I never fooled around with anything except the original Forsyth compound. I tried 8-bore and 12-bore Forsyth shells and I don't think that they would be as powerful as what Daryl describes. The Forsyth shells are pretty hard to set off and I don't think that one would ever go off inside the barrel. For an example, I fired an 8-bore shell into a soft, wet bank once and it didn't go off. The shell was fairly crushed up but I guess that shock wasn't enough to set it off. That shell does have a rather thick nose though.

A failure that really surprised me was when I shot a 12-bore shell into a Paw Paw tree (about like balsa wood) at a downward angle. The shell went through about 7" of wood and then embedded in the ground, unexploded. Again, the shell was fairly crushed up. If you make the nose thin enough or hollow with wax plugging the hole, they will go off reliably in a ľ” thick stack of hanging wet newspaper. I haven’t seen the effect on game but I have a friend that has shot large game with them and he said that they are very effective if you choose the right alloy to match the application.

I may just have to work up a shell design for the 16-bore…