Talk:Shotgun shell

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[edit] Dimensions

No mention of shell length? Actually, I was quite impressed with all the dimensions presented on our rifle and handgun cartridge articles (Name Bullet Length Rim Base Neck OAL) but I've never equivalent info on shotshells (here or elsewhere). Is it just because shells are made with less precision? Obviously some of these dimensions don't apply, but it would be interesting to see pre-fired length, base and rim diameters (e.g., some people say the .303 British / .45 Colt / .444 Marlin has the same rim as .410 shotgun ammo, but I have never seen any data on the latter). Boris B 03:06, 4 August 2006 (UTC)

Shotshells are pretty variable. The length given is the length of the hull, which is the post-fired length. Subtract half the bore diameter from the hull length to get the OAL of the shell before firing. Loaded length can actually vary quite a bit, compared to metallic cartridges, because accuracy isn't usually a big deal (slug guns being the exception) and the large scale and low pressures of shotguns seem to be pretty forgiving. The big issue with hull length is the same motivating factor for making, say, the .357 Mag longer than the .38 Spl, i.e. the pressure is higher so you don't want to have the high pressure shell fitting in the low pressure gun. And like the .38/.357, running 2 3/4" shells through a 3" shotgun, or even 2 9/16" or 2 1/2" shells, is more a matter of having the power to operate an autoloading mechanism more than a feeding issue. The limiting length seems to be pretty short; the Aguila "minishells" will function just fine in Winchester pumps, and with mixed success in Remington and Mossberg pumps. Those are about 2" shells, as I recall--really short, and light loads.
That said, the bit about how hull length is measured should be included (took me a long time to figure that out) and the common current and obsolete sizes should be listed. scot 00:25, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merge From suggestion

  • Totally For. Shotgun shells have to do with a shotgun right? They could be put under a subtopic. 67.167.127.118 added by Yaf 03:24, 17 March 2007 (UTC) 17 March 2007
  • For: Those areticles subcategories of a shotgun shell and therefore should be under this overall category.--Asams10 21:02, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
yeah, I suggested it because except for the shotgun slug article none of those articles are more than a paragraph, and it would work nicely for this article to un three sectioms: shot, slugs, specialty ammunition.--70.51.176.45 13:35, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
I added mergeinto tags to all of the suggested articles. The info seems to be essentially duplicated with the exception of the Shotgun section which could stay. I didn't put a tag there because it says to see the main article. Perhaps that section can be slimmed down significantly as a duplication instead of being directly merged.--Asams10 14:38, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Partially for. I think that the resulting article might be a bit on the large size, and there will be too much scope involved. I think shotsells should be covered in this article, as those are by far the most common ammunition type. Shotgun slugs deserve their own article (with Foster and Brenneke slugs merged in), since they are radically different in application from shotshells, and are the next most common type of shotgun ammunition. All the other types of specialty ammunition can probably be lumped together into a single article. I think that will result in three articles of reasonable length and focused scope. scot 15:09, 31 October 2006 (UTC)
  • Against. Early shotguns did not have such a thing as a shell - they were muzzle loaded with just a paper wrapping around the shot. A Shotgun shell may refer to shells which don't contain lead shot, for instance a single solid projectile. Also, lead shot is used many things which are unrelated to shotguns, especially as ballast in various situations (e.g. I have seen Hydrometers that use lead shot) --Ozhiker 12:00, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
  • For: as being able to see all the various data in just one article would greatly increase the value of the data and improve comprehension in reading the article, rather than forcing a reader to go from mini-article to mini-article. Early shotguns without shells could probably just be covered under muzzleloaders, unless there is enough material to warrant an article unto itself. Yaf 13:03, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
Addition to list: Found another orphan article today that should probably be added to the list: Rat-shot. It had essentially no links to it, and would benefit by being merged here, too. Yaf 04:36, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Why? Rat-shot isn't a shotgun shell, it's used to give rifles/pistols shotgun functionality.Zoift 21:56, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
How is it not a shotgun shell? They make smoothbore .22 Long Rifle shotguns specifically for these, such as Marlin's Garden Gun; it's just a rimfire .220 bore shotgun... scot 22:22, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Against: There is enough information for this article to stand on its own. 68.196.104.119 03:00, 16 December 2006 (UTC)
against:

67.177.116.171

  • Strongly against The articles about the specialty shells should all remain, with brief pointers in the main article to the articles about the specialty shells.
    • The wikipedia works best, can best take advantage of the ability for wikipedia articles to be widely interlinked, if the articles are generally, short and focussed. Omnibus articles, that try to cover several related topics throw away the advantages of that the ability to inter-link provides.
    • We don't know, can't know, why readers come to the wikipedia, arrive at our articles. Imagine, for instance, that a reader is only interested in:
      1. Technologies for breaching doors, windows. Well, then they would only be interested in reading the articles about breaching rounds, (and, of course, other technologies for breaching, that have nothing to do with shotguns — on dallas swat they hook a big chain to windows, or doors, and pull the whole window, or door, out of the wall, or sometimes they pull the whole wall off...) Why the heck should that reader have to scan through all the other kinds of shotgun rounds?
        • An article about door breaching technologies should be able to link directly to articles about breaching rounds, skipping the step of making the reader scan through the rest of an article about ordinary shotgun shells.
        • But can't the articles about breaching technologies contain a link like [[shotgun shell#breaching rounds|breaching rounds]]? Nope. This is a highly fragile work around. It strips the wikipedia of the most important advantage it has over plain old html links. HTML links are one directional. When you look at an HTML web-page, there is no good way to know what links to it. A web-page author might make a slight change in the name or location of a web-page, without realizing it will cause chaos to someone who had been linking to their page. Well, when you don't link just to a page, but rather, to a specific heading on a page, then your link breaks if another wikipedian changes the spelling, punctuation, capitalization of that heading. Or that other wikipedian might remove the heading altogether. In that event the reader gets taken to the top of the shotgun article. They will think to themselves, "Hey, I thought this wikipedia was supposed to be just about as well constructed as encyclopedia brittanice! But I just clicked on a link named "breaching rounds" and it has taken me to an article about "shotgun shells". What the heck do they have in common?
        • An even worse situation would be if someone removed all references to breaching rounds from shotgun shells. Then the reader would really be confused as to why their interest in breaching technology took them to shotgun shells.
      2. Or the reader might be interested in less-lethal munitions: sponge rounds, smoke rounds, tear gas munitions — but not in lethal munitions — and in other less-lethal technologies, like tazers, stun grenades, and so on.
      3. I believe there are specialty munitions used by bosuns to send messenger lines between ships at sea. Why the heck would someone interested in this kind of technology have to read about the lethal rounds?
    • There are many paths through the multidimensional universe of human knowledge that would cross various kinds of shotgun munitions, that have nothing to do with the most common shotgun shells that contain shot, for lethal or target purposes.
    • Cheers! — Geo Swan 04:02, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
Your argument seems flat in this area. All of the suggested merges are, in fact, SHOTGUN SHELLS or parts thereof. They differ in ways that are relatively minor. You seem to suggest that somebody looking for a breachng round article would be surprised and upset that they discovered that a breeching round is a type of shotgun shell. It is more succinct to describe a very minor subcategory of a shotgun shell under the shotgun shell article. On this we disagree, but I would like an honest discussion of why we disagree. One could conceivably list every type of self-contained firearm load under one article. We could have recoilless rifles, howitzers, mortars, shotshells, caseless cartridges, rifles, pistols, etc under one gigantic, muddy article. We don't.
We appear to disagree on where we say, 'it needs its own article' and where we say, 'it belongs in the main article.' For me, I believe it is most appropriate to roll everything into one, relatively short article for the sake of context, clarity, and ease of access. --Asams10 05:41, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Against: I think that merging articles is a good solution for stubs, short articles, or topics that are either duplicates under different wording, or very, very similar. This is not the case. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and it should go in depth. This means that specific topics need to have their own articles. "[Rolling] everything into one, relatively short article" would diminish the quality of the content on this topic. Details that are here should stay. If someone wants a simple explanation, Simple English Wikipedia is a great place for that. I think that the articles should remain seperate, and in depth. If an article in an orphan, give it the orphan tag and take care of it that way. Phasmatisnox 01:20, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
  • Against ...On just two points! I found this article because I was researching Hafnium which links to Dragon's Breath, and it would have been difficult to find in a much larger article. Also, it is a rather impressive and unique phenomenon of nature don't you think? The photograph shows this graphically. Perhaps Dragon's Breath deserves to have an independent existence on that basis also. Perhaps the article could also be expanded with reference to the chemistry behind this phenomenon. It is not necessarily limited to firearms in subject matter. (The phenomenon appears to be caused only by powders of the two sister-metals Hafnium and Zirconium when these powders come into contact with the air.) --Elizabeth Jane 14:08, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
The Dragon's Breath cartridge is non-notable; it's merely a novelty with, to the best of my ability to determine, no notable use (only rumors of use by firefighters for starting backfires). Other than the image, the article contains not much more than the blurb in the specialty ammunition section. The image is certainly worth keeping, but it might be best used in the article on zirconium and/or hafnium, with links to the shotgun shell article. The only references I have that refer to the composition of Dragon's Breath only mention zirconium, not hafnium. scot 14:52, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
  • Strongly against: Lion, Tiger, Jaguar, and Claw are parts of or types of cats, but merging would clearly be silly. In particular, Lead shot should not be merged -- the articles have almost no overlap. --N Shar 03:39, 15 February 2007 (UTC)
  • Against This is not ordinary shotgun shell and there are other varieties in addition to zircomium one, including the thermite-filled version I have heard about. No citations, unfortunately. - Skysmith 10:51, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
  • Against The article should be expanded with discussions for example of the use of lead shot in polishing gold jewelery, and more information on the manufacture of lead shot (which is what brought me to the article -- I want to build a testing device for glass which uses lead shot and I am not in the US where it is readily available, so would like to make my own -- ie. nothing to do with shotguns at all.) A reference to a related topic is what is needed in the shotgun article. Tom 11:50, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
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