leeklm

Night & Day

I have never tried rifled slugs in my rifled barrel though. I am definitly going to give it a run!

eldeguello

Speaking of averages, IMO a rifled barrel with the right loads will usually outshoot a smoothie. BUT I have seen some smoothbores that would amaze you! The old Ithaca 20" smoothbore Deerslayer I used to own would put three of a certain lot of Remington Foster-type slugs into 3" at 100 yards. A friend's Remington 870 would do the same with a Brenneke. Butmine just would not shoot those Brennekes at all.

Yes, you CAN shoot thoseFoster-type rifled slugs in a rifled barrel. In some gunsthey shoot very well, in others, they crud up the bore real fast with LEAD! When this happens, they stop shooting accurately.....

IF I owned a rifled bore deer "shotgun", I would not handicap it with 1930's technology (Foster "rifled slugs"). I would use the best available (the one that shoots best in my barrel!!) modern sabot-type "bulleted" shell.......

Range: The Foster-type slug is pretty much finished by the time it gets to 100 yards, max. The bulleted-sabot type from a rifled barrel might be OK to 150, and maybe even 200 yards. BUT, remember, ALL single-projectile shotgun cartridges use bullets or whatever that are designed to poop out before they've gone very far, since most places that require shotguns for deer do so for safety reasons. They don't want bullets or slugs flying into the next county!

lovethebigguns

mtucker,

These guys hit the nail on the head.
My Winchester 1300 with the smooth barrel with "rifled slugs" can do the "old paper plate" thing at 100 yards, and when I was a teen-ager that's all I used and I killed at least 1 deer per year with that set up. I ALWAYS kept my shots at 75-80 yards or less though. As I got a little older and became a better shot then I bought a rifled slug barrel, a Leupold scope and some Winchester Supreme Partition Gold sabots and can now reach out there in the 150 yard range.

I believe you should ask yourself a three part question:
"How far am I intending to shoot, am I good enough to shoot that far, and am I going to scope my shotgun?"

I believe if you're not intending to shoot past that 75-100 yard range you should use the smooth barrel with some good sights like fiber optics (not just a bead) and the "rifled" slugs. That is a very adequite set up for that range and damn, with those slugs save you a lot of money versus the premium sabots.

And I also believe if you want to shoot farther than that you need to spend some money and get a good scope, some good mounts and the rifled barrel and PRACTICE PRACTICE before you try to make that 200 yard shot. IMO I think that if you buy a rifled barrel and spend 5 bucks apeice on slugs and don't intend on scoping your shot gun you've kinda wasted your money. It takes a pretty special person to be able to shoot 200 yards open sighted! So with out a scope you've "bottle necked" your set up. Again fellas, just my opinion!

Sorry if I rambled on!