doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Chokes and Choke Information

Writing in the current Shooting Sportsman, Michael McIntosh says "Shot cartridges are so efficient nowadays that choke is all but obsolete."

I've been looking unsuccessfully for a valuable thread a month or two ago of methods used by members to open chokes. the increments etc.

I'd like to send it off with a couple barrels to my gunsmith hunting buddy, and would appreciate assistance in finding that information.

The cautionary notes re POI were particularly interesting.

This site has the choke increments for each gauge - might help some:

http://www.hallowellco.com/choke_chart.htm

And to think that McIntosh, by his own admission, was once an active trapshooter. 'All but' is quite a disclaimer. Must mean that choke is obsolete unless you need choke for something - like for breaking a target or killing a bird beyond about 25 yards.

It was indeed the advent of the modern plastic shotcup that made 100 straight a statistical certainty (Winchester, et al), but this is only so with a barrel that will deliver a 70% or better pattern at the target plane. This takes choke at any distance over 25 yards, assuming lead shot. Steel and the harder non-tox stuff does indeed shoot very tight with little or no choke.

Mac is a good writer, and I enjoy his stuff... but physics is still physics. We may well need less choke these days to duplicate the performance of pre-plastic times, but for most long range gunning choke is hardly obsolete.

George Digweed says he shoots full and full on everything. As he is the most successful clay target shooter alive and makes a living at it and plays for big money then tight choke does matter.

At my skill level I am probably better off following Mac's philosophy than George's.

Best,

Mike

At one time in my shooting life I would have agreed with Michael McIntosh, but, no longer. I did use cylinder-bored guns, with heavy loads of hard shot in one-peice plastic shot cups, for decades for everything, including ducks over decoys. Worked fine. However, as I now need and much prefer lighter guns, I need lighter loads. I simply cannot any longer even shoot those heavy, 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 oz load, even in 8 and 9 pound guns.

In last decade I have been finding 7,0 to 6,0 lb hammer doubles, with long barrels (75 cm or longer), tightly choked, and 1,0 oz loads to be just as deadly and far more suitable and enjoyable to hunt with.

I do shoot lots of bismuth ammo each fall on ducks and geese and find that it patterns really tightly, as tight or tighter than high Sb lead shot that is Cu-plated. Only problem I have with 1,0 oz of #5 bismuth is that ducks and geese shot at up to about 40 yards are sometimes riddled with deep-penetrating shot pellets.

Niklas

After reading Michael McIntosh's writings on choke and how he could break targets beyond 40 yards with a cylinder bore I hung a clay target on a bush and measured off 40 yards. I used a cylinder bore gun and shot at it with 1 ounce of 7 1/2 shot and it didn't even move. I walked up to it and could see where a pellet had grazed it but it didn't move that I could see.
I repeated the shot about six or seven times with the same result.
(Once it did fall off the bush without breaking)
This led me to beleive that MM either could not judge distance or he was full of it.
Pete

Of course you can break a clay target at or beyond 40 yards using a cylinder choked gun and 7-1/2 shot. IF you hit it with 3 or more pellets! If you could do that RELIABLY, most trap shooters would be using cylinder bored guns. I'd be surprised to learn that MMCI uses a lot of cylinder bored guns for medium to longer range shots. I find it easier to believe he is just puffing a bit of gun-writers' smoke at the readers. I'm quite sure he is not that stupid, but I could always be wrong.

You need Mr. Legg's three pellets (or more) and a moving target instead of a stationary one to get the correct result. Once the pellets have fractured the spinning clay target, centrifugal force will split the target apart.

Very good point! I agree.
thank you,

http://bbs.shootingsportsman.com/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=38187

Might be of interest.