and his unmuzzled at 192 is just way off of anything on the chart.
 
LittleBigHorn22 said:
I'm starting to think there was a change to their pellets and we are comparing old to new stuff maybe. That chart you posted shows 158 #4 in 1 1/8 and 140 in 1 oz which matches A5's, newer stuff but not the old. For Joes the buffered (169 avg) was close to their 175 pellets in 1 1/4 load, but that difference could be the buffering and his unmuzzled at 192 is just way off of anything on the chart.
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Hmmm quite possibly. I just received a new case of 12ga 1.25oz 4's last week. I should cut one open tonight and count.
 
MNMEAD said:
Hmmm quite possibly. I just received a new case of 12ga 1.25oz 4's last week. I should cut one open tonight and count.
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Yeah looking more at Joe's numbers. The unmuzzled he measured would have 9.5 g/cm^3 density vs the newer one with 10 g/cm^3. Not that I would fully trust those exact numbers because measuring the diameter isn't very precise, but that's a pretty big difference. If the newer stuff is more dense then that's really good. And if they are just a bit oversized then you could drop down 1 size to gain back pellet density and still be good on penetration.
 
MNMEAD said:
Something seems off... Don't they say about 190ish pellets for the 1 1/4oz? Based on your shells that isn't even remotely possible. But Joe Hunter's dissections show that his batch of 1 1/4oz loads did have the accurate # of pellets.
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I happened to have a 12 ga 1-1/4 oz shell that somehow ended up in my truck, so I dissected it too. Its payload of #4's weighed 1.259 oz & contained 181 pellets, for nearly 144 pellets an ounce.
 
LittleBigHorn22 said:
Yeah looking more at Joe's numbers. The unmuzzled he measured would have 9.5 g/cm^3 density vs the newer one with 10 g/cm^3. Not that I would fully trust those exact numbers because measuring the diameter isn't very precise, but that's a pretty big difference. If the newer stuff is more dense then that's really good. And if they are just a bit oversized then you could drop down 1 size to gain back pellet density and still be good on penetration.
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In my most recent analysis, I didn't busy myself measuring pellets & trying to calculate a density. But my guess is the newer shot's low pellet/oz count is a result of larger diameter, rather than increased density. Assuming the only 2 other metals involved are tin & copper, it's obviously impossible to have density higher than the "heaviest" one, which is bismuth at about 9.8 g/cc.
 
A5 Sweet 16 said:
In my most recent analysis, I didn't busy myself measuring pellets & trying to calculate a density. But my guess is the newer shot's low pellet/oz count is a result of larger diameter, rather than increased density. Assuming the only 2 other metals involved are tin & copper, it's obviously impossible to have density higher than the "heaviest" one, which is bismuth at about 9.8 g/cc.
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That would have been my guess too, but just felt that the 0.5 g/cc difference was a bit more than regular errors. Obviously yeah it's not 10g/cc but if both measurements were effected then it could be like 9.7g/cc and the older one actually at 9.2g/cc. Just would be exiting if Boss got more dense as that really is "free" improvement for ballistics.

Really would need to do the water tests to figure out more precise. But that's honestly a lot of work.
 
A5 Sweet 16 said:
Typically, I'd be all for more density, but the bismuth 4's I'm used to are plenty. I need bang for my buck, which in this case is more pellets.
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But as I said, it's a "free" improvement. If his numbers were right and you got a 5% increase in density and 2% large pellet. That yields 23% increase in range. Or you can use the #5 instead which would have the same penetration range as the lesser 4s, but would pick up 12% more pellets. Density truly is king for ballistics.
 
LittleBigHorn22 said:
But as I said, it's a "free" improvement. If his numbers were right and you got a 5% increase in density and 2% large pellet. That yields 23% increase in range. Or you can use the #5 instead which would have the same penetration range as the lesser 4s, but would pick up 12% more pellets. Density truly is king for ballistics.
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The unfortunate thing is I already own a case of the new 4's. I didn't need more range PER PELLET. I wanted more pellets with range equal to what I had been shooting. But let's say I exchanged the 4's for 5's. I'd be banking on Boss providing 5's that were actually 4's or at least 4.5's. I don't trust them right now, especially in terms of consistency. Then down the road I order my NEXT case of shells & the 5's are 5's again, or even 5.5's, & I can no longer kill a rooster at 50 yds no matter HOW many pellets I throw at it. It'd be much simpler if Boss just provided what they said they'd provide.
 
I'm very pleased with the 1 ounce #5 Boss shells (16 ga).

I want to get some 1-1/8 ounce and was thinking about #4. But, now I'm thinking about sticking with the #5.

I rarely take those long shots...most shots are over point. Thoughts?
 
Kre said:
I'm very pleased with the 1 ounce #5 Boss shells (16 ga).

I want to get some 1-1/8 ounce and was thinking about #4. But, now I'm thinking about sticking with the #5.

I rarely take those long shots...most shots are over point. Thoughts?
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Kre,

I typically shoot 1oz lead #6 in my 12, 16, and 28 for pheasant. I have Boss is #4 and #5. I have not shot the 4's, but I have shot pheasant, ducks, and geese with the #5 in 12 and 16 and they worked really well. I plan to try the #4 next season in the 16 and 28.
 
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