This is a page all about cartridges, how they work, which shot to use, fibre wads, reloading, black powder- you name it and I'll try to cover it eventually.

Cartridge
When you pull the trigger to bash a few clays, for very little effort on your part there is a big explosion inside the barrel which pushes a lot of little lead pellets of towards the target. Pulling the trigger sets off a chain reaction in the gun which goes like this: trigger releases hammer, hammer hits firing pin, firing pin hits cartridge primer. The primer is the small copper coloured round bit in the centre of the brass part of the cartridge and when it is hit hard enough by the firing pin its contents burn very hot and very fast. The bottom of the primer is touching the main charge of gun powder and the fire is directed into the powder which in turn starts to burn. While the gun powder is burning it is producing gas that is under pressure. On top of the gun powder is a wad, usually made of plastic or fibre which is a gas tight seal inside the barrel and on top of the wad is the lead shot which will break the clay. The gas produced by the burning gun powder in any shogun is at a high enough pressure to push the wad and shot for the best part of 220m, fast and hard to break any clay you are asked to shoot at.

Cases
Wherever we shoot clays we leave behind thousands of empty cartridge cases, useless unless reloaders take some home to use them again to shoot the next lot of clays. Normally on a clay ground the cases are plastic because it is cheap, easy to use and unlikely to be affected in inclement weather whereas paper cartridges are more prone to swelling in damp conditions so they may not go in the chamber or swell whilst they're in there and not want to come out. The majority of cases are made as an open plastic tube with a seperate base and a plated steel head although a notable exception is the Gordon System that employs a steel ring around the integral sealed end of the plastic tube. The steel head is usually brass coloured and can be between about 8 and 25mm high, in my experience it's all dependent on the price of the cartridge.

Fibre

Many years before it became environmentally PC to use fibre or felt wads, my last gun club voluntarily banned the use of plastic wads. For a start they looked awful laying in the sun looking like a watery mess; as well as that it was decided that plastic wads were a nuisance, not to mention a danger to all the birds and wildlife on our ground. Over the years they have been cleaned up and the ground doesn't half look a better place - next time you go to a club, have a look around and you'll easily be able to spot plastic if it's used. The old arguments about plastic wads holding their shape and so having better patterns than felt or fibre no longer apply. Technology has moved on and there are supporters and experts who say fibre cartridges now produce better patterns. I must say that in my experience whatever wads I've used have been more than good enough to break all the clays I have shot at; for preference I use fibre wads although there is a slight price premium, not just because more clubs are now wanting cleaner and greener sites but because I find plastic residue is far more difficult to clean from my barrels. It's not just me and mine who are pro fibre - ask in your local gun shop where they will tell you fibre is on the up.

Steel

At the time of writing this, cartridges prices in the UK are going through the roof as a result of ever increasing lead prices. This has prompted stories of a few shooters turning to the alternative steel shot. At present it's probably the only other product that is readily accessible at a sensible price but is it worth changing to steel to save a few bob? In my opinion - no. Steel is less efficient at doing it's job when it hits the clay because it isn't as heavy as lead and therefore has less force when it strikes the target; OK it's not a problem at closer range on practice clays but what about when you want to do the best you can at competition? Do you accept it's not so good at longer range and lose a couple of clays or do you change back to lead cartridges anyway? At more than 35 yards it is possible that some steel cartridges won't have enough clout to break a clay whereas lead is still breaking them at 60 yards. Steel shot loses it's speed faster than the heavier lead equivalent so to compensate and compare with lead a larger pellet is needed with perhaps a heftier gunpowder charge to help it on it's way, whatever we go for it seems to me that we would suffer with a recoil problem. If you do choose to try steel make sure that your gun is proofed for steel cartridges - if you're not sure whether it is or not, go to your friendly local gunsmith with the gun; to shoot steel cartridges with the wrong choke or wrong gun is asking for trouble.

Please come back soon to find some articles or ask me about cartridges.

Copyright of this page belongs to Andy, How to Break Clays.com - the website for the amateur clay shooter, July 2007.