sighting in on: Federal Flitecontrol® I
Buckshot
admit to experiencing hesitation when using shotguns for law enforcement purposes. Please don’t misunderstand, although I’m built like a Praying Mantis that swallowed a marble, I can still handle a shotgun, so it’s not the recoil. I’ve been nervous that, if
I needed
to fi re in a populated area, a stray pellet might fi nd an innocent. Many cops have the same feeling. Too many times when I have practiced, trained and qualifi ed with buckshot, a rogue pellet struck several inches outside of the main pattern; often not only outside the qualifi cation ring but occasionally even off the silhouette altogether. There’s a popular phrase that you are civilly liable for each round you send downrange. I’ve never been comfortable with that saying because concern for the safety of our fellow citizens should take precedence in our minds over civil liability. So, I often left my shotgun in the car and instead chose the AR platform carbine for hot calls or pre-planned raids. In retrospect, the shotgun may have been a better choice for some of those situations. I thought I’d found the solution with Benelli’s interchangeable choke tubes. T e modifi ed choke tightened up my buckshot patterns to a comfortable level. But then I learned that chokes tighter than Improved Cylinder tend to send slugs off course. If you don’t believe me, just ask my department’s target stand that is no longer with us. One of the senior fi rearms instructors directed me to change back to the Improved Cylinder choke tube and leave it there for the safety of our range equipment.
New Technology In recent years, some ammunition manufac- turers have made headway in this area and introduced new technology that signifi cantly reduces the pattern of their buckshot. Specif- ically, Federal added the Flitecontrol ® wad to their Premium® Law Enforcement buckshot
Federal recently added the Flitecontrol®
Enforcement/Tactical buckshot lineup, resulting in tighter groups at farther distances.
loads. It’s essentially a cylindrical plastic cup that holds the shot together as it leaves the barrel. T e rear section of the wad opens and the wind resistance or ‘drag’ pulls it away from the shot. T e result is an incredibly tight pattern.
We used the Federal Tactical LE13200 of- fering for testing. T is 12-gauge, 2 ¾-inch, nine-pellet shot shell is advertised at 1,145 feet per second. T e pellets have a smooth copper coating that also contributes to tight, consistent groups. Our department started using it a few years ago with great results. T ere were no more errant pellets and quali- fi cation scores went up across the board. T e closest thing to a problem we came across was, at 7 yards, the Flitecontrol® buckshot strikes so close together that there are only three or four discernible holes in the target. T is makes it a little more diffi cult for the fi rearms instructors to score the targets and that’s a good problem to have.
Range Time
SWAT Sgt. Tim Doyle agreed to do the shooting (take the beating) for me. Patterns
were measured at their largest and smallest diameters and then rounded to the near- est quarter inch. T e original plan was to compare Flitecontrol® to standard buckshot loads at 7 and 15 yards since that is our qualifi cation course of fi re for buckshot. After witnessing this Federal ammunition’s capability, we tested it out to 25 yards. At 7 yards, both the old-fashioned buckshot and the Flitecontrol® stuff gave good results. At 15 yards, the patterns started to open up a little. T e Flitecontrol® group was 4.25-inch by 3.25-inch while the standard buckshot was a much more familiar 10.25-inch wide by 5.5-inch high. T ere was one errant pellet on the latter target that struck over 3 inches to the right of its nearest relative and almost completely off of the silhouette. It should be noted that we used our state’s police qualifi cation target for this test. It’s a picture of a female off ender pointing a gun at the shooter and has an approximately 10-inch by 13-inch scoring ring. It’s more than a little challenging to get all of those pellets into that 10-inch-wide area with a 10.25-inch pattern. T e rogue pellet in question hit the felon’s
wad to its Law
55 The Police Marksman Summer 2015
www.policemarksman.com
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