Hello all,

I have a quantity of Aquila 12ga 1 3/4" hulls. Had no idea as far as reloading so went it on my own. Looked up a load for a 2" shell using the powder I had on hand. I reduced the powder charge several grains and reduced the shot charge (after experimenting with the crimp) from 1oz to 5/8oz. I had to modify my loader to crimp them (with a hacksaw) and had to use wood blocks under the shells to seat wads and crimp. For a wad I used a WAA12SL, cut the wad column off and trimmed the shotcup to hold 5/8oz. I used W209 primers, Universal powder and #6 lead shot. Finally got to pattern my loads today. Impressive! No recoil and consistant 81.5% patterns at 15yds. Gun was a Mossberg M500 with a 30" full choke bbl and I fired at 15yds for 2 reasons. First, I figured that's about the effective range of these powder puff loads, and second it's the longest I can shoot at my indoor range. Not sure what good these loads will be (maybe birds in the backyard?) but it's been fun working up a load from scratch. Anyone interested in details, please e-mail me at ohiomohunter@aol.com

SSB