Given the present ammo situation, I wanted to have some alternatives to the Federal LE133 00B I prefer. A local gun store had sixty rounds of Hornady TAP Versatite Reduced Recoil 00B in stock. This is an eight-pellet reduced recoil load marketed at 1100FPS. The round consists of unplated lead pellets with no buffering. Pellets were stacked in a 2-2-2-2 configuration. The Versatite wad is, from what I understand, licensed from the same design as the Flitecontrol wad and performs a similar function. A cut shell is pictured:
Patterns were fired from an 18" Gen 1.5 Beretta 1301. This is the fixed improved cylinder barrel. For comparison purposes, here are two rounds of LE133 from that gun at 10 and 15 yards:
Patterns from the TAP load at 5, 10, 15, and 25 yards are below:
Pattern density at 15 yards seemed quite good. There was one flyer:
Conclusions:
The Hornady load compared favorably to Federal LE133 from my gun. The TAP shot to approximately the same point of impact as the LE133 within 15 yards, though it printed a few inches higher at 25 yards. Patterns were approximately 2" at 5 yards, 3" at 10 yards, 5" at 15 yards, and 7" at 25 yards (note that I failed to catch one of the 25 yard pellets in the photo -- the impact on the left side of the target's neck with no Sharpie markings was from 25 yards). An observation I had is that the TAP buckshot felt very light -- noticeably lighter than the Federal, which is marketed as 1145FPS. Though only nine rounds were fired, the TAP cycled the 1301 with no issues. Both the Federal and Hornady rounds felt significantly lighter than the Federal #4 buckshot load (F127 4B, marketed as 27 pellets at 1325FPS) I also patterned this date.
I would recommend the TAP load without reservation in a pump-action gun. On the surface I would be comfortable using this load as a substitute for LE133 as my stock of that round is depleted, though I would want to test it more thoroughly for cycling in the 1301 due to that aforementioned light recoil. For comparison, my 1301 was vetted with over 200 rounds of LE133 with no malfunctions from that load. A LGS stocks this TAP load somewhat regularly and I will be purchasing more in the future.