Thanks sky chief

[Yewbender]

Welcome Mailman and 30 yard looks good and 25 will be better. Now the nice thing with saving your money by not jug choking you can spend it to buy more powder/shot/wads/cards as a smoothbore will keep you busy at the range! Since you used 5 shot maybe try it with 4’s and heck even 7 1/2. Just remember the tuna/soup can test, if it puts holes in them it will kill.

 

[mailmanmike40]

Welcome Mailman and 30 yard looks good and 25 will be better. Now the nice thing with saving your money by not jug choking you can spend it to buy more powder/shot/wads/cards as a smoothbore will keep you busy at the range! Since you used 5 shot maybe try it with 4’s and heck even 7 1/2. Just remember the tuna/soup can test, if it puts holes in them it will kill.

 

[mailmanmike40]

I'm going to continue testing with different shot sizes and powder charges. The complexity of the whole process really does intrigue me. I'm definitely hooked. Thankfully I've still got time till Pa turkey season starts.

 

[jefair1]

How does the Sky Chief load work in a choked barrel? I just got my supplies from TOW for my 10ga Pedersoli.

 

[mailmanmike40]

How does the Sky Chief load work in a choked barrel? I just got my supplies from TOW for my 10ga Pedersoli.

The way I understand it's primarily for cylinder bore barrels. I'd still try it and see how it does out of your gun. Good luck

 

[Brokennock]

How does the Sky Chief load work in a choked barrel? I just got my supplies from TOW for my 10ga Pedersoli.

Jug choke or constriction?

The way I understand it's primarily for cylinder bore barrels. I'd still try it and see how it does out of your gun. Good luck

@Eric Krewson has a gun he had jug choked and wasn't happy with the results. The Skychief load brought out the best from it.... hopefully he'll jump in here and give us more details.

 

[sportster73hp]

Purchased a partial bag of plastic wad cups at a show Saturday. Will try these in my chrome lined pedersoli .

 

[Blackpowderart]

How does the Sky Chief load work in a choked barrel? I just got my supplies from TOW for my 10ga Pedersoli.

Which 10ga pedersoli? Waterfowl edition? Here's my improved cylinder barrel shot yesterday at 25yds
Loaded
70 ffg swiss
1 mini nitro card
1 5/8 corn meal
1 thin over shot card
1 5/8 #6 lead
1/2 lubed fiber wad

there are different sized nitro cards.. mini nitro from ballisticproducts.com

 

[Blackpowderart]

And at 30yds loaded the same....I aimed
A little high thinking it may drop a little but it did not

 

[mailmanmike40]

And at 30yds loaded the same....I aimed
A little high thinking it may drop a little but it did not

That's an impressive pattern!

 

[Old Shepherd]

Which 10ga pedersoli? Waterfowl edition? Here's my improved cylinder barrel shot yesterday at 25yds
Loaded
70 ffg swiss
1 mini nitro card
1 5/8 corn meal
1 thin over shot card
1 5/8 #6 lead
1/2 lubed fiber wad

there are different sized nitro cards.. mini nitro from ballisticproducts.com

Your 25 and 30 yard patterns are nothing short of amazing.
Old Shepherd

 

[Blackpowderart]

This will be my 3rd season hunting turkeys and 3rd season with a muzzleloader. Admittedly it took this long and well over 15hrs in total over these years to get it this good. I've tried it all... plastic cups, nitro, mini nitro, cork, dry fiber, lubed fiber, buffer, os cards, 1f and 2ff, swiss, shuetzen, goex and Olde Enysford....this is the first year
I added cornmeal after watching a capandball episode. I didn't use his method exactly, i added other things....but adding it did help immensely.

 

[Robin101]

I have never taken a turkey with a modern shotgun. Of all the configurations I experimented with over the years in non jug choked barrels the SkyChief set up works the best, bar none. Of course I have my theories as to why that is, which I will keep to myself, because is just that, theory. I don't really know why it is so effective, and now I see fellows adding corn meal to the mix. That would be another thing I don't understand. Any clarification out there? It might be fun to experiment with.
Robin

 

[Ron hall]

Part of me is tired of thinking about why it works, and all the debate and theorizing about it.
It works,,,, when loaded as originally described.

However, if we coukd find out why it works, maybe modifications could be made based on circumstances.
Even if it could just be determined if it is the weight/mass of the lubed cushion wad, or is it all the lube being spread down the bore ahead of the shot?
Circumstances. A friend can't get cushion wads. If it is the weight, he's kinda screwed for this to work, if it is the lube, a couple heavily lubed felt wads in place of the cushion wad should suffice.

I personally think it is neither and both at the same time. Neither and both.
I think the results come from more than just the lubed cushion wad.
When I tried it with my usual, powder,thin overshot card, lubed felt wad, shot, thin card, then added thr lubed cushion wad,,, results were not as advertised. When I accidentally tried it without the thin card between shot and lubed cushion wad,, results were not as advertised,,, however I did see and improvement in how even the pattern was,,, it just wasn't as dense.

it works just like the ol shot gun turkey shooters cheating method if you ever shoot at them years ago guys would cheat buy taking a seringe and injecting some oil into the shot the oil would hold the shot together so the olive oil 1/2 inch wad is doing the samething as it goes down the barrel its soaking the shot and holding it together longer if you use cups you could put say like 5 to 7 drops of oil in the top of the shot then put your card on top of that then the soaked 1/2 inch wad then your shot would be at max soak should hold an even tighter group a lil farther !!!??!!??

 

[Britsmoothy]

Several factors are in play.
Thin over shot card's slow down rapidly, colliding with shot pellets not slowing down as quickly. The heavy oiled wad keeps up with the shot behind it.
It also creates a partial vacuum that will make life easier for the leading pellets.

 

[Blackpowderart]

It definitely makes for a clean shooting gun

 

[Eric Krewson]

I had two similar Colerain barrels jug choked by Caywood; One barrel was cut off center at the bore, Colerain sent me a new barrel and let me keep the old one.

I had the off-center barrel jug choked before I noticed the off center bore.

I gave the off-center barrel to a friend for him to make him a turkey gun out of, he paid me the cost of the jug choking, the barrel was free. His turkey gun with a Skychief load was a 40-yard gun, he said it shot as tight a pattern as his 10 modern gun with a screw in turkey choke.

I had high hopes for my jug choked barrel but alas, with a normal load it did very poorly at 20 yards the extra full jug shot like a modified choke. I tried the Skychief load and was really impressed with the improvement.

25 yards, 1 1/2oz #6 shot, Skychief load, 90 gr of 1F.

I don't have any experience shooting a Skychief load in a choke bored gun or with shot cups.

 

[Onojutta]

Eric Krewson, knowing what you know now with the second gun you mentioned, if you could do it again would you get the jug choke, or just stick with the Skychief load? I guess what I am asking is, do you think the Skychief load with the jug choke is any better than Skychief load with no jug?

 

[Johnny Too-Tall]

For those that are struggling to get solid pattern try combining shot sizes, it worked for me.
I use 1 oz #4 and 1/2 oz #6 mixed together (prior to dropping in barrel) using the skychief load. It really filled in my shot pattern better vs running same sized shot. I kill my turkey opening day using this combination.
**Hint: After mixing them together I use a modern inline Ml'er reloading tool (the one with the 3 clear tubes to store 3 pre-measured shot charges. **

 

[Trigger]

For those that are struggling to get solid pattern try combining shot sizes, it worked for me.
I use 1 oz #4 and 1/2 oz #6 mixed together (prior to dropping in barrel) using the skychief load. It really filled in my shot pattern better vs running same sized shot. I kill my turkey opening day using this combination.
**Hint: After mixing them together I use a modern inline Ml'er reloading tool (the one with the 3 clear tubes to store 3 pre-measured shot charges. **

most the old timers talked about there mixture of shot.. mixing performs better in the muzzloader.

I have 6 and that's it... I don't know if I want to use 6 and 8 or like 6 and 4.. I think 1oz number 6 with the rest 8.