What ammo can I use in my new Circuit Judge?
I went yesterday and bought a new Rossi Circuit Judge. Funky little gun. Fun, too.
Any way, I get the idea from reading various posts about the gun that I may be limited in the ammo I can use in the gun. I am speaking specifically about the .410 ammo.
The specs on my gun are:
1. It has a rifled bore.
2. It has a rifled choke, and a smooth bore thread protector that I am told is to be used for the .45 lc ammo, and .410 ammo with slugs.
Anyway, I am wondering what ammo I SHOULD NOT use in the gun. What is the best ammo to use if I want to use the gun for a home defense gun?
Any way, I get the idea from reading various posts about the gun that I may be limited in the ammo I can use in the gun. I am speaking specifically about the .410 ammo.
The specs on my gun are:
1. It has a rifled bore.
2. It has a rifled choke, and a smooth bore thread protector that I am told is to be used for the .45 lc ammo, and .410 ammo with slugs.
Anyway, I am wondering what ammo I SHOULD NOT use in the gun. What is the best ammo to use if I want to use the gun for a home defense gun?
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Is the cylinder 2 1/2"or 3"? That would be a big limitation for the .410 ammo 0 -
about usless with bird shot.. 0 -
I gave my friend at work 2 boxes of 3" brass plated steel .410 shells made by Golden Bear (Russian ammo). I got these from Sportsman Guide.
Now he had purchased the circuit judge, the one with the long barrel and the full shoulder stock.
They were 97 grain sabot slugs and 5 pellet buckshot loads.
The report he made was laughable. The 3" steel shells would stick in the chamber. The chamber is made for the 45 long colt and then the chamber tapers slightly. He had to use a dowel rod to knock out the shells. At 30 yards he could hit a 9" pie plate and keep the buckshot
within it also.
When he went to fire the 45 long colt, and the slugs flew all over, couldn't even hit the pie plate at 30 yards, accuracy was terrible.
He than tried regular .410 shells and once fired they ejected cleanly as the plastic doesn't fire form to the chamber like the steel .410 shells did.
He said the shot pattern at 30 feet was acceptable, but consider he had purchase the long barrel circuit judge with the full shoulder stock and not the shorty barreled judge.
Range report over, good luck Thor.0 -
To answer this question, Rossi states explicitly that its "Circuit Judge" is fine with all conventional .410 ammo
quote:
http://www.rossiusa.com/product-details.cfm?id=190&category=15&toggle=&breadcrumbseries=&CFID=7837071&CFTOKEN=96554177
Now you can fire .410 GA. 3-inch Magnum shotshells, .410 GA. 2.5-inch shotshells and .45 Colt ammunition. In any order you please, without switching barrels.
I don't see why you couldn't use .410 slugs from this gun, though the usual factory slugs use a pretty light projectile, and I don't think they are going to perform as well as .45LC rounds.
So along those lines, and addressing your next question, I think the best choice for a defensive load would be .45LC pistol rounds. Those will use good heavy bullets (eg 200+ grains), and put them out at a good clip.
I'll leave the debate about which exact round is best aside; but any decent hollow or softpoint round should perform well, especially from a long barrel.
If .45LC rounds were unavailable, I think the next best thing would be .410 slugs. .410 buckshot would be a distant third place.
EDIT: If these numbers are to be believed (and I don't see why they shouldn't be), then these "magnumized" .410 slugs should offer awesome performance:
http://hoeningbigboresouth.com/Big 410 Ballistics.html
A 400 grain .410 slug at 1500 fps muzzle velocity will be better than any ordinary .45LC and in fact better than a typical .44 magnum load; certainly enough to work as a good defensive load.
Responding to silliness below:
quote:Wonder if this will be come popular with Mafia hitmen. Using the slugs with discarding sabot, wouldn't that result in a slug with no rifling? That would be a good thing if you don't want ballistics to track back to you. On the other hand, 00 buckshot loads don't have any ballistic markings either. When the muzzle is placed gently behind the ear, either will be good for completing the Whack.
First of all, I can't possibly imagine this gun being the choice of any professional for any application (whatsoever). Given what's out there to pick from, why would you deliberately choose a bulky, inaccurate gun of limited capacity and relatively low power to commit a planned murder? For a toy at the range. . .sure. For hunting human beings? Don't think so. There are way too many better choices out there.
As to ballistics, that's mostly an exercise in implausible TV fiction. You're not catching professional assassins that way. Anyone with a clue (and that presumably includes professional hitmen) can completely override all possibility of ballistic trace with the simple expedient of destroying/discarding their weapon after use. With Mafia "hits" in particular, one traditional practice was to use a non-papered gun and simply leave it at the crime scene. EG, remember THIS?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHzh0PvMWTI
The point behind leaving the gun is to show it was an assassination (as opposed to a robbery). Trying to trace the gun would be pointless. . .it wouldn't help you find the actual shooter.0 -
Just wondering what the manual has to say about what ammo to use and what not to use.................? 0 -
quote:Originally posted by Nwcid
Just wondering what the manual has to say about what ammo to use and what not to use.................?
Manual isn't currently available online, but the ad copy is here:
http://www.rossiusa.com/pdf/rossi_ad_circuitjudge.pdf
It reiterates what I cut-and-pasted above from the Rossi website.0 -
Wonder if this will be come popular with Mafia hitmen. Using the slugs with discarding sabot, wouldn't that result in a slug with no rifling? That would be a good thing if you don't want ballistics to track back to you. [:D] On the other hand, 00 buckshot loads don't have any ballistic markings either. When the muzzle is placed gently behind the ear, either will be good for completing the Whack. [}:)] 0 -
The "rifled choke" is a shot straigtener not a choke.It's the same concept used on early T/C Contender barrels in .410/45 colt 0 -
for home defense a load of high brass 6 shot at 30 feet or less would be as effective as a slug or 45 lc bullet 0 -
quote:Originally posted by ROBERTWISE
for home defense a load of high brass 6 shot at 30 feet or less would be as effective as a slug or 45 lc bullet
quote:Originally posted by ROBERTWISE
for home defense a load of high brass 6 shot at 30 feet or less would be as effective as a slug or 45 lc bullet
Respectfully, I disagree.
The "high brass" (ie 3") .410 shotshells hold only 11/16 of an ounce of shot, or an even 300 grains, and put them out at 1135 feet per second.
That would be respectable ballistics for a single solid projectile, but the problem here is that each individual #6 shot pellet is only .110" in diameter and weighs only 2 grains. The small diameter, and especially low pellet weight mean each individual pellet will offer low penetration and lose energy pretty fast.
Consequently, with any spread at all (eg at 30 feet), a #6 shell is likely to create a lot of really shallow wounds, instead of once nice deep one apt to penetrate a vital organ. Intermediate clothing (eg a leather jacket) will take out a lot of energy from light pellets like this, too.
If you think about it, .410 shotshells aren't even adequate to hunt waterfowl. Admittedly distances are usually longer for that kind of hunting, but if these ballistics aren't good enough for a 3 lb duck would you want to trust your life with against say an armed and angry 240 lb adult male?
Compare again, to the "magnumized" 400 grain slug at 1500 fps, and its not even close.
As another point of comparison, a standard .410 slug is about 90 grains, and yields about 1800 fps. That's roughly comparable to a .30 carbine round, or maybe a light-bullet .357 magnum, though the .410 will punch a larger hole and yield less accuracy. IMO, a better choice than birdshot from this low-caliber shotgun, even indoors.0
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