doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com Doubles and slugs

I own quite a few side by sides. Ive always hunted grouse, pheasant and woodcock. Ive recently started bowhunting whitetail and i questioned whether or not you can shoot slugs safely thru side by sides? Most of my guns have 2 1/2 chambers and i saw the other day that 2 1/2 slugs are available.Ive never shot slugs and i guess i have the impression that there would be alot more recoil than the bird loads i shoot, potentially damaging stocks and whatnot, do any of you guys have any experience with this?

Equal slug weight vs. shot weight results in the same recoil. Some type slugs will go through tight shotgun chokes and some will not do so well. I don't use sabot type slugs in my doubles. Regulation can be a problem...Geo

Slugs of equal weight and velocity produce equal recoil to equivalent shot cartridges.
Most slugs are at higher velocity, and have recoil that will get your attention.
You may have difficulty shooting foster slugs well enough with your double to reliably place them on a deer beyond 40 or 50 yards. Only testing will tell.

The solution is handloading foster slug, just like it is for pellets. You can create whatever velocity and pressure suits your shotgun.

Regulating both barrels of the gun for slugs is another matter.

MN Joe,

I toyed with this for 5 minutes a while back. It CAN be done, but as a practical matter really isn't a great choice unless you just feel like a new challenge. As was said above, you CANNOT use Sabot slugs, which are meant for rifled shotgun barrels (I know...I know...which makes them basically a rifle.) You want the old type Foster slug, like Remington Slugger, for example. These are mde for smooth bores, and will fire through any choke safely because the projectile is considerably smaller than the bore. It is the flexible plastic "fins" which yhe projectile sits in front of that keep it centered in the tube. These fins will bend through any choke.

As a practical matter, though, a rib and single centered front bead dont make for very good sighting for "aiming small." This is one area an over and under would offer an advantage.

My general disposition is to use shotguns as shotguns, and rifles as rifles. The lone exception to this being a turkey shotgun which is set up with rifle sights and "aimed" accordingly.

NDG

My younger brother has used a Savage BSE 12 with slugs to take deer for decades. The gun is robust, with 30� tubes and mod/full chokes. It has a single non selective trigger that fires the mod tube first. A good thing, the mod choke barrel will consistently put it�s slug into a pop can at fifty yards. The full choke barrel does not. We don�t actually know where that one goes, as it won�t hit the thirty inch circle on a web printing stock end at ten yards.
He has taken many deer with the gun. He only loads the mod barrel.
I imported slug guns from France that performed better, but, always considered them a compromise I wasn�t interested in.

Best,
Ted

I have never shot at a deer with a shotgun. I did once carry a double shotgun on a deer hunt but did not get a shot. This was some 45 years ago when deer weren't the Vermin they are now in my area. Just prior to this my Wife had gone on a ladies only hunt on a wildlife management area where only shotguns were allowed. She carried my Richland 707 20 gauge double & killed a doe with it. We had sighted it in & the left (full choke) barrel hid dead center, with the right barrel shooting off by around 6". I don't recall for certain now but as I recall it crossed & hit to the left. I told her if she got a shot to pull the back trigger first, which she did. She was using standard Foster 2 3/4" factory loaded shells, Remington, as I recall.

There is a long standing tradition in the South of driving deer with hounds and using shotguns loaded with large buckshot, 0 and 00 sizes being the most popular, with 00 probably carrying the polls. It is effective, when used in tightly choked guns, out to about the range that slugs can be counted on to hit a deer's vitals out of a smoothbore shotgun with a bead for a sight.

Some of us call the big buckshot pellets "blue whistlers". A broadside shot is very effective. A frontal shot in the chest, not always so much, IMO.

SRH

For a long time, Iowa was slugs only for deer. And that's still how most deer are taken there (other than with bow or muzzleloader). Not being a deer hunter, I have no personal experience. But what I always heard (from those who didn't use rifled slug barrels) is that cylinder works the best.

Stan I've saw the term "Blue Whistler" in print but never knew what buck shot size they were referring to or where the term originated.

Peter's made a blue paper hull 12ga. load during this time period.

Ps...Since I was 13 years old I've shot all my deer with rifles.