Good call rebel. So i tried about 6 different brands of steel shot. I found that the Hevi Metal pheasant load and the black cloud 4 shot was the best at 30 yards with an improved cylinder choke in my franchi I12. Glad i did the test. I found the cheap 11 dollar a box steel shot did not hold pattern at 30 yards at all.
Steel Shot sizes and chokes
- Thread starter 870-Lefty
- Start date
mustistuff
Banned
confused as to the poor patterns you got with the cheap steel! the biggest problem usually with the cheap steel loads is speed, and with steel, speed kills and it helps if the pellets are going closer to 1400fps than 1200 fps. I'm impressed you worked that hard to find your answer
cheers
BritChaser
Well-known member
The Invector Plus choke tubes for my Citori have two ratings on each, one for lead, one for steel. The steel rating is always one notch tighter, for example, modified for lead is full for steel. The message is never shoot steel through anything tighter than modified.
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mustistuff
Banned
pretty close, haven't seen the double marked choke tubes but I believe studies have shown that size 6 and 7 steel can be shot safely through improved mod. it's the larger size that just may ruin the barrel as they are the one's that have a tough time adjusting to the space inside
cheers
Yeh, i'm not sure what the speeds were. that may have been the problem with the cheaper shells. I am not all the knowledgeable when it comes to all that. The choke tubes that came with the franchi are exatly like mentioned. steel is one size tighter (more constrictive) than for lead. i started with full for steel shot (modified for lead). It was kinda of wierd that the full didn't pattern as well as the improved cylinder (Cylinder for steel) at 30 yards. again maybe I didn't know what i was doing.....
mustistuff
Banned
again most studies done on steel shot show that they in fact do tend to shoot a tighter pattern in more open chokes, if you had access to all the shot, chokes and barrels out there you would go crazy tying to figure it all out, part of the problem is poor tolerances in many of the gun barrels and the choke tubes they come with, then every mfg. used their own wads and every one of them are at least slightly different, ie: the thicker the petals on the wads, the more choke they provide. if you measure a wad petal on you pheasant load it will run from about .010 to .015 and the petals on your steel loads may be about .035 to .040, all those numbers change the effect of the choke you are using, nobody will tell what those dimensions are, you will have to take the shell apart and measure, believe those petal thickness do make a difference both in tightness and range
cheers
Deweybagger
New member
I have choke tubes from Carlson that are labeled as waterfowl chokes that you can shoot steel shot through no larger than BB and no faster than 1550 fps, constriction in the long range model is .695 which is near extra full/full depending on which gun its for.
We use Prairie Storm choke tubes by Carlson a lot, one is labeled Early season .710 (LM) and my main tube is labeled Late Season .700 (IM)
There are a lot of tubes available tighter than mod that are designed for steel. Just make sure to use the right kind of choke for the wad design and range of shot/pattern.
uplandrules
Banned
I like the Hevishot Pheasant loads in 6's
Bottom of my previous post.
One other thing with the hevi metal is that the hevi shot is very deformed and extremely small so you wind up with a bunch of pellets in your bird the size of
7 1/2's to pick out.
They do smoke them however with a IM choke @ 25yards if your on them
Here's a picture of a 3" 1 1/4oz #4 hevi-metal
Loaded with a lot of filler, deformed pellets from the size of 4's-8's
I would be curious to see how this load patterns, with the deformity and size differences.
I will be shooting steel at pheasants (hopefully) for my first time next week. After a little time in front of the patternboard, I learned that the blackcloud 3" 1 1/4 oz #3 at 1450 fps through a cylinder choke yielded the best results at 30 yards. I was really surprised I had to go all the way to cylinder to get this load to open up reasonably at pheasant ranges. I have no doubt it will do the job, if I do Mike.