Home Forums Reloading Shotshells new to shotshells

i was trying to duplicate a load I found in my Lyman manual. It called for winchester AA hulls, winchester 209 primers, WAA12r wads and 38 grains of blue dot powder, 10 O-buck for a velocity of 1375 at 9,500 psi. To start off with the lee-load-all called for a .198 powder bushing (the biggest one it comes with). I dumped ten powder loads in my scale and they averaged 35 to 36 grains. 2 to 3 grains less than what the load called for but i figured that was OK. the buckshot loaded fine but the crimps were horrible. I found if I put a BP overshot card on top of the buckshot it crimped great. My question is: will this overshot card increase the pressure and if so how much? Will these be safe to shoot?

Should be fine. A couple other things you could try - put a card between the shot and the wad, or put some sandpaper on a dowel and open up the bushing a little. Go slow until you get it to throw the right powder charge. Which brings up a question, was this the first ten charges you threw? It can take longer than that for the powder to settle down in the powder hopper. I usually will fill the powder hopper to the same level every time I'm going to reload, even if it's just a couple shells, then lightly tap the side of the powder hopper with a screwdriver (can be anything, just use the same thing every time) for about 30 seconds to settle the powder, then throw dummy charges until I get 3 in a row that are the same. Try to develop a routine that includes pushing the shot/powder selector with the same force and pulling down/pushing up the handle with the same force each time. The reason for this is that anything wiggles the reloader will change the amount of powder and shot charges slightly. That said, shotgun reloading doesn't necessarily take this level of attention to detail; you won't notice it as much as if you were reloading for rifle or handgun... But, once you start reloading it's a slippery slope; you'll probably end up reloading for rifle and handgun soon, if you don't already... Might as well develop good habits early on.

+1

If you are only loading a box or two, throw the charge, pour it onto your scale pan, trickle the last acouple of grains to get what you need. The added powder might make up the height difference and improve your crimp.