Anyone tried Federal BlackCloud Ammo ?
- Thread starter Greg P
- Start date
Dave Sikorski
Well-known member
Wasn't impressed.
Watched an early season goose take two shots of BB's at 20 yds in the chest and not fall. It's just steel, nothing fancy.
-D
Watched an early season goose take two shots of BB's at 20 yds in the chest and not fall. It's just steel, nothing fancy.
-D
Paul "Pablo" Britton
Active member
I'll say this:
They sure do a nice job of marketing.
I wonder if the different weights of shot will decelerate at different rates, thus lengthening the shot string.
I was shooting bismuth No-Tox, but the price just went too high for me.
I've switched to heavy steel. It patterns well for me and seems to drop birds better than my blind partners' plain steel.
They sure do a nice job of marketing.
I wonder if the different weights of shot will decelerate at different rates, thus lengthening the shot string.
I was shooting bismuth No-Tox, but the price just went too high for me.
I've switched to heavy steel. It patterns well for me and seems to drop birds better than my blind partners' plain steel.
Bought a box of 12ga 4s last week.I'll try it in December on divers and let you know.I finalized my 12 ga Bizmuth load the other day;WW AA 23/4" hull,Fed 209 primer,win red wad,30 gr Longshot,and 11/4oz of #5 Bizmuth,for 1300fps.Make sure you use a scale when weighing powder and shot.By volume,11/4 oz of bismuth = 11/2 oz of lead.I use an adjustable charge bar on my Mec and set it up in accordance with Hodgdon's loading manual.Waiting for wads from Balistic Products to finalize my 1oz 20ga load.
Dave Sikorski
Well-known member
Paul-
I agree.
I started shooting heavy steel this year. I've been very pleased. It does 1550fps and seems to pattern well. Definitely more deadly than regular steel. Have crushed a few geese so far with 3" #6's heavy steel.
-D
I agree.
I started shooting heavy steel this year. I've been very pleased. It does 1550fps and seems to pattern well. Definitely more deadly than regular steel. Have crushed a few geese so far with 3" #6's heavy steel.
-D
Dennis Smith
Active member
Joe
What has been your experience with using different bismuth loads, I have not tried it before.
What has been your experience with using different bismuth loads, I have not tried it before.
No experience whatsoever.I am just now working up loads for this very first season on divers since lead was banned.I thought that Bizmuth was as heavy as lead,but it is allot lighter IMO.I still need to pattern it.I expect to use IC and Mod in my SxS.A load of Bizmuth takes up more room than lead.I can load in 12ga ,for instance,11/2 oz of lead in the same space it takes to load 11/4oz of Bizmuth.Thats why it's important to weigh the charge,and not go by the fixed charge bar indication.I don't intend to load steel,but I will shoot it and try other materials.Everything has gone sky high,with no end in sght.
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Geoff Pike
Active member
I tried it and came away thinking I got taken. ATK usually makes great stuff but the Black Cloud
is no big deal in my opinion. Just a premiumm price for another steel load.
Also, and I know it doesnt make sense, the stuff seemed to kick like a mule. 3" #2's shouldnt
be a big deal it sure seemed to hit hard on the shoulder.
is no big deal in my opinion. Just a premiumm price for another steel load.
Also, and I know it doesnt make sense, the stuff seemed to kick like a mule. 3" #2's shouldnt
be a big deal it sure seemed to hit hard on the shoulder.
Lee Harker
Well-known member
Used Hevi Steel at Steves a couple years ago. It was #2 and the autopsies on the birds showed pretty good penetration. Last year I was going to buy another case but it doubled in price so I said F it. Got some Nice shot and loaded it in my 28ga and just loaded some Hevi Shot in 28ga......now I just need some birds to shoot at.
leslie riggan
Well-known member
You guys must have some money! I can't afford to look at them.
travis bruce
Active member
I think its funny everyone on da net had a fit about xspurts shot being different sizes and shapes, and now you can pay double or triple for the the same physics. I'll keep shooting my $8 a box xspurts thankyaverymuch. travis
Dennis Smith
Active member
I am going to stay with paying less for steel loads and use loads with a velocity of 1425 fps.. They have plenty of energy out to 50 yards and how many shots can you expect to take at that distance and knock something out of the air. I used some of the 1550 fps loads and it did not pattern good. I used it for a season and at the end of the season I had problem with my shotgun. I could not get my screw in choke out. I oiled it good and I finally used a blow drier to heat up the barrel and I it got out, but it was tough all the way. After I got the choke out, I found that the Rem choke had split the full length (choke was for steel shot). All I had done differently was shot the high velocity loads.
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Steve Sutton
Well-known member
concensus?
I just read all the responses....only one person has actually used it, (one took a round apart but didn't say he'd actually "used it", and neither person said how many rounds they'd shot)......the rest of the people said it was too expensive for them to try, or that they were using something else like bismuth, Hevi Steel or sthe lower end stuff like "drylocks"....that makes the only "concensus" that I saw being one of several people "think" its not worth the price but have nothing to back that up except what they use currently works for their present situation....making a choice based on that might well be a mistake because "who knows" what Travis would be saying about his "Drylocks" if he was sitting on a rock ledge in Maine tickling Eiders with them and dropping them in the ocean and not on realitively dry loand where cripples are far easier to recover?
I'm not saying that your decision isn't correct just that the responses that you received should, in no way, be considered a "test" of the efficency of this round.....in reality it takes hundreds, if not thousands, of rounds to compare loads so one guy shooting a box or two is certainly not ballistic proof of effectiveness, or lack thereof.....
For what its worth I like the stuff, so far. I became the owner, by default, of a case of it when a nephew had a case sent out for a hunt that he then had to cancel....I bought it from him rather than him having to pay to ship it back to Florida....I took it to Manitoba and shot all of the ducks that I shot there with it....I didn't lose a duck on that trip....didn't kill em all "dead in the air" either but who's to say whether that was me shooting them in the ass or some degree of shell inefficency? I do know that every cripple that I smacked on the water was dead the first shot and that could not be said of the other types of shells used by other people shooting cripples, (but again given the low volume of total rounds shot this way that that wasn't the result of range, aim, waves, angle on the bird, etc. etc.).....
Truth on this one is that I'm not sure that I'll ever shoot enough of them, (the one case not being "enough" IMO), to tell if they are "better" than the other stuff I currently like...I "suspect" that in the right conditions that it will prove to be better than the cheapo 6's that I shoot at puddle ducks when I don't have to worry about cripples escaping, but not as good as the Hevi-shot that I shoot at stuff like Eiders when I travel out of State on "once a season/liftetime" hunts.....
Its kind of like boats.....I really do think they all have their place....you can use them in situations where you're definately pissing away money and you can use them in situations where they'll save you both ducks and money...with the "reality" being how "you" hunt and not on "what other people" recommend....
Steve
I just read all the responses....only one person has actually used it, (one took a round apart but didn't say he'd actually "used it", and neither person said how many rounds they'd shot)......the rest of the people said it was too expensive for them to try, or that they were using something else like bismuth, Hevi Steel or sthe lower end stuff like "drylocks"....that makes the only "concensus" that I saw being one of several people "think" its not worth the price but have nothing to back that up except what they use currently works for their present situation....making a choice based on that might well be a mistake because "who knows" what Travis would be saying about his "Drylocks" if he was sitting on a rock ledge in Maine tickling Eiders with them and dropping them in the ocean and not on realitively dry loand where cripples are far easier to recover?
I'm not saying that your decision isn't correct just that the responses that you received should, in no way, be considered a "test" of the efficency of this round.....in reality it takes hundreds, if not thousands, of rounds to compare loads so one guy shooting a box or two is certainly not ballistic proof of effectiveness, or lack thereof.....
For what its worth I like the stuff, so far. I became the owner, by default, of a case of it when a nephew had a case sent out for a hunt that he then had to cancel....I bought it from him rather than him having to pay to ship it back to Florida....I took it to Manitoba and shot all of the ducks that I shot there with it....I didn't lose a duck on that trip....didn't kill em all "dead in the air" either but who's to say whether that was me shooting them in the ass or some degree of shell inefficency? I do know that every cripple that I smacked on the water was dead the first shot and that could not be said of the other types of shells used by other people shooting cripples, (but again given the low volume of total rounds shot this way that that wasn't the result of range, aim, waves, angle on the bird, etc. etc.).....
Truth on this one is that I'm not sure that I'll ever shoot enough of them, (the one case not being "enough" IMO), to tell if they are "better" than the other stuff I currently like...I "suspect" that in the right conditions that it will prove to be better than the cheapo 6's that I shoot at puddle ducks when I don't have to worry about cripples escaping, but not as good as the Hevi-shot that I shoot at stuff like Eiders when I travel out of State on "once a season/liftetime" hunts.....
Its kind of like boats.....I really do think they all have their place....you can use them in situations where you're definately pissing away money and you can use them in situations where they'll save you both ducks and money...with the "reality" being how "you" hunt and not on "what other people" recommend....
Steve
Kevin Weir
Well-known member
Agree with Steve's synopsis. It takes LOTS of birds to truly determine the efficiency of a given load. Just 'cause it does or doesn't do what you require does not mean it isn't a great load.
Has anyone seen the video that Tom Roster made of his studies on the effectiveness of steel? Range finders, field notes on each shot, xrays of dead birds, autopsies of damage, pattern densities etc. were all factored in to state at what ranges and what chokes sorked for given shot sizes and loads.
That said, I haven't tried them either and not sure if I will buy many. I like my shots over the decoys inside 30 yards and for that small pea gravel can do the trick sometimes.
Now to find some birds to shoot at.
Good hunting guys.
Has anyone seen the video that Tom Roster made of his studies on the effectiveness of steel? Range finders, field notes on each shot, xrays of dead birds, autopsies of damage, pattern densities etc. were all factored in to state at what ranges and what chokes sorked for given shot sizes and loads.
That said, I haven't tried them either and not sure if I will buy many. I like my shots over the decoys inside 30 yards and for that small pea gravel can do the trick sometimes.
Now to find some birds to shoot at.
Good hunting guys.
travis bruce
Active member
da sutton wasn't paying that much attetion. xspurts, not drylocks. drylocks are half again as much. If its good enough for me to stay in the rain and get my bullets wet, Im gonna shoot all of them while I am there. Never understood the whole, can't get bullets wet thingy. If you get your bullets wet, and don't get a chance to shoot them, you must REALLY not wanna go home. I don't get wet without a good reason, and thats namely, a chance to shoot a lotta bullets. At 8 bucks a box, if I do manage to get a few wet, and one didnt go off, Id throw em away and still be money ahead.
If I was going to maine to shoot eiders (which would be way kewl btw), Id ask whomever was taking me what kinda bullets to bring. And odds are, it'd be some big heavy stuff. Da sutton is right, the chances of recovering a bird ought to defiently figger into what you shoot. 6 pound birds that dive for a living on the open ocean, need an azz pounding. travis (who picks up 98% of what we shoot, and it's easier with the 8 buck a box xspurts seat of the pants proven time and time again to us at least and is smart nuff to not get his bullets wet!)
If I was going to maine to shoot eiders (which would be way kewl btw), Id ask whomever was taking me what kinda bullets to bring. And odds are, it'd be some big heavy stuff. Da sutton is right, the chances of recovering a bird ought to defiently figger into what you shoot. 6 pound birds that dive for a living on the open ocean, need an azz pounding. travis (who picks up 98% of what we shoot, and it's easier with the 8 buck a box xspurts seat of the pants proven time and time again to us at least and is smart nuff to not get his bullets wet!)
Steve Sutton
Well-known member
Good news is the Dr. told me I was "good to go" and that he "didn't think that recoil would be an issue", (being a Dr. he didn't say "it wouldn't" he said "he didn't THINK it would".....so I slowly started shooting again, first with a 28 and then building up to light loads in the 12 and then to hunting loads....so far so good but then thats what the blonde chick said as she passed each consecutive floor on her fall off of the top of the Empire State building.....
Bad news is that I'm "legally" blind in my right eye....I can see shapes and colors and movement but that big ol E on the chart is an a badly drawn ink spot if my left eye is closed.....peripheral vision suffered about a 60% decline as well so lots of birds, and short little old ladies, sneak up on me from the right side these days.....interestingly the loss of acuity hasn't changed my dominant eye which is nice because I can still shoot right handed....All in all I'm pretty happy with the outcome since for a time it looked like I'd have to cose between never shooting again or going blind....
I went to Manitoba on the Annual MLB hunt earlier this month....haven't posted any pictures yet but will once I get my computer issues sorted out, (new work computer and a switch over on the personal one).....diveer hunting there on that trip was incredible....
Steve
Bad news is that I'm "legally" blind in my right eye....I can see shapes and colors and movement but that big ol E on the chart is an a badly drawn ink spot if my left eye is closed.....peripheral vision suffered about a 60% decline as well so lots of birds, and short little old ladies, sneak up on me from the right side these days.....interestingly the loss of acuity hasn't changed my dominant eye which is nice because I can still shoot right handed....All in all I'm pretty happy with the outcome since for a time it looked like I'd have to cose between never shooting again or going blind....
I went to Manitoba on the Annual MLB hunt earlier this month....haven't posted any pictures yet but will once I get my computer issues sorted out, (new work computer and a switch over on the personal one).....diveer hunting there on that trip was incredible....
Steve