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Winchester's marketing men have done their best to confuse customers in recent years, changing the product range and then bringing back old favourites all over again. The latest to reappear, to I suspect loud cheers from the shooters, is the Trap 100. We renewed old acquaintances.

BW (UK) Ltd are to be congratulated on their decision to turn back the clock. Brand loyalty is a powerful thing and too valuable to disregard. Add in some competitive looking prices and success seems assured. Early indications suggest that the bigger dealers will be selling at under £100 per thousand and that pitches the Trap 100 right into the thick of the action.

For that you get a 'true' Winchester cartridge for your money, famous compression-formed case and all. For those not familiar with the difference, the compression-formed construction has been a feature of Winchester cartridges for many years. Conventional cases are made of extruded plastic tubing which is cut to the required length. Winchester's system produces a 'one hole' case rather like the finger of a rubber glove. Take an empty case apart and you will easily spot the difference. Compression-formed cases are very popular with reloaders because they will withstand several reloadings. Somehow the Winchester Club, with its standard parallel tube case, has never seemed quite the real thing. Take a Trap 100 apart and you have pure Winchester through and through.
 
The components are familiar. The case (a low brass version of the familiar red job) is finished with a six star crimp and the distinctive Winchester heat seal in the middle. This is designed to give consistent rates of opening of the crimp - a key factor in keeping consistent performance from shell to shell.

Inside, the famous AA wad is there too. The different shot loads (Trap 100's are available in 24, 28 and 32 gram variants) are catered for by adjusting the length of the central compression column. Incidentally, ground owners can check for evidence of cheating by spotting wad colours. The 28 gram wad is pale yellow while its 32 gram counterpart is a fetching crushed mulberry colour.
 
Winchester make all their own components and are fairly cagey about their specifications. All the powders used are their familiar 'ball powder' type, quite distinctive when compared with other powders in common use. There are various types to meet the needs of different recipes. The shot itself is well up to standard, very evenly sized but to Italian sizes as is usual with the brand.

Winchester claim muzzle velocity of 399 metres per second (1308 feet per second) which is by no means fast by current standards. The upside to that though is excellent pattern quality, they state 82 per cent with full choke at 32 metres (35 yards) and a very smooth shooting shell.
 
I have often found some of Winchester's performance loads to be rather too sharp in recoil for my taste. Not so here. I used them to shoot some Double Rise trap targets, always a good test of a cartridge, and was very happy with the quality of kills and the shootability.
 
Expect to see a lot more of the distinctive red cases on the empties piles this summer. Trap 100's are back and they mean business.

More information: BW (UK) Ltd.,
37D Milton Park, Abingdon,
Oxon OX14 4RT
Tel. 01235 833939

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