#1 Buck for HD

"My big gripe with #1 buck is recoil."

The felt recoil is lower with #0 Buckshot which is the icing on the cake -- my "if there must be only one."

"Based on a 7 lb. shotgun, the Remington #0 Buck Loads generates 27.4 ft. lbs. of recoil, while the #1 Buck factory loads generate 31.8 ft. lbs of recoil. This roughly 15% reduction in recoil may sway you to the Remington #0 load on the basis of comfort and controllability."
 
Ya'll must have some long hallways. The biggest room in my house is 24'X18', take into account the furniture at walls or furthest shot I could concievably make and its going to come out at about 4-6 yards at most. Now taken into account that I routinely kill most birds at 40 yards the pattern on my shotgun with say a #5 High brass at those distances in my home is pretty tight to the point all shot from the pattern is usually concentrated into an 8" or less circle.

I have plenty of buckshot in all sizes from 000 to #4 from 2 3/4" to 3 1/2" but for HD, I'm grabbing my SXS or OU and the #5's or if I don't want to take the chance of lead shot on future lawsuit should the individual live maybe some heavy shot. I'll let the surgeons figure out how to deal with the hamburger it makes and how to get all the lead out.

Or one could go with the old cut shell instead.
 
I think you could pick just about any of the buckshot loads from #4 to 000 and be OK. There are more important factors...like practicing!
 
typical shotgun engagement distances
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Can anyone please define what exactly these distances are?

And how does reduced recoil 00 buck fare at these distances for penetration? How about reduced recoil slug?
 
Saltydog235 said:
I have plenty of buckshot in all sizes from 000 to #4 from 2 3/4" to 3 1/2" but for HD, I'm grabbing my SXS or OU and the #5's or if I don't want to take the chance of lead shot on future lawsuit should the individual live maybe some heavy shot. I'll let the surgeons figure out how to deal with the hamburger it makes and how to get all the lead out.

Or one could go with the old cut shell instead.
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Your reasoning makes no sense to me as to why you wouldn't use the #4 buckshot that you have on hand. Don't kid yourself, tiny little #5 birdshot pellets do not have the sectional density necessary to penetrate deep enough to reach vital organs, and an O/U shotgun sounds like just as bad an idea. How long are the barrels?

A 'cut shell'? If you're suggesting the dangerous practice of cutting the shell just above the brass, you're asking for trouble and passing along information that could potentially get someone injured. It will probably bulge the barrels of your O/U on the very first shot; and i'm assuming the O/U is a fine quality shotgun

This thread topic is about #1 buckshot, not another pointless birdshot -vs- buckshot argument. If you mistakenly choose to load your defensive shotguns with birdshot that's fine and dandy; just don't insist others make the same mistake as you.

Gehrhard said:
"My big gripe with #1 buck is recoil."

The felt recoil is lower with #0 Buckshot which is the icing on the cake -- my "if there must be only one."

"Based on a 7 lb. shotgun, the Remington #0 Buck Loads generates 27.4 ft. lbs. of recoil, while the #1 Buck factory loads generate 31.8 ft. lbs of recoil. This roughly 15% reduction in recoil may sway you to the Remington #0 load on the basis of comfort and controllability."
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I use reduced recoil 00 and 000 buckshot ;)
(got a great deal on some Fiocchi RR 00 buck that throws decent patterns)
 
Heck no I don't advocate the use of a cut shell in any instance. And yes most of my guns are of the finer variety or at least not junk. It was a joke to see if anyone would respond and it looks like it got some interest from people that had never heard of it.

As to the buck vs bird arguement, I use buckshot to kill deer in the woods while the dogs are running them or on a hog that I jump moving through the swamp. However the shot charge of a high brass #5 at a range of 4 to 6 yards is absolutely lethal. I don't really care what others choose to do as I don't plan on too many home invasions in the near future. If someone decides to break in, I'll hit em with the shot or go to a .40, 45, .44, .41, .38, .45LC or any of the other 20 or so pistols that I own.

Another thing 2 years ago I shot a sow while we were duck hunting with a 3" Kent Matrix #5, she was about 5 yards from me. There was massive cranial evacuation and instant death. Don't tell me about penetration or your geletan tests or the physics of your paper calculations. I did a feild experiment on a live animal with finite, destructive results. Cranial mist with bone and teeth fragments all over the place. I think every pellet in the load hit it, about 1.5oz or so of shot. The piglets I hit with a boat paddle, we have a hog problem around here.
 
Buckshot and the shotgun in general

There has been mention of gelatin testing. Humans and gelatin are very different. Gelatin doesnt behave like a human torso or a human head on impact. Still, gelatin is an interesting test median.

The shotgun in generaL is the ultimate smootbore combat tool. The shotgun is the ultimate musket. Usually very large caliber, and it throws multiple projectiles or one single huge mass. IT can also be stuffed with a variety of special purpose cartridges. Shotguns can be well adapted to almost any combat problem or tactic with the exception of long distance sniping.

Home defense presents many things to consider. Home defense mostly will take place indoors; however; the outdoor terrain for home defense is not out of the question. Outdoor HD is likely to be short range with bystander and adjacent property and houses at risk of being struck.

If you fire any firearm inside of a house, there is a risk of hitting someone on the other side of a soft, easily penetrated sheetrock wall. Sleeping children, the wife, other family members, etc. You also run the risk of the projectile passing through the structure and traveling outside to hit neighboring residences, etc, etc.

Lets be real here. The shotgun, loaded with ANYTHING will definitely stop or kill a human being at 10 feet. Even #12 micro fine bird shot will kill someone at 10 feet. Load your shells with chicken feed and they will kill a man at 10 feet.

For home defense, consider a payload that will destroy the attacker, but not easily kill anyone in the next room, let alone travel outside of the structure to hit the neighbors houses.

The 20 gauge shotgun loaded with number three buckshot is something a wife can be trained to handle most effectively. The 20 bore with threes will do the job and significantly reduce the risks of killing someone in the next room. Recoil is manageable for someone with a lighter frame, such as a woman. Outside the house, at 25 feet, threes will kill a human being instantly at 10 or 15 feet and there is no question about it at all.

For the 12 bore shooter, when you load with number four buckshot, it is a seriously effective weapon in many tactical situations. The 3 inch mag shell will put 41 .25 caliber balls simultaneously into a target at speeds well beyond what many large bore pistol loads will be traveling. A submachinegun cant do that. Yet the #4 balls will slow down significantly if they pass through a wall. Even using the smaller 2.75 inch shell will still give you 27 balls on the target at great velocities. Like hitting them with a hailstorm of lead with a single pull of the trigger.

Large buckshot can be somewhat unpredictable. 000 buckshot seems to have a mind of it's own because of the way it travels up the barrell of the shotgun. Those projectiles are heavy and they will slam through walls and doors with enough energy to kill whatever it finds on the other side. Often the balls arrive on target with a mottling of mixed energy transmission, and who can call 000 a "pattern" really? There are not enough projectiles, really.

Single "0" and 1 are more efficient in the way they load into the cartridge and travel up the barrell and arrive on target. If you are in a patrol situation where distances are increased from the home defense field, you can get more striking energy at greater distances with these loads, as opposed to number 4 or number 3, because the pellets are heavier in "0" and 1.

The FBI shotgun studies actually indicate number 4 buck to be their reccomendation for a variety of reasons. The transfer of energy being their primary reason. I am using number 4 buck in a coach gun for home defense. I chose number 4buck partly on what I learned from the FBI study and a number of experiments I did on the range with a variety of loads.

Number 4 buck patterns evenly and has some serious velocity. 4 buck has numerous projectiles to increase the likeliehood of a one-shot stop. I chose the hammerless coach gun because it has no noisy slide or noisy bolt to operate to get the gun into action. I can sit silently in the shadows and not give away my position, yet I can still fire the gun without creating any noise to prepare the gun. Granted, there is only two shots, but I have a pistol as well. Both the coach gun and pistol sit nicely under the bed. Both are small. Both are easy to handle and quick to deploy.

If you really want to hit an intruder hard, pull both triggers on the coach gun at the same time! Makes for a hell of bang and a huge lead storm on the target.
 
Just for fun, here's the link to the results of shotgun testing at the famous Box O Truth website: http://www.theboxotruth.com/docs/bot3.htm

In summary, at a distance of 12 feet from the muzzle to the first layer of drywall:

Remington 2 3/4", #4 Buck with 27 pellets penetrated six layers of drywall and bounced off the seventh.

Winchester 2 3/4", #1 Buck with 16 pellets penetrated six layers of drywall and bounced off the seventh.

Remington 2 3/4", 00 Buck with 9 pellets penetrated seven layers of drywall, three pellets went through the eigth layer of drywall, and one pellet was stuck in the 9th drywall board.

Remington "Slugger", 1 ounce, Max load, 2 3/4", "rifled" slugs penetrated all twelve layers of drywall in the Box O Truth.

In previous Box O Truth tests, 9mm, .45 ACP, and M-193 out of an AR all penetrated all 12 boards.

I love this line from the shotgun test results summary:

I "racked" the shotgun several times during the tests, and no bystanders lost control of their bowels. Conclusion: Racking a shotgun will not make the bad guy faint.
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:D

As others have pointed out, the properties of the human body, as related to penetration by ammunition, are different from those of drywall. However, the Box O Truth serves as a useful demonstration of what could happen if you miss a human body with a shot from your home defense gun of choice ... or the extent of what could potentially happen if your round passes through a human body and continues on.
 
1 buck seems to be where the lines cross on the graph for pellet size and quantity. I've yet to find a load,however, that patterns as tightly as my pet 00 rounds. If and when I find one, I may switch. Meanwhile, I'll continue with "Old" Estate 00 R/R..... copied from post #8

How tight do you want a pattern at 12 or 15 FEET?? or 7 FEET?
 
"Do you guys think about what the operating range of a shotgun is?"

No, I spend more time thinking about the ranges at which I'll operate a shotgun inside my house.

Because of that, I've chose No. 4 buck as my primary HD load. 27 pellets hold a center of mass pattern on the target at all distances at which I might encounter someone in my home.

If No 4 isn't enough for some reason, I have 5 rounds of S&B 00 buck, 12 pellets instead of the normal 9, in a butt cuff.
 
Rugerismisticness said:
I don't think you can go wrong with 7 1/2shot, he'll either shat his pants or have a bunch of chicken pox marks
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Using 7½ birdshot for SD is a lousy idea. Yes, you can go wrong! Chicken pox marks?? Surely you can't be serious. The thread topic is about using #1 and 0 buckshot, yet people keep chiming in with their clueless birdshot argument..
 
I think the idea is that since at HD ranges the shot is not going to disperse significantly - that the column of shot is going to hit the intruder and bore through his body like an auger.

But that's not the case. It's not that the shot has or hasn't patterned out before impact - it's simply that the smaller shot doesn't penetrate. it doesn't matter if it is a "solid" column when it hits - it's just not going to go very deep.

Some have said that #2 Buck or smaller doesn't consistently penetrate to sufficient depth to reliably stop an attacker...

The thing about #4 penetrating so many layers of drywall... I am in a townhome. The choke point in my home is the staircase... if they stay downstairs - they can steal my TV and kitchen appliances and whatever, but if they come the stairs - that's where I would engage them. If I fire directly down the stairway - it probably will not involve anyone else's property unmless there is some crazy ricochete... but if I fire across the stairway - I am actually firing directly at the bedroom of the next unit over. So for instance if I fire directly out my dedroom door, there are 4 layers of drywall between the muzzle end of my shotgun and my neighbor. The way I think about this - I think about engaging an intruder where the line of fire doesn't cut across into the other units... But given that if I miss - the pellets are leaving my home one way or another - I'll choose #1 or #0 Buck over 4.

Although... #4 doesn't look that bad on the gelatin tests, but then someone pointed out that those blocks might not have been at the right temp since the calibration BB seemed to have penetrated so deep...
 
00 buck because

when I shoot I am going to put a hole in him. there is no other reason for me to pull the trigger. yes, I use 3" 15 pellet 00 buck too so I can transfer every last bit for a little recoil on my side
 
I think this argument is being overthought to the nth degree. Buckshot will do the trick, any of it. No.4 all the way to 000. I would use whatever I had left over from hunting and not think twice about it
 
I have noticed that the advantage the Vang Comp System provides is most pronounced with higher pellet count rounds such as #1BK and 12P 00BK.

With a regular barrel I would get almost 14" patterns at 50' with such ammo.
With the VCS barrel I get sub 7" patterns or better at the same distance.
 
Great StuntMan, except for one thing. You shouldn't WANT a 7" pattern at 50-feet! What is with you guys -- you don't know what a shotgun is for and how it is supposed to perform!? Crack open a book fellas instead of being impressed by overcoming the intent and design of a shotgun.

Oh, and don't be too impressed with a tight pattern -- it is from something called "choke" on the barrel.

Jeez boys...
 
Great StuntMan, except for one thing. You shouldn't WANT a 7" pattern at 50-feet! What is with you guys -- you don't know what a shotgun is for and how it is supposed to perform!? Crack open a book fellas instead of being impressed by overcoming the intent and design of a shotgun.

Oh, and don't be too impressed with a tight pattern -- it is from something called "choke" on the barrel.

Jeez boys...
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You need a whole lotta schoolin' on the entire range of uses for the modern shotgun.

The shotgun developed from the ol' blunderbuss sort of uses. The versatility is why the blunderbuss type front loaders became the modern shot gun of today.

If you want to talk clay pigeon shootin', you need top address BigJimP, Zippy and oneounceload. Those guys will get you squared away with the 7 1/2 shot and patterning. But if you want to engage in big game hunting or HD/SD, you need to forget all of that stuff... And don't go advising folks to seek a wider pattern when they are discussing buckshot for big game and HD/SD. SMALLER PATTERNS ARE THE ONLY THING YOU SHOULD BE SEEKING!

YOU DO AIM FOR HD/SD if you want to make a true shot. You also need to realize that the only safe lead is lead that is stopped or significantly slowed by the warm squishy target. any that miss are COLLATERAL DAMAGE waiting to happen.

Point shooting is ONLY for wing sports and clay sports and the smallest of mammal game. For big game or HD/SD it is more accurately described as "swing shooting" which is also used in rifle uses.

Brent
 
Crack open a book fellas instead of being impressed by overcoming the intent and design of a shotgun.

I've bought, cracked open and read/studied every book I could find on gunfighting with shotguns, bought most of the shotgun gunfighting videos and even gotten some actual training in the subject as well. I've even gone in harm's way with a shotgun a time or three.

And I LIKE TIGHT PATTERNS because they help me do what I want a fighting shotgun to do. That's not hit stuff I don't want hit, make big holes in targets, let in lots of daylight, let out lots of blood, disrupt important stuff inside the target and bring the proceedings to as sudden an end as possible.

You go for whatever level of performance you want in your shotgun/load combination, but please don't try to tell me or anyone else what we are supposed to want from ours... 'kay?

lpl

ETA - Range, fellas, range. Sheesh. Those gelatin shots are great but were taken at a range of 3 yards for the light pellets and 5 yards for the bigger Buckshot.

See http://www.brassfetcher.com/Federal... FLITECONTROL performance summary 23MAR11.pdf
 
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