Hunting Forum

I have a 30 year old Browning BPS 20 guage and was wondering what slug would work best with my gun. I am not going to use it but a couple times a year maybe. Most of the slugs that I have looked at are for rifiled barrels.

For a smoothbore i use Remingtons rifled sluggers. You may want to try a few along with Federal & Winchester to see which shoots the best.

you have to use rifled slugs for smoothbores, NOT to be confused with slugs for rifled barrels or sabot. DO NOT USE SABOTS IN A SMOOTHBORE!! You can if it is a improved clyinder but is much cheaper to use rifled slugs. You will have to try different brands, but I would seriously check out Brennekes. Either way this is a 50-75 yard gun if using the regular barrel.

The key is to be ready to try various brand. Two identical setups will most likely "like" different brands.

Even though it's an older gun if it has a screw-in choke system or a poly-choke system you could also try different choke settings as well. I would pick up a 15rd valu-pak of Rem Win and Fed rifled slugs (last I looked they run about $10-12 apiece) and run a 3 shot group of each through an improved cylinder, cylinder bore, and modified choke (you could also use some of the oddball chokes if you have them i.e. - skeet, light midified, etc.) and see how each pattern. Personally wouldn't go tighter than modified with a slugh though. If it does have the screw-in chokes a rifled choke tube is an option but not one I would truely suggest unless everything else isn't working and it's all you have left. They typically provide 2-4" (depending on length) of rifling just in the length of the choke itself though. You could try using rifled and cheaper heavier sabots through one of those as the twist rate in them are usually slow. Hope this helps and doesn't confuse the heck out of you.

Thanks guys this really helps out. I was confused but I now have some where to start.

Also realize you are going to have quite a bit of lead build up in the barrel that will require a lot of scrubbing out. Another option could be a single shot H&R 20 ga. Tracker II or Ultra Slug. Either one will be about $250 but well worth it. The Ultra is heavy and not fun to carry a long time. Tracker is a fun gun to carry but will kick a little more.  These wont break the bank and are superb shooters and would allow you to use sabots thereby increasing range and accuracy.

If changing anything then I would checkout Cabelas as they offer a good selection of fully rifled barrels but I prefer the cantilevered scope mount ones myself as the scope stays with the barrel when changing it out for another barrel. By doing this you can then move up to using the new sabot slugs which are accurate up to 200 yards with practice.

I forgot to mention Federal Tru-Balls. These are designed for smoothbores and pretty accurate out of my 2 smoothbores along with Brennekes. I'd use Tru-ball before trying regular rifled slugs. I really am a fan of both these brands. A barrel will cost you as much as a new H&R or even a Mossberg 500 with a catilever barrel.If you do go with a barrel I agree with Big Dawg catilevered barrel is the only way to go.