Dear Technoid,

I understand your desire for 1 1/8 oz. loads, but being a heretic, I recently purchased a full choke Model 42. I plan to use it primarily for skeet, but will occasionally shoot 5 stand and trap. If I decide to open the choke, what would you recommend based upon my planned usage. I am thinking IC, but I defer to your infinite knowledge.

Bob
Claremont, CA

Dear Bob,

Deference to my infinite knowledge! Uh huh. I’d defer to it too, if I could ever find it.

If you are going to use your M42 for 5 stand and trap (with a 410?- you are either crazy now, or will be soon), you had better leave the Full as it is. Always choke for the longest game.

To me, 410s only really have two chokes- Skeet and Full anyway. I had Briley screw choke my original Skeet M42 with .003″, 009″ and .015″. I probably would have been just as happy with .007″ and .020″. My Briley tube set has .005″ and .015″ across the board. The .015″ is perfectly adequate for general sporting clays. The .015″ isn’t too awfully terribly tight at skeet either, though the .005″ gives “rounder” breaks with #9s.

.005″ is a pretty standard skeet choke size in ALL the gauges. I do know of many skeet shooters who go down to .007″ and have heard that Wayne Mayes uses .009″ to .010″s in the 410, but he is thinking more about doubles in the shootoffs than I am.

Full should work OK on 5 Stand too. I don’t know how your 5 Stand is set up, but our FITASC parcours (we have very little 5 Stand in my area) are usually looooong. If you use #8s and all the choke you own, the 410 still seems to hit a wall at 35 yards. After that hits depend more on your Church attendance than on shooting skill.

And one last thought (the wisdom truly is infinite, or at least unrestrained). You might want to mike your “Full” choke and find out what it actually measures. 410 Full should be from about .020″ to .025″, but a lot of them came in around .015″. If it did, I would leave it there and consider the problem over. Also, depending on when your M42 was made (mine was made in 1932), your gun has had a lot of owners before you and someone may have tried to “improve” his scores by opening that choke up. Always mike first.

Best regards,

Bruce Buck
Shotgun Report’s Technoid
(Often in error, never in doubt.)