Many economy shells do have a shotcup. Others use a wrapper, similar to the revolutionary and much touted Mark-5 shot collar.
Most of the doubleguns admired and used by the guys on this board pre-date the shotcup/wrapper by a good many years.
The steel head and SAMMI pressure specs would be my major concern with older guns.... my Miroku Brownings and modern autoclackers couldn't care less, and devour the cheapos with gusto. They pattern so poorly, that last week I ran the first 50 with my new BT-99 (Gun Club) and scored 24/25 recently from 27 with B-682 (Top Gun).
Federal 'Field and Range', which is an economy shell, has some of the hardest shot I've ever seen. I tested it because of the insanely tight patterns out of my IC/M Merkel.
