Thread: Would like to see paper shotgun ammo on the market

No one appears to be stocking it in NZ, although on the kilwell page they list gamebore regal game paper out of stock.
From an environmental perspective plastic hulls are not biodegradable and its easy to loose the spent ones in long grass, especially if using my semi auto.
The wads are horrible things that persist in the environment too, ive seen plenty of the things washed up on beaches.
I see that there are some brands with fibre wads that I use for clay targets for this reason.
Overseas there are polymer wads in some ammo that turn to goo when they get wet, so it looks like its something they are trying to address.

THERE ARE OPTIONS... paper cases were a mongrel if they got wet..... you hit nail on head though with semi comment...you want to pick up all your empties,use a break open gun.

I've even found the ejectors on my O/U can fling them away quite far. Quite a problem at night when you are shooting possums.
Yes paper had their issues for sure, I think the paper is impregnated with wax and/or some sort of varnish.
I dont like getting ammo wet at the best of times however.

Yea we need a environmentally friendly option that is comparable in price,
Makes me think about finding new hobby. when i see how much rubbish my club generates.

Originally Posted by muka88

Yea we need a environmentally friendly option that is comparable in price,
Makes me think about finding new hobby. when i see how much rubbish my club generates.

Agreed, those wads are terrible things, thankfully it's slowly changing.
Federal also make paper target loads, but not available in NZ.
More ammo has fibre wads options these days, but there are bio polymer wads that dissolve in water now on the market too.
Look at these paper gamebore loads I found. They are made to the exact specs for older guns with 65mm chambers.
Will be great to try out in my old SxS, would be good to see more people buying it so we get a reliable supply imported.
Killwell are the distributors here for gamebore, their ammo is top notch quality.

Would be keen to try it out if they had a reasonably priced clay busting cartridge.
38 bucks would be an issue for me.

that ammunition is targeted (pun intended) at the driven pheasant type end of the market.... the cases will MOSTLY get picked up and what arent will EVENTUALLY break down and the wads wont last long.... now if you happen to find somewhere that USES them...see if you can aquire the empty shells.. win win,Im sure others would be happy to take some off your hands just for grins n giggles reloading.

Originally Posted by muka88

Would be keen to try it out if they had a reasonably priced clay busting cartridge.
38 bucks would be an issue for me.

These are game loads and priced accordingly, the price for the plastic ones was not alot different from memory. I certainly won't waste them on clays, but these are well suited for older shotguns, in fact Gamebore produce a good amount of their loads in 2.5 inch shells due to the large number of older guns still used in the UK, seems the UK was quite late adopting 2.75 inch shells.
Gamebore have a very well priced target load called Evo with fibre wads for less than the eley Olympic blues too (only $15 per box of 25)
Worth looking into. Would not be a bad idea to approach gamebore to express interest in seeing a paper target load on the market.
Would be good if there was a recycling program where clubs could return the hulls to the factory for reloading too, although the ones used by the likes of falcon are not really designed to be reloaded and performance could potentially be affected after reuse, also the problem of counting reloads would need to be addressed.

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

that ammunition is targeted (pun intended) at the driven pheasant type end of the market.... the cases will MOSTLY get picked up and what arent will EVENTUALLY break down and the wads wont last long.... now if you happen to find somewhere that USES them...see if you can aquire the empty shells.. win win,Im sure others would be happy to take some off your hands just for grins n giggles reloading.

These paper hulls will be perfect for reloading black powder loads, which I intend on doing.

In what parallel universe are the hulls used by falcon NOT good for reloading????? Go and look in any reloading manual and the amount of recipes for cheddite hulls is mind boggling. They are VERY reloadable

I was told they are not reloadable.
Supposed to be designed for single use only.
Winchester AA are the ones everybody uses for reloading because they are compression formed, but the newer ones are poorer quality and not preferred.
The base wads can somehow dislodge and get stuck down the barrel apparently.
You saying falcon uses cheddite hulls? I didn't know that if that's the case, your right there is plenty of cheddite load data.

They have a good reloadable life with smokeless although primer seating depth can be an issue. Black powder develops a lot more heat than smokeless and they kind of melt a bit. Mind you all plastic shells do

yes falcon uses cheddite hulls..... look in your reloading manual..... my lyman one has chapter that is all about hull ID.... AT ONE POINT you could buy new primed cheddite hulls from gunworks for not a huge amount.
the headstamps are a dead giveaway. said it before..for muck around loads,possums up trees,bunnies etc you have to be being rather silly to not make a usable safe shotgun load for a break open gun.

Originally Posted by Marty Henry

They have a good reloadable life with smokeless although primer seating depth can be an issue. Black powder develops a lot more heat than smokeless and they kind of melt a bit. Mind you all plastic shells do

Yup, exactly, plastic wads are a big no-no with black powder too, leaves a ton of melted plastic in the barrel.
Even though paper hulls cannot be reloaded as many times as plastic, they are a perfect shell for black powder loads because they dont melt.

bollocks.......yes you will get some melt holes in some cases..where your home made black powder has a sulphur lump that sticks..but that might be 1 in 20 cases from the few I put together a couple of years back. I hazard a guess you could run a small thin card sheet as tube liner of case and prevent that too. but seriously...dont over think it for snotting a few possums out of trees, just poke a few loads together and go and have fun. break open guns allow all sorts of digressions to be OK...