Last year I used my grandfather's duck gun to take a few eiders and blacks. I had loaded #5 Bi and #6 ITX in plastic 2 3/4" hulls with plastic wads. This is the Cashmore I mentioned on the recent Cashmore thread and is chambered for 3" shells and 1 3/8 oz. lead.
So now I want to use fiber wads, so I figure I ought to use 3" hulls to avoid gas blowby in the 3" chambers. I've got some old 3" hulls from steel loads (used in a newer, uglier gun) and I can get new 3" plastic hulls so I can play with roll crimping, but is there anywhere I can get new 3" paper hulls so I can go whole hog?
And there is the question of powder. Historically, what powders would have been used in 3" waterfowling loads in the 1930"s? and What sort of burn rates did they have? and What sort of pressures did they develop? and What modern powders are most similar?
Judging by my grandfather's adjustable brass shot dipper, 1 1/8 Bi 5's is equivalent to 1 3/8 of lead by volume, but with the full chokes I'm thinking of reducing that to 1 oz Bi, similar to 11/4 lead. By the way, as a teenager, I was introduced to duck hunting using this gun and modern (late '70s) 1 1/4 of lead 4's loads which were very effective on the infrequent occasions that I connected. (Warning to fine gun enthusiasts with children: Teaching a young person to shoot and hunt with nice English sidelocks may permanently impair their ability to recognize worth in other guns.)
The bismuth load data in my 5th ed. Lyman's is all for heavier loads at what seem unnecessary velocities. Is there more useful data somewhere? The Hodgdon website listed only one powder which I'd never heard of.
Thanks, Sumner
