Why You Should Shoot Remington American Clay & Field Shotshells

The most popular line of Remington target / dove loads are the economical 2% antimony Gun Clubs. Surprisingly, Gun Club shells were not specifically designed to be reloaded. They are reloadable, though, and popular for that use. While 2% antimony shot is not the hardest, it is made with Remington's shot tower and is more spherical than other shot of similar antimony content.

The most efficient shotshells from the 2016 testing by Neil Winston were Remington 6% antimony 1-1/8 oz. #7-1/2 STS loads that did 77.9% @ 40 yards, 10 shot average, Full choke. These were the most efficient shotshells tested from several brands.

Neil Winston also tested the 4% antimony Remington American Clay & Field 1-1/8 oz. #7-1/2 loads: the ten shot average was 74.3 % pattern efficiency in a 30 inch circle at 40 yards. Your results will vary, but the best available version of the truth is that the Remington American Clay & Field shells get you within 3% or so of the pattern efficiency of the top of the line STS loads. The results of my testing show them to be within 2% on average, at 40 laser-verified yards, with a .033 inch constriction choke.

Gun Clubs sell for about $6 a box, American Field & Clays at $7.50 per box, and STS loads at about $9.50 a box. The individual retailers decide on the pricing, of course.

In my own recent testing of shells, Browning BPT (loaded by Olin-Winchester), Remington American Clay & Field, Federal Top Gun, and Fiocchi White Rino were all compared. All shells were 1-1/8 oz. loads of #7-1/2 shot. I was surprised by the results. The Remington American Clay & Field loads were the easy pick of the litter, the most consistent shells from shot to shot, offering the best pattern efficiency for a specific shotgun / choke combination.

The reloading life of American Clay & Field shells is better than Gun Clubs, and at least as good as STS loads: the hulls are stronger, and the C&F loads use the same plastic for the hull sans the metallic sparkles. They also use Remington STS primers.

If money was no object, everyone that is remotely performance-minded would be using Remington STS loads or the new Federal Gold Medal Grand shotshells. But everyone wants the best price-performance ratio that they feel is affordable.

You can choke soft shot or gravel-shaped shot all you want, all day and all night, and it won't help you. It isn't a question of the clay targets that are broken, it is a question of the ones that are not. It doesn't take a lot of gumption to walk the field and see all the unbroken clay pigeons that have two or three holes in them . . . but didn't break. For a lousy 6 cents a shell, you have a far better load with twice the antimony, a far better hull, a better primer, a better wad, lower standard deviations, both more pellets and higher pattern percentages.

It is a no-brainer. It is even more of a no-brainer if you reload, for you'll get significantly more reloads out of the American Clay and Field hull as well. Now, it gets down to a fraction of a cent per shot, if you are shooting for hulls. For American Skeet using a 12 gauge, with 21 yard shots or less, it doesn't matter much. However, the F&C rounds come in a 1 oz. #8 and #9 shot 12 gauge for that application, and #8 and #9 shot for the sub-gauges.

Past 30 yards, though, deformed pellets quickly drop out of the shot cloud and the higher antimony count, higher pellet count, and retained sphericity make the Clay & Field loads really stand out compared to the promo fodder. It is current the best target and dove shell for the dollar in 12, 20, 28 gauge, and .410 bore.

Initially, the Remington American Clay & Field shells had an erratic, confusing roll-out. But now, folks are quickly catching on. Your pattern board will prove it to you. As George Trulock has long shown, if you want a quality pattern it takes a quality shell and a quality choke, not just one or the other.

Copyright 2017 by Randy Wakeman. All Rights Reserved.