buckshot or slug?

Don't mean to horn in on the conversation, but those of you use birdshot for HD may have missed my post at http://thefiringline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=428980&page=3

Birdshot spreads out quickly from a short-barreled gun (granted, no choke at all) and I would be hard-pressed to say that is is lethal at even 20 feet, especially through clothing. Buckshot on the other hand forms a fist-sized pattern at 20 feet and a hand-sized pattern at 30 feet from my gun. Your gun may be different, just passing along my real-world experience with a gun that is probably the most common HD shotgun - an 870 Remington 12 gauge.

The main point I'm trying to make is that you should definitely pattern your gun and don't trust the experience of others. It's easy and fun.
 
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Birdshot is for the (uneducated) birds! :D

My family is too precious to trust protecting their lives on superficial underpenetrating tiny pellets.

Attention: IF you are serious and well educated about self-defense and care about your loved ones as I'm sure you do, common sense will help you upgrade to at least #1 buckshot or larger - putting greater odds (than birdshot) in your favor.

Remember that you are trying to stop a threat attempting to harm your family and reduced recoil 00 buckshot is the industry standard! Last I checked, burglars don't have wings, so save the birdshot for the birds and use buckshot on the bigger bucks. :D
 
does any company make a shell with 00, then the space filled with 1, then again filled with 2, etc? all sizes in one shell would use all the space, but spread unlike a slug.
 
Dude really

Candy Striping is for neutron and electron atrophied mall ninjas in training ... And really there is almost no reason to have a slug anytime indoor anyway. But i don't want to inflame that nor even incite the bird shot mafia ( if you want to have birdshot thats your a$$ its all good ) ... kISS is right !! Buy yourself a 15 box of lke Winchester 00 buck , load up the tube and kick some ass! Buy hornady tap If yo want " HD " ammo or even fancy flitecontrol Fed if u got that dough

It's real simple ... Blast em with buckshot. The buckshot that u got your tube loaded with. Its really THAT simple my righteous peoples.
 
FYI:

Federal and Hornady both license their Flight Control (FC) wads from Chris Billings at Choke in Layton, Utah. Federal didn't design the popular FC terminology, but does an outstanding job in marketing it.

Federal's Flight Control ammo can be purchased for a lot less than Hornady TAP and both loads basically perform the same with buckshot. Slug comparison is a bit different even though both companies use the same FC wad.
 
I'm physically comfortable shooting 00 2-3/4" repeatedly or basically more than enough to reload multiple times on my HD gun.Of course thats with hearing protection and safety glasses [required] on the range,confined inside a room or down the hall at home would be another matter without such protection.
A friend of mine [ex Marine Security Forces] "candy stripes" his loads,never asked him why.
 
if you want to have birdshot thats your a$$ its all good
Click to expand...

I for one am glad Grandma didnt read this thread, or she may have thought her shotgun to be ineffective against the intruder who she shot and killed useing a double 12 ga and birdshot. At room distance it doesnt open much, made a rather large hole in the guys chest, he bled all over the floor. But dead is dead, no levels of dead, just dead.

Old poor folk used to cut the shell right above the wad, this top part would leave the barrel as one piece, could hit a plate at 100 yards. Killed deer dead. Poor mans slug.
 
I'm siding with the heavy birdshot group on this one actually, in the sense that it is a viable option. Say #4 birdshot or larger. At 8 yards or less it won't open up much, and do what Markj's Grandma's shotgun did to her assailant. Shoot bad guy in the head he'll be blind and or dead.

Having said that, I use 00 buck. ;)
 
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