Description
The Eley cartridges contain an average of 206 pellets. They contain a short plastic wad with short skirt, and a half-length shot cup. They are crimped with a 6-point star closure. The case is a standard 2½” parallel tube plastic case, supplied in red with Eley branding printed in white. A number of the pellets were deformed or split with some severe flattening.
Recoil
Recoil was exceedingly mild, but the muzzle blast seemed surprisingly loud given that this was the case. With the exception of the 2″ cartridges so far tested, these cartridges have produced the lightest perceived recoil of any thus far fired in the SBS test gun.
Performance
Initial testing showed the cartridges to pattern reasonably well, putting a very usable 144 pellets in the standard circle at 30 yards distance. 40-yard patterns have been attempted at the time of writing. Performance on live game left something to be desired – two wood pigeons, both shot going away and hit well at approximately 30 yards were not cleanly killed and required a follow-up shot from a cartridge containing larger shot to finish the job.