The title may be a little misleading as this isn't so much a cartridge test of the new Eley Blue rather a review of me reacquainting myself with shot size 9's and in particular 24 gram loads.
If it matters then the shells are averagely well made, the crimps aren't the crispest I've ever seen,the steel height is just about the only justification for their £190 price tag ! The pellets though were very very even in size and appeared bright and polished too.
For some time I've been after a reduced load shell specifically to help reduce recoil fatigue over a days clay shooting. Back in the 80's shot size 9's were quite common in ESP shoots alongside 7.5's of course but when 8's came on the scene most people decided that their long range performance shortfall meant there were better choices available. A few years ago we had the 21g load which I found wanting hence my trying out 9's !! It's worth noting that there are significantly more pellets in 24g load of 9s (512) compared to 28g load of 8's (405) so coverage and density are going to be fantastic but at only just over half the weight for each individual pellet, kinetick energy is much poorer.
Having got hold of a thousand of these I decided to first try them out in practice, only on stands that logic and experience told me they would break the clays if pointed correctly. Being careful to select birds this way meant I could gauge the manner of the breaks rather than worry whether I was even going to hit them ! Well, unsurprisingly they coped really well and using a combination of the Superb 8's in 28g and EB 24g 9's I managed a reasonable round of 89.
What became obvious very quickly was that the breaks were very nearly indistinguishable when shooting MIDI clays with either 1/2 or 3/4 choke, even at ranges approaching 35 yards you get surprisingly good breaks on edge on MIDI clays, the reason for emphasising the midi bit is that the same is not true of either rabbits or Standard clays.
Two days later I shot another practice 100 birder only this time forcing myself to shoot each and every stand as they came using 24g 9's to see what they won't break. Any side on rabbit inside 25-30 yards breaks but never convincingly, neither the 1/2 or 3/4 choke will mince these in the way 28g loads using common sizes do. They don't like quartering rabbits either, after 1 poor hit and 2 misses on these I was forced to swap over to 28g and the difference was astounding, the whole ground shakes up compared to the 9's and breaks are almost routine.
Slowly I was beginning to see the limits of these shells capabilities, Standard clays are another potential problem, again it is very very difficult if not impossile to achieve anything like the sort of crushing breaks if these are edge on. They will break well enough at short to just under medium range but on one stand I had 3 straight misses on a 35 yard+ crossing / quartering away bird which upon swapping to 8's I broke with no problem.
One stand featured a Standard going away rising flat teal at 45+ yards with the dome visible and incredibly the 9's broke
them time after time with both chokes. Another stand that forced me to stop using them featured a side on Standard teal thrown at 40+ yards and the scorer even remarked at the time delay between shot and my only break here, again once I changed to 8's the breaks were impressive. The pattern was definitely beginning to emerge that these 24g 9's can kill really well but the clay needs to show belly or top, Standards are a definite issue if edge on and over medium range. Tower clays break into a million pieces even with Skeet choke. They broke good teal OK as long as some top is visible, when breaks became weak and I changed to 28g load, the difference in breaks were immediately obvious. The second round produced a score of 88.
Going back to rabbits, it's a strange sensation using these because you see very little debris being kicked up and of course the recoil is much less noticeable, even the noise seems less loud. One stand featured a curling clay at 40+ yards break point followed by another a bit higher and again looping but even further at maybe 50+ yards and all broke really well. I have long held the view that you can tell the difference in speed between different shells and I would be happy to prove this with these. When I shoot this sort of presentation with 28g Superbs the lead with pull away maintained seems to be around one and a half feet just prior to the final shove, these 9's needed half as much again to get proper breaks. Nothing wrong with that in principal but my finding were that they don't feel as fast getting out there. I think it's a combination of slower initial speed coupled to the fact that 9's will slow down faster and this becomes noticeable on longer birds and is still a factor even at medium range.
Having established that they can only be used in conjuction with my main shells I decided to use them in competition. Now if you suffer palpitations if you so much as change chokes then clearly carrying two different shells is not advisable but I can cope with that sort of thing. I just happened to shoot really well last week using 65 x 9's and 35 x 8's I surprised myself with a 96 which drew with GD for HG. I simply chose them when I knew the fact the clay was showing face meant it would break; where distance or edge on orientation dictated it I used 28g.
This Sunday I used them again in similar ratio and shot well for a 92, GD won with 97 with second and third going to local hot shot W. Stein and the mega shot Kevin Howland with 93's...... 5 of my misses came on the same stand using 28g 8's on a silly pair of distant going aways so definitely not the fault of either shell.
I haven't touched on the recoil aspect much yet, is it worth all the hassle ? If I'm honest yes and no, it's true the recoil is very noticeably reduced, no access to equipment means I'd be guessing but certainly 30%+ min less so well worth buying them for recoil reasons but I would like them just a touch faster if possible so I'm already on the lookout for the next batch of 24g 9's from someone like RC or Fiocchi and also intend to do proper testing with 24g shot size 8 to see if breaks can be improved when shooting rabbits and Standard clays.
What will really please you when you shoot these is how forgiving they can be of shooter error, they really do break stuff with top or belly at good distances and second shot recovery is impressively easy as a result but I dare say they're not suitable for newbies who won't always know when not to use them. They were designed for close Skeet targets at the end of the day.
If it matters then the shells are averagely well made, the crimps aren't the crispest I've ever seen,the steel height is just about the only justification for their £190 price tag ! The pellets though were very very even in size and appeared bright and polished too.
For some time I've been after a reduced load shell specifically to help reduce recoil fatigue over a days clay shooting. Back in the 80's shot size 9's were quite common in ESP shoots alongside 7.5's of course but when 8's came on the scene most people decided that their long range performance shortfall meant there were better choices available. A few years ago we had the 21g load which I found wanting hence my trying out 9's !! It's worth noting that there are significantly more pellets in 24g load of 9s (512) compared to 28g load of 8's (405) so coverage and density are going to be fantastic but at only just over half the weight for each individual pellet, kinetick energy is much poorer.
Having got hold of a thousand of these I decided to first try them out in practice, only on stands that logic and experience told me they would break the clays if pointed correctly. Being careful to select birds this way meant I could gauge the manner of the breaks rather than worry whether I was even going to hit them ! Well, unsurprisingly they coped really well and using a combination of the Superb 8's in 28g and EB 24g 9's I managed a reasonable round of 89.
What became obvious very quickly was that the breaks were very nearly indistinguishable when shooting MIDI clays with either 1/2 or 3/4 choke, even at ranges approaching 35 yards you get surprisingly good breaks on edge on MIDI clays, the reason for emphasising the midi bit is that the same is not true of either rabbits or Standard clays.Two days later I shot another practice 100 birder only this time forcing myself to shoot each and every stand as they came using 24g 9's to see what they won't break. Any side on rabbit inside 25-30 yards breaks but never convincingly, neither the 1/2 or 3/4 choke will mince these in the way 28g loads using common sizes do. They don't like quartering rabbits either, after 1 poor hit and 2 misses on these I was forced to swap over to 28g and the difference was astounding, the whole ground shakes
up compared to the 9's and breaks are almost routine.Slowly I was beginning to see the limits of these shells capabilities, Standard clays are another potential problem, again it is very very difficult if not impossile to achieve anything like the sort of crushing breaks if these are edge on. They will break well enough at short to just under medium range but on one stand I had 3 straight misses on a 35 yard+ crossing / quartering away bird which upon swapping to 8's I broke with no problem.
One stand featured a Standard going away rising flat teal at 45+ yards with the dome visible and incredibly the 9's broke
them time after time with both chokes. Another stand that forced me to stop using them featured a side on Standard teal thrown at 40+ yards and the scorer even remarked at the time delay between shot and my only break here, again once I changed to 8's the breaks were impressive. The pattern was definitely beginning to emerge that these 24g 9's can kill really well but the clay needs to show belly or top, Standards are a definite issue if edge on and over medium range. Tower clays break into a million pieces even with Skeet choke. They broke good teal OK as long as some top is visible, when breaks became weak and I changed to 28g load, the difference in breaks were immediately obvious. The second round produced a score of 88.
Going back to rabbits, it's a strange sensation using these because you see very little debris being kicked up and of course the recoil is much less noticeable, even the noise seems less loud. One stand featured a curling clay at 40+ yards break point followed by another a bit higher and again looping but even further at maybe 50+ yards and all broke really well. I have long held the view that you can tell the difference in speed between different shells and I would be happy to prove this with these. When I shoot this sort of presentation with 28g Superbs the lead with pull away maintained seems to be around one and a half feet just prior to the final shove, these 9's needed half as much again to get proper breaks. Nothing wrong with that in principal but my finding were that they don't feel as fast getting out there. I think it's a combination of slower initial speed coupled to the fact that 9's will slow down faster and this becomes noticeable on longer birds and is still a factor even at medium range.
Having established that they can only be used in conjuction with my main shells I decided to use them in competition. Now if you suffer palpitations if you so much as change chokes then clearly carrying two different shells is not advisable but I can cope with that sort of thing. I just happened to shoot really well last week using 65 x 9's and 35 x 8's I surprised myself with a 96 which drew with GD for HG. I simply chose them when I knew the fact the clay was showing face meant it would break; where distance or edge on orientation dictated it I used 28g.
This Sunday I used them again in similar ratio and shot well for a 92, GD won with 97 with second and third going to local hot shot W. Stein and the mega shot Kevin Howland with 93's...... 5 of my misses came on the same stand
using 28g 8's on a silly pair of distant going aways so definitely not the fault of either shell.I haven't touched on the recoil aspect much yet, is it worth all the hassle ? If I'm honest yes and no, it's true the recoil is very noticeably reduced, no access to equipment means I'd be guessing but certainly 30%+ min less so well worth buying them for recoil reasons but I would like them just a touch faster if possible so I'm already on the lookout for the next batch of 24g 9's from someone like RC or Fiocchi and also intend to do proper testing with 24g shot size 8 to see if breaks can be improved when shooting rabbits and Standard clays.
What will really please you when you shoot these is how forgiving they can be of shooter error, they really do break stuff with top or belly at good distances and second shot recovery is impressively easy as a result but I dare say they're not suitable for newbies who won't always know when not to use them. They were designed for close Skeet targets at the end of the day.
