Got a couple of boxes of Hevi 7's from Cabelas Tuesday. Been pressed for time, so went out to listen for turkeys yesterday morning, and threw the Stoeger in the vehicle, hoping to shoot it a time or two. I fired one of the 7's through the Tightwad choke at 40 yds (measured with a rangefinder), and got a pretty poor pattern, compared to what most of you guys are talking about. Ten inch circle count was something under 150, with several holes in the pattern. The Tightwad is a 655, so I'm thinking that perhaps going to something with slightly less restriction might improve the pattern?
And, no the barrel has not been polished, and I didn't deep clean the barrel after shooting it twice in Alabama, but even the possible claimed increase of 10% would still have resulted in way under 200. Yow, I know, it would likely still have been a dead turkey, but more than likely at 50, it won't be holding a killing pattern.
Season starts Monday, so I may end up just taking my old Remington this year, and worry about dialing in the Stoeger over the winter. Like an idiot, I didn't think to take the Remington, but would really like to try the 7's in it, to compare the results to the Xtended 6's I've been using the past few years. Neill
