Cartridges

[chippy]

On boxing Day I decided to sort out all the cartridges I had chucked into a box from the bottom of my shooting bag and skeet vest pockets after a shoot. I had about 200 of all makes from comp X to jockers to black gold and express supremes. I sorted them into sizes and put them in boxes. I've shot the last two reg shoots with them and scored a 88 and 86 my highest scores for a few months. Do cartridges make any difference?

 

[No Bunny]

 Do cartridges make any difference?

Only in your head - as you've just proved!!   

 

[westley]

I did a similar thing many years ago, but with a mix of wads plastic/fibre. Strangely enough I saw no perceptible difference either   !

 

[Oldblaster]

Its just what you get used to, recoil might change but little difference in performance. Shot two rounds one with plaswads and one with fibre, scored better with fibre by a few clays. 

 

[Doctor Lecter]

I am sure any shell on todays market  is so much more consistent than me as a shooter !     but  if you believe in a particular one    I am sure its a advantage ,    

 

[chippy]

The only one that I could notice any difference was comp X which was much softer than all the others.

 

[MJJ]

I usually do this if i am going out with friends for a practice. It just uses up all the odds and sods accumulated over time. I do try to stick with one brand for comps though.

 

[Cosmicblue]

Yup, cart choice is another head game thing for us normal mortals, I find the sort that make a loud bang when you pull the trigger are generally best...

 

[squimp]

I have just tried some Bornaghi game cartridges. They worked just fine and are £100 per thousand less than the major brand equivalents...…

I may have to pattern test  a few -  just to convince myself that they are okay !! 

Cartridges do funny things to your head, especially when they cost £350 a thousand. 

 

[Paul120]

For most sporting targets they don't make any noticeable difference. I shot a round yesterday with most of it shot with 21g 9s and broke the targets ok enough. They were rubbish on the ABT though.  Out of a round of 10 I hit 3 first barrel with them in ghe first  and 6 second barrels using 28g 7.5 Fblacks  in the second. 

so I guess they can in principle break them but not reliably

Good practice for using the second barrel. 

 

[Wonko the Sane]

What Cosmicblue said

My skill set is so limited that my cart choice is boundless - OK, almost.  Although 9's will work in many instances I only use them for skeet.  AFA 71/2's and 8's are concerned for the most part I don't really care since the games I shoot don't seem to either, the only exception being the zippy 28gm/7.5's(2nd bbl) and 8's(1st bbl) I use for ZZ's.  I suppose that the bigger shot will break targets at longer distances but I've killed targets at stupid distances (for me) with 8's.  I used 8's in the 1st barrel for pigeons even.  So the position that I enjoy is being able to buy and shoot whatever is on sale.  And that usually comes to about $200/K around here.  Not having to do cart nit picking is one of my few joys in shopping but a substantial one.

 

[Martinj]

Sorry for jumping in a bit late:

I tend to agree that if you have a mix of good quality cartridges it won't matter, if you put the shot in the right place the result should be predictable,  HOWEVER, due to my inner demons, I have got to a point where I don't want to mix them up at all, there is an advantage in using all one brand/shot size and that is that you don't have to even think about your ammo and that's one thing less to worry about. If I have one odd cartridge In my pocket I have to think about when to use it, which target? which barrel etc. and I just don't want that distraction.  All I want to think about is where to put the shot.