Stan;
I have thought on these all these years but just don't have any other answer. I do not recall the exact load now, but it was taken directly from the DuPont handloaders guide. It used Rem SP hulls, Power Piston wad (forget the number now but was the one in the guide) CCI primers. The 7625 powder of course behind 1Ľ oz #5 shot. Was loading it for duck. It was supposed to give a velocity of about 1125 fps with a pressure around 7K. I had tried some of them prior to the duck season & they patterned well & went of with a nice Bang to them. Although I was primarily a .22lr squirrel hunter I did carry some of these out to see how they performed & were Death on the bushytails. Then we got to the Duck swamp with the Temps in the 20's. Had to break ice in some open water to get to the woods with the Jon Boat. My first try at a duck was an incoming Mallard @ no more than 30 yds if that far. He shivered a bit but kept flying so gave him the other barrel & he did come down but hit the water swimming. Both shots had a very weak sound & hardly no recoil. My son aimed at his head with a little 20 loaded with 1oz of #6's & rolled him over. When we dressed it the 6's had penetrated deeply while the 5's had barely broken the skin. I can't say for sure but perhaps the secret was in the primers. The CCI's were comparatively mild primers, maybe they just weren't hot enough to light the 7625, don't know but they were the listed primers in the recipe I used. I did note the next guide I got that load along with several other similar ones had been dropped so perhaps I was not the only one who found them lacking in some conditions. Anyway for better or worse I quit using 7625 & went to Green Dot, have never had a problem with it. Anyway I am not a fan of extremely low pressure loads with anything other than Black. I have absolutely no qualms with loads in the 7K-8K range even in twist or damascus. My feeling is if a gun is not considered sound enough for that it needs to be Hung on the Wall & not used at all.
