New Magnum Blend Shells

[bbcoach]

Hope the shoot good.



If I'm spending money for Hevishot it's going to be on Hevi13 #7's.  I've not seen anything any better.

X2 Tom!  I've had excellent results with the 7's.

[turkey buster]

I'm a hypocrite here but I went form the mag blends to long beards because of price in 12ga ammo, but I shoot federal heavyweights in my 20ga.

There's my review 

[allaboutshooting]

I just ran a few of theses through my Mossberg835 today with the Hevi-13 choke, Carlson long beard choke, and an Indian creek. The Hevi choke at 40 yds scored 150 hits, the long beard choke scored 128 hits, and the Indian creek choke scored 138 hits. You can definitely tell there's a big decrease of pellets in theses shells. I shot the 3.5" 2.25oz. 4,5,7 shot and the patterns where significantly less dense at 40 yards when compared to the 5,6,7 shot. The patterns weren't "that" bad and resembled some of the patterns I've gotten with the Winchester long beard #4's. One question I would have is, if the 5,6,7 blend was advertised to kill out to 70-75 yds, I wonder how far this one will  !? I m pretty sure Pattern density will be the limiting factor on this load . 

Very interesting. I appreciate the information.

Thanks,
Clark

[petemoss83]

Ok, I like the idea of these shells so I decided to give them another run today. I only used the Hevi-13 choke tube today since it yielded the best results on my last session with these shells. First shot from 40yds put 190 hits in the 10". Second shot was in the upper 180's. The temp was actually 10 degrees cooler today at 56 degrees. Not really sure what was different today from last time but the 4,5,7 shot seemed to pattern better than the 5,6,7 shot today. I shot the 5,6,7 shot through my indian creek, long beard choke, hevi-13 choke, and ssx today and the best I could get was 184 with the Indian creek. Not sure if its worth mentioning but the 5,6,7 did have better numbers in the 20" circle. The 4,5,7 shot had a total of 290 hits inside the 20" at 40yds(190 in 10" + 100 in outer ring) and while I didn't count the 5,6,7 shots 20" numbers, by simply looking at the patterns you could tell they had approx. twice the hits in that outer ring between the 10 and 20. I don't think my 835 is too crazy about these mag blend loads overall, but Im satisfied with the 4,5,7 patterns and have decided give them a try this year. Hope this info is helpful to someone and hope everyones season is off to a good start!!!

[allaboutshooting]

Ok, I like the idea of these shells so I decided to give them another run today. I only used the Hevi-13 choke tube today since it yielded the best results on my last session with these shells. First shot from 40yds put 190 hits in the 10". Second shot was in the upper 180's. The temp was actually 10 degrees cooler today at 56 degrees. Not really sure what was different today from last time but the 4,5,7 shot seemed to pattern better than the 5,6,7 shot today. I shot the 5,6,7 shot through my indian creek, long beard choke, hevi-13 choke, and ssx today and the best I could get was 184 with the Indian creek. Not sure if its worth mentioning but the 5,6,7 did have better numbers in the 20" circle. The 4,5,7 shot had a total of 290 hits inside the 20" at 40yds(190 in 10" + 100 in outer ring) and while I didn't count the 5,6,7 shots 20" numbers, by simply looking at the patterns you could tell they had approx. twice the hits in that outer ring between the 10 and 20. I don't think my 835 is too crazy about these mag blend loads overall, but Im satisfied with the 4,5,7 patterns and have decided give them a try this year. Hope this info is helpful to someone and hope everyones season is off to a good start!!!

It's helpful to me and I appreciate your sharing it.

Thanks,
Clark

[owlhoot]

Well sounds like a good pattern.
What would be neat is a hevi 6 and 7 blend load at the head whooping 1200 mag. Blend velocity

Hey Clark bend their ears a bit

[petemoss83]

A 6,7 blended load sounds perfect....... Pattern density would be awesome and range would be more than enough!! 

[Ranger007]

Now that's a blend that would work. 6 x 7 wouldn't stay on the shelf

[foxred1962]

Clark,

Could you possibly do an article on penetration of pellets and post it on here. I don't have the materials to compare true terminal performance of loads other than what I see in the field. It would be really neat to see a 40 yd comparison of long beards vs. hevi13.... 6s vs. 7s ... 5s vs 6s and so on.

[Tom Foolery]

Not exactly what you asked for but here is an old test with lead, hevi and TSS on metal:

http://www.oldgobbler.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=18&t=1653&sid=965967d595f43a1d6e874995b0f9b69a

[allaboutshooting]

Clark,

Could you possibly do an article on penetration of pellets and post it on here. I don't have the materials to compare true terminal performance of loads other than what I see in the field. It would be really neat to see a 40 yd comparison of long beards vs. hevi13.... 6s vs. 7s ... 5s vs 6s and so on.

Penetration tests are always interesting and also very time consuming. I've done a number of them on home and personal protection loads using barriers, internal walls, external walls and with mycrocrystalline wax, which is more stable than ballistic gelatin.

When evaluating turkey loads, I use "big paper" mounted on multiple sheets of corrugated board with an earthen backstop. That sits on top of and behind a large open box. At the end of any session, that corrugated board and the box have a lot of shot retained in them.

A pretty simple yet maybe revealing study could be done by using a few layers of new corrugated board and firing those various shells from 40 yards at them, changing out the boards with each shot,  and observing penetration and retention of the shot. Maybe not too "scientific" but it should give a pretty good visual idea of what's going on.

That would need to be a late summer project for me however.

Thanks,
Clark

[foxred1962]

Thanks for the quick reply Clark. I love patterning a ton especially with finicky waterfowl loads. It's just tough to simulate kinetic energy when your talking about pellets and then simulate energy transfer to breaking bone instead of just feathers and breast bone like with geese. I have heard of people hanging little dowel rods and shooting them along with wet phone books and other materials.... i agree with most that pattern density is the key then energy but what load is the best of both worlds is very intriguing... My dad used to hunt with and old wingmaster full choke and 2 3/4 lead #2's back in the old days and killed a ton of birds it's amazing how far technology has came!!!

[bowbird87]

I would like to see a 6x7 blend running 1200 fps.

[BandedSpur]

Clark,

Could you possibly do an article on penetration of pellets and post it on here. I don't have the materials to compare true terminal performance of loads other than what I see in the field. It would be really neat to see a 40 yd comparison of long beards vs. hevi13.... 6s vs. 7s ... 5s vs 6s and so on.

Here you go: 40 yds, sea level, 70 degrees, 1200 fps, penetration in ballistic gel (via KPY Ballistics)

Lead 4=2.2"
       5=1.9
       6=1.6
HS   4=2.6
       5=2.2
       6=1.9
       7=1.6

[RiverRoost]

I was talking to nitro yesterday and I'm almost positive that they can make whatever loads you want. May be worth checking into a 6/7 load from them