Steel Cartridges

There has been a lot said on this topic and I believe it will be an important one now and in the future.I have now shot steel on two ocassions puting approx 400-500 of them through the gun now.I can honestly say if i did not know what they were then I would not even know the difference.(apart from recoil)After Dorhout Mees I was impressed although I now realise the 28gram Gamebore do kick like hell!Yesterday I shot a combination of 24 gram and 28 gram and the 24 gram are much more comfortable to shoot! Shot some longer targets as well than at Dorhout Mees and they did the business very nicely.Really, my opinion was steel is no good for clays etc etc but I have totally changed my opinion on them the only downside here in Germany and Holland is that they are still way to expensive for steel! I also guarentee if we had to shoot these in UK the price would soon go up as it always has been with shooting a captive audience so the prices ever increase.Glen.

Hello Glen, Good to see you here mate, I think you will enjoy this new site a lot more Matt's put a lot of time and effort into it. Yeah you are right about the steel shot, we have been shooting it now for 3 years and like I said to you before if someone had been slipping it into your pocket when you were shooting leads shot apart from maybe a little more recoil the steel shot cartridges will make a in my opinion a better kill within 25/30 yrds, It was good to hear what you thought of it on further out targets and even big Ben said he was impressed with it in serious competition.btw George is still King

I'm not sure I know enough about the subject yet - does anyone know if ANY gun can shoot steel, that seems to be a bone of contention? Until that becomes really clear to people then I'd imagine there will be a lot of nervousness around testing. If I was given a box of steel cartridges - I'd have no idea if I could put them in my Beretta. As for the price issue - someone really needs to do some investigation about what is driving up the prices. I'm thinking about whether there are some things we could do on ShootClay to help shooters get better value for money.

Matt,I saw people using heavily choked guns at Dorhout Mees one guy was using his with 3 Quarter and Full. I was using IM chokes in both Barrels at this shoot. Nobody at any point discussed this or warned me in anyway??? I am not saying you should but to be honest I have not heard of anything specific only that you should not used a heavily choked gun???I will have a ask around some of the guys here who are shooting it weekend after weekend and get some opinions as they are they guys who have a lot of experience with it.Glen.

Quote from Nigel on August 29, 2011, 12:24Hello Glen, Good to see you here mate, I think you will enjoy this new site a lot more Matt's put a lot of time and effort into it. Yeah you are right about the steel shot, we have been shooting it now for 3 years and like I said to you before if someone had been slipping it into your pocket when you were shooting leads shot apart from maybe a little more recoil the steel shot cartridges will make a in my opinion a better kill within 25/30 yrds, It was good to hear what you thought of it on further out targets and even big Ben said he was impressed with it in serious competition.btw George is still King

Click to expand...

On the Skeet Range they smoked them big style! :huh: -_- Glen.

Ok ........where are you hiding the moving smileies??????????? :-0I cannot find them!!

Quote from Nicola on August 29, 2011, 14:50Ok ........where are you hiding the moving smileies???????????

Click to expand...

Well - the forum software I am using is not quite as sophisticated as ones you may have previously used - but I think the sophistication of the site owner more adequately makes up for things...I am investigating how I can build out a few features - spellcheck will be first and then I'll look if I can add smilies.

Hey Matt the advice your login gave me that my explorer was an old version was brilliant. I have just used your link and it downloaded Explorer 9 and now I can whiz around your site in double quick time. Before that it was taking 30 seconds to load up each page. So thanks you very much for that help. I am sure that pressing : - ) will give me a but I do not know the keys for the laughing one. Fess up Glen.....how did you do it?.

Just trying to make the web a better place, browser by browser...

'Quote," I have just used your link and it downloaded Explorer 9 and now I can whiz around your site in double quick time. Before that it was taking 30 seconds to load up each page." QuoteI use XP and IE8. I don't think IE9 is compatible with XP but you are right Nic about the slow page load up.Vic.

I will look into page load speeds - IE8 is notorious fr slow loading.... everything looks good on me IE9 machine, also tested with Chrome and Firefox...

Quote from shootclay admin on August 29, 2011, 16:55I will look into page load speeds - IE8 is notorious fr slow loading.... everything looks good on me IE9 machine, also tested with Chrome and Firefox...

Click to expand...

Seems to work OK with Firefox.Now back the topic, I have not shot steel but my brother in law has and the only thing he noticed was that the fouling in the forcing cones was greater than normal plastic wad cartridges and took a good scrub to remove.Most multi choke guns can shoot steel cartridges and should be proof marked accordingly, I think a fluer de leys type mark on the barrels.

I think this particular topic was chewed over on other forums every other day. Seems you either love or hate them - with no middle ground. Not keen on soft iron personaly, probably because I shot lead for over 40 years and never found anything wrong with it, unless it was lodged in a Pheasant breast.RegardsPhil*Angel.

Phil,At least with soft iron sh*te, the magnet finds it in your birds for you .

Correct, IE9 is not available on XP Back on topic, I use a LOT of Gamebore Super Steel 24g for all my Skeet shooting so probably around 15000 a year and they really make a mess of the clays if you put the pattern in the right place, I too discovered that the 28g are very heavy on recoil compared to the 24g and that's shooting them Through a Beretta AL391 Urika Teknys auto with the recoil reduction system... I found this out when I bought some 28's to try and put a slab of them in the boot for the Skeet Masters which is a 200 bird comp and the recoil really started to build after the first ton and i still had the pool shoot and a second ton of skeet As to Matt's question - No, not all guns can be used to shoot steel shot, they need to be proofed for steel and there will be a fleur de lis mark on the barrels with the proof marks which most modern guns have. The general advice is that you should NEVER go tighter than 12 choke and generally you go a choke lighter to get the same pattern, i.e. for SKT using steel I use a CYL Briley Spectrum to give me a SKT pattern. On some guns the chokes are marks for lead and also steel. Some manufacturers are selling guns with chokes that can be used 34 or full with steel.The risk of using steel in a non proofed gun is ring bulging about 2" back from the muzzles and also potentially a breech explosionbarrel failure due to overpressure.Cheers,Jon.

Yeahhhhhhhaaaaayyyyy. Good post Jon.The last sentence has been known for years but lots of people will not believe it. As I only shoot 3/4 and full I will not be going anywhere near it in any of my decent guns. If I go to Holland next year I will be taking an old multi choke 'minger' from the back of the cabinet. which I affectionately refer to as Denise For the record like Angel - I hate steel.

Yep, I use lead for all my sporting but use steel mainly for cost, I used to use Hull Intercomp HV's but as the price increased the difference to me between steel and lead is over £1000 per year and that's a LOT of practice roundscomp entry fees.For skeet the retained energy is fine at 20-25 yards but tails off quite significantly at longer ranges, trap etc.Having seen a gun that has suffered from a breech explosion I wouldn't want my headhand anywhere near it. The cause wasn't due to steel but down to a foreign object in the barrel.Cheers,Jon.

Steel shot is 40% cheaper than lead shot, but the wad is more expensive! Steel shot is not very good at over 25M as it is so much less dense than lead and looses velocity so much more. We have shot steel at a military range for 10 years. It sucks and is dangerous as it ricochets much more than lead. I for one, has been hit behind station 4 on skeet field by lead pellets. I have been hit many more times by steel pellets. We use steel BB for geese in the early season ( Sept and Oct.). After that, it is BBB first shot followed by tungsten alloys! There are studies done by ISU and the NRA that proove that lead is NOT a pollutant on land! Did you know that copper plated shot is a killer of aquatics? That the so-called BIO clay targets kill vegetation because they are sulphur based? They change the PH of the soil! The ONLY true Bio clay target is made in Canada and certified by the Agriculture Ministry! Lawry targets are truly bio and will not effect the PH of the soil!The Lone Canadian,Henry