[Rick618]

gameandfish.about.com/lib...06402a.htmThere are three different types of shotgun barrels through which slugs can be fired: traditional smoothbore (any choke, with or without rifle-type sights); smoothbore with a screw-in rifled choke tube; or full-length rifled. In terms of ammo performance, it's the barrel that counts. The type of shotgun action - auto, pump, bolt or break-open - is not really significant. Nevertheless, the situation is not mix-and-match. For satisfactory performance, the type of slug ammunition you use needs to be matched to the type of barrel you are using.A smooth-bore slug barrel does not spin its projectile, so its range is limited. A smoothbore barrel with a screw-in rifled choke is somewhat better because it will impart at least some stabilizing spin to a departing solid or sabot-design slug, and a full-length-rifled barrel is best (which is why high-power rifles are not smoothbore). In general terms, sabots are intended to be spun. The faster they spin, the better they work, the more stable the flight of the projectile they enclose and the more consistently they separate from the bullet. So, the rule of thumb is essentially this: All types of slug ammo, sabot and non-sabot, provide their best accuracy and the longest effective range when fired in a full-rifle barrel. A smoothbore barrel with rifled choke tube will be somewhat less accurate, and a pure smoothbore offers the least accuracy. You can safely shoot all types of slugs in all types of barrels, but if you use premium-grade sabot ammo in a smoothbore, you're wasting your money, and will likely get less accuracy than with a conventional old Foster-type soft lead slug, since the sabot won't properly separate from the bullet and it actually de-stabilizes the trajectory more than a solid-type load.

 

[Rick618]

Some of the Foster slugs have no fins and are very similar to the Minnies www.ballisticproducts.com/products/Slugs/slugs.htm and Brenneke has some unique sabots that fit in regular shotgun wads....www.ballisticproducts.com/products/Ammunition/Brenneke/brenneke.htm Edited by: Rick618 at: 1/13/03 9:08:38 pm

 

[Rick618]

Those are loads for which the recipes will come when you order the slug, also if you open some of the modern slugs, either the Winchester or Federal still use that plan style Fosters....no ribs, or they did years ago, when I used to dig them out of the range backstop.As you know as the ejecta leaves the shell setback occurs at ignition and then there is friction on the wad as it goes down the barrel. With a shotstring you can see that the wad actually stretches in length and the pellets are kept within the shotcup. In a smoothbore there might be some spin inparted from the fins in the barrel, but I would think that once the projectile hits the air that the resistance coming into contact with the fins would begin to impart the spin needed to stabilize the slug.One issue with using some of these rifled slugs in a rifled barrel would be the handedness of the helix....if you place a right hand set slug into a left hand helix barrel, which rifling would play or would it just destabilize the projectile?I'm sure Brenneke has some more information at their website, as I don't use them since they don't pattern well for me. If you click on the slug, the fins indicate according to Brenneke:"that they are compressable and able to travel through any choke". The supersabot looks pretty interesting!!www.brenneke.de/