I found this on another website I am a member of. I think this sums it up better than I can so I copied it and am pasting it here.
Armchair turkey ballistic junkies have generally come to accept 1.25" penetration in ballistic gel to be the minimum required to cleanly kill turkeys. Penetration in ballistic gel is a much more useful metric than foot-pounds of energy because it is accurate across all different pellet materials (lead, HS, HW, TSS, etc) For example, a TSS 9 will penetrate as deeply as a lead 4, even though the lead 4 carries significantly more ft-lbs of energy. The TSS penetrates so deeply because of its greater density and small size (reduced surface area). So now for your question...
Per KPY Ballistics, lead 6s at 1200 fps yield 1.25" of penetration in ballistic at 0' elevation and 70 degrees to 52 yds. At 1050 fps (magnum load) they will do it to 47 yds,
Lead 5s at 1200 penetrate 1.25" to 64 yds and when launched at 1050, 58 yds,
My takeaway is that to maximize range with Winch LBs, one should choose 5s. The only way to choose between the standard and magnum (slower) load is to buy a box of each and pattern through your setup. The range at which your pattern density falls to 100 in a 10" circle is your max range. Sixes may put more pellets on target but I would not trust them with regards to penetration and killing potential beyond 50 yds.
Last edited by pullit; 06/01/21.
