WINCHESTER AA LITE HANDICAP TARGET LOADS

I love my .410 Winchester cartridges; they may be costly, but they don’t half perform well. It’s true for the whole Winchester range of shells. They are not made to a price, rather they are made to perform at their best, and it shows in the quality of components, especially in these famous AA 12-bore rounds.
Winchester offers this series of cartridges in all manner of combinations for all shooting and sporting disciplines, and they are the official cartridges of the Amateur Trapshooting Association.
Today, we are testing the Winchester AA Lite Handicap Target ammunition, which is a lower-recoiling option for long-range trap and sporting clays. These AA shotshells feature Winchester’s legendary high-strength case, here in a striking charcoal/green livery, providing reliable performance and a case that reloaders adore. The specially engineered synthetic wad system is purpose-built to lessen recoil for high-volume clay shooters, as well as increase pattern performance downrange.
Two velocity levels are available, both using a combination of Winchester’s 209 primers and clean-burning powders, ensuring reliable ignition, whilst the company’s hard lead shot takes off briskly downrange. This is a premium load with high-end performance.

Let’s inspect them
Visually, the cartridge looks spectacular, with superb build quality that is both obvious and highly tactile. The super-tough polymer casing is crafted with very uniform walls and, in this variant, features a charcoal/green colour with black lettering indicating the internals, giving it a very smart appearance.
The closure at the top is Winchester’s eight-star crimp, rather than the more common six-star. It forms a very tight seal to prevent ingress from debris or moisture, securely holds the load in place, and generates the correct back pressure to fully ignite the powder charge and produce consistent propulsion.
At the other end is a 12mm brass head stamped ‘Win AA HS 12 GA’, with a very nice, pronounced lip to the casing for reliable ejector grip.
Inside is the uniform, hard shot which Winchester makes using its own shot towers, and the pellets were all very clean, bright, and spherical, which helps keep the patterns tight and uniform, too.
This is the faster 1oz, 1250fps version, but you can get a 1150fps velocity option for closer-range clays. You can also buy a No.8 or No.9 shot version, as well as a slightly heavier 1 1/8oz loading. I have also seen lighter shot charges of 26g or 24g, with the latter being a great cartridge for simulated game and general vermin control around the farm, as well as for introducing recoil-shy shooters to the sport. You can also opt for the copper-plated version, loaded with 1 1/4oz lead shot, for extended range or enhanced downrange performance.

What else?
Also contributing to the overall performance is the clever wad system. Winchester has extensive experience in perfecting wads, and the AA series plastic wad is specifically designed to reduce felt recoil and enhance pattern performance. They are often tighter as a result, and perfectly seal the bore for consistent velocities, as well as cushion the lead shot in transit down the bore. The wad has a typical, slightly yellow cast to it with four well-defined and split petals that encapsulate the shot column, yet open up easily when they leave the muzzle to ensure the pellets are not impeded in flight. The wad’s box-section, collapsible design is sturdy enough to withstand the initial primer and powder ignition, and then cushion the blow to both lead pellets and shoulder alike.
Powder-wise, Winchester uses a “best-in-class” primer and powder combination to achieve a consistent, dependable, and clean burn from its flattened, ball-powder-looking form. Interestingly, when I removed it from the case, it came out as one block/cake of powder that gently crumbled to individual elements when touched.

Field test
First up, what a lovely-looking and handling cartridge this is, with its charcoal green casing that slips in and out of the Browning Black Shadow’s chambers with ease. Recoil with these 1oz loads was very easy on the shoulder, even with the slightly higher velocity of this particular cartridge.
They say they shoot very clean, and I would say clean-ish, to be honest, as a certain amount of lead was left, but very little, if any, powder, so super efficient.
With the ¼ and ½ chokes fitted, the former produced a total of 256 No.7.5 pellets on the pattern board at 30 yards, with 90 strikes in the 15” inner circle and the remaining 166 spread across the 30” outer area. Overall, the cartridge/gun combination delivered a well-radiated spread with a few gaps, which is to be expected from a ¼ choke. Even so, the pattern remained impressively tight considering the level of constriction, which is something the AA cartridges are known for.
Next up was the ½ choke in the upper barrel, and this tightened things significantly. Now we had a veritable swarm of pellet strikes with a superbly dense and uniform spread of shot, culminating in a total of 317 pellet strikes. In the inner circle, a concentration of 120 pellets, and there were 197 outer hits, meaning a clay-breaking certainty at any sensible range.

Conclusion
I have always liked Winchester shotgun cartridges, as they are not only very good but have a super-efficient and smooth nature to them. This, of course, is combined with impeccable build quality. You can use these cartridges for serious competition at the highest level, which justifies the higher price point. GM

Contact:
BWM UK – www.browning.eu