Hail the Skychief load

[Eric Krewson]

I have a 12 ga fowler, jug choked full my Danny Caywood, it never shot a good pattern.
Today I played around with different loads and Skychief's olive oil soaked 1/2" cushion over the shot.

I had been shooting 100 gr of 1F 1 3/4 oz of #6 shot and got kills on targets at 25 yards but nothing to get excited about.

I varied the wad column, 3 thin over powder, 1 thin with a wool wad and finally 4 thin cereal box wads over the powder and a 1/2" cushion wad rolled in olive oil over the shot. This time I tried a lighter load of 90 gr of 1F and 1 1/2 oz of #6 shot.

Bingo! this target was shot was at about 27 yards, I like it. I finally feel confident in my turkey gun.

 

[Carbon 6]

Has anyone tried the Skychief load without using a magnum amount of shot ?
Less shot might be a better indicator of the load's design performance.

 

[Britsmoothy]

Has anyone tried the Skychief load without using a magnum amount of shot ?
Less shot might be a better indicator of the load's design performance.

Yes, I did. There is a clear improvement.

 

[Rat]

Looks to me like she's talking turkey now. Only about 15 days or so until turk opens here.

 

[Skychief]

Get the grease hot Eric! Thanks for sharing with us.

Best of luck, Skychief.

 

[George]

Has anyone tried the Skychief load without using a magnum amount of shot ?
Less shot might be a better indicator of the load's design performance.

Here's a target shot at 50 yards with my 20 gauge flintlock smoothbore, cylinder bore, using Skychief's loading sequence with 60 grains 2F and 1 oz. #5 shot. More than 90% of the pellets were in an area 32" x 36".

Spence

 

[Carbon 6]

Much better, seems such a waste to use more shot than is needed.

 

[George]

Much better, seems such a waste to use more shot than is needed.

You only need one pellet. How much powder would it take to push one pellet of #5 to supersonic speed?

Spence

 

[Carbon 6]

You only need one pellet. How much powder would it take to push one pellet of #5 to supersonic speed?

Spence

In a 12 gauge? More than you might think actually. Mass/weight is an important part of the equation.

I typically shoot between 3/4 and 1 ounce for small game.
Generally, I aim for less overall weight, but larger shot, and tighter groups. Those are the parameters I follow.
Like you said, "all you need is one pellet" and a larger pellet travelling faster is a sure bet.

 

[Feltwad]

100grains of powder to 1.3/4 oz of shot at 27 yards is high for a 12bore hear in the UK that is classed has a 9 to 10 bore load.
Feltwad

 

[Comfortably_Numb]

All jugs are not created equal. Every jugged gun I have had would shoot any combination you put down it very well, I haven't found them to be picky at all. The only guy I have ever had cut my jugs is Lowell Tennyson. Now Rice is offering jugs too, they learned the technique from Tennyson so they should shoot good. I have even had jugs cut in my skeet guns, usually about .005 will keep the center filled in nicely. My upland guns I jug to about .015. Those were all 12 bores.
I have built lots of jugged Turk guns in 10, 11, and 12. They will all handle big loads which helps fill in your pattern when you get out to 50 yards. Loads up to 2 5/8oz. plated #6's and 140gr of powder are very effective. Recoil will get your attention. About the smallest load I have had customers tell me they use was a guy with a 10 bore that used 1 5/8oz and 100gr.
Rice now makes an 8 bore barrel. I see one of those on my bench in the near future.
Here's a nice Turk gun in 10 bore with a 38" rice barrel and about .040 jug. Affectionately known as "BIG BADDA BOOM"

 

[Eric Krewson]

I had Caywood do two chokes for me, I gave the first barrel to a friend, it was cut off center by Colerain and they gave me another barrel and let me keep the off center one. To sell it would be stealing a barrel from Colerain in my opinion so I gave it to my friend and he paid for the jug choke, he built a turkey gun with the barrel. I had the new barrel jugged by Caywood as well.

My friends barrel shoots as tight as any modern screw in turkey choke, it is unreal. My barrel shoots like a modified barrel at best. The Skychief load improved the pattern immensely.

Mike is right, all jug chokes are not equal.

 

[Skychief]

Eric, are you turkey hunting now?

 

[stank]

I need to learn something here. What is a jug choke? Does it affect shooting ball?

 

[Zonie]

I need to learn something here. What is a jug choke? Does it affect shooting ball?

A "Jug" choke does the same thing that all chokes in a shotgun do. It tightens the shot group by compressing the shot column right before it leaves the barrel.
On modern smoothbores this is done by reducing the bore size at the muzzle.

On a muzzleloader, the smaller diameter of a modern choke presents a problem because the wads don't want to pass thru it when they are being loaded. With this in mind, wouldn't it be neat if there was some other way of making the shot column compress right before it leaves the bore without needing to actually make the bore smaller?

That is what the jug choke does.

The jug choke is made by enlarging the bore several inches down the bore from the muzzle but leaving the actual bore at the muzzle the same size as a unchoked barrel was before the machining was done.

When the shot column reaches this larger area inside the barrel, it acts like it is outside the barrel so it starts to expand. After traveling thru the larger area in the bore it is forced back down to the original bore size by a short tapered area. This forces the shot back together and in doing so, the shot acts just like it has gone thru a modern choke.

Hopefully this all makes sense.

 

[WRustyLane]

So how far down the bore does the choke begin? And what is the effect should one want to shoot a patched round ball out of the modified bore? I know how modern chokes work that are screwed into the muzzle of a modern shotgun. This is the first time I've ever heard of a "jug" choke. Also I would like to know if shot could be used in a .50 cal rifled barrel, i.e., if one uses proper wadding over the powder and over the shot.

 

[Grenadier1758]

Should shot be used in a rifled bore? As a practical use of a shot load, no. The rifling will impart spin on the shot column and when the shot column it really opens the pattern up. So shot in a rifle won't be effective for anything other than mice or snakes at 15 feet give or take.

 

[smo]

I don’t own a jug choked gun , but know several that do.

They shoot patched round ball’s thru their guns all the time,
And very well I might add.

 

[WRustyLane]

Thanks. You have answered my questions quite nicely.

 

[Darkhorse]

Not to confuse the issue but Colrane sells a Turkey Choked barrel that is not the same as a jug choked barrel. It is not recommended to shoot round balls out of their turkey choked barrels.