IndyArms 10,186 Posted July 11, 2009 Report Share Posted July 11, 2009 As a director of a local gunclub, I have access to bushels of empty 12 gauge hulls of all varieties! I set aside the WinAA's and the Remington STS's and Nitro Golds for the "good" trap loads I reload... well... That still leaves me with hundreds and hundreds federals, and Rio's and multitudes of other goodies... The RIO hull is a beautiful hull... pretty blue or green with nice, shiny brass bases... well... from there they get squirrely... Rio's are also known as "Cheddite" hulls and require 686 style primers... slightly larger than a standard 209 primer... a 209 will just fall out if you put it in a RIO hull... Likewise... they have a 6 point star crimp... almost EVERY other shell out there has an 8 point crimp, so I have to change the crimper stations over on the press... I was able to find cheddite primers at a local shop for $29.00 a thousand... so I snagged up a couple K. to go with the multitudes of Rio hulls I have... I looked for load data for the Cheddite hulls... found some sweet loads in the ounce and an eighth range and heavier... so I load up a bunch of these in the blue hulls: 1 1/2 oz. #4, Cheddite 209/686 Primers, WAA12R Wads, 30.6 Gn's of Longshot powder, yielding appx. 11,100 PSI, at 1315 FPS... Talk about a load that fucking KICKS... With the Saiga-12 on number 1 setting... (which wont eject trap loads consistently on the number 2 setting)... It was kicking hulls 15 feet to the front and right!! I then loaded up a box and a half of green Rio hulls with the following load... 1 1/8 oz. Copper Plated Magnum #4, Cheddite 209/686 Primers, WAA12F114 Wads ( instead of the windjammer wads the load recipe calls for) , 38.9 Gn's of Longshot Powder, yielding appx. 9,400 PSI, and 1585 FPS... Talk about a FIREBALL!!! It reminded me of a Mosin Nagant... There must have been a 3 foot diameter sphere of flame out the end of the muzzle!! Ya gotta love that!! These didnt kick near as bad... but I KNOW they were some SCREAMING loads... The wads were changed to the WAA12F114, because those have a 4 petal slit, compared to the Windjammers with an 8 petal slit. I didnt want the wads to fall away quite so fast, and this replacement will increase the practical range about 20 more yards... One thing about the RIO hulls that I DID NOT LIKE... was the fact that 1 out of every 6 or 7 hulls for some strange reason doesnt want to pre-crimp right... and when you final crimp it, its kind of weird... its not something you would notice at a glance... but if you look you can see that they arent QUITE perfect... AND... 1 in 15 or 20 will really screw up and get all creased when you try to pre-crimp them, and have to be unloaded and components reclaimed, and those hulls discarded. The ones with the "odd" crimps still go off WONDERFULLY, though... so I plan to load up a couple thousand of them for hunting rounds... that way when I shoot them, there is NO need to retreive empty hulls... whereas if I load them for trap loads, I will be getting them back when I grab the empty hulls from the trap ranges... and I do not want to reload them more than once... all in all... I plan to continue to load RIO hulls till I run out of Rio primers... and then I will probably NOT load anymore... Although... with the price of the primers for these so cheap, I still might grab a couple more thousand and reload the once fired hulls till my arms fall off!! Would I recommend reloading RIO hulls??? *IF* you have access to the primers CHEAP... You plan to only load the hulls ONCE, and are not concerned about every one being perfect... sure... They seem to come out nice... Just thought I would share my RIO reloading experiences of the day with you all... Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Glockmonger 18 Posted July 11, 2009 Report Share Posted July 11, 2009 What, NO pics? damn Quote Link to post Share on other sites
bigcec1 72 Posted July 11, 2009 Report Share Posted July 11, 2009 As much skeet as I shoot I should look into reloading shot gun shells I do alot of handgun and rifle reloading. But uhh no big fire Pic,s ? ehh how bout a mosin nagant pic and we cant pretend its the shot gun. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Bvamp 604 Posted July 11, 2009 Report Share Posted July 11, 2009 hah you got me Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Gaddis 1,689 Posted July 12, 2009 Report Share Posted July 12, 2009 Shit, those powder charges listed sound kind of HIGH. Been a few years since I last reloaded shot shell, but 13 grains (or so?) sounds more in line. Don't want you to end up like Mr. Bolt in Head experienced Lee Navy rifle re loader a few years back. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
IndyArms 10,186 Posted July 12, 2009 Author Report Share Posted July 12, 2009 Been a few years since I last reloaded shot shell, but 13 grains (or so?) sounds more in line. That may very well be true, bro... for whatever specific powder and load you were making up back then... Lots of powders use loads containing less than 20 grains of powder... I load trap loads all the time that only require 15 to 18 grains of TITEWAD powder, depending on the velocities I want... These loads are for "LONGSHOT" which is a bit denser of a powder, so you need "more" to get the load specifics... The data are strictly from the Hodgdon reloading website... here: http://data.hodgdon.com/shotshell_load.asp Plug in 12 gauge, longshot powder, lead shot loads, and cheddite hulls... Once you get the specifics entered into the drop down boxes... ( it takes a few seconds between choosings...) click on the brownish "Get Data" button to see the loads... Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Gaddis 1,689 Posted July 13, 2009 Report Share Posted July 13, 2009 Wow, the way that's set up is pretty cool! I guess you can't argue with Hodgdon data if you are using their powder. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
IndyArms 10,186 Posted July 13, 2009 Author Report Share Posted July 13, 2009 Wow, the way that's set up is pretty cool! Gaddis, I agree totally!! I printed almost every page of their shotshell data from that site... and compiled my own loading manual... ( did it at work, so... LOL ) I also downloaded every page of the metallic cartridge load data for the calibers that I currently reload. When I get other calibers to reload, I will just print out all the data for that caliber and add it to my loading manual. Alliant, VihtaVouri, Ballistic products, etc... all have similar load data spots on their webpages... You can download, or print all kinds of data! Its also nice when you are contemplating making a certain load, you can reference several manufacturers sites to get the one recipe that best suits your current component inventory. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
Gaddis 1,689 Posted July 14, 2009 Report Share Posted July 14, 2009 Too bad these online reloading resources don't seem to show any TMJ data (Rainier, Berry's) though. Quote Link to post Share on other sites
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