Several years ago while experimenting with a shotgun sabot, I stumbled across the notion of a sabot inside a sabot. The particular sabot I was testing was designed for a .50 caliber bullet to be loaded in a 12 gauge shotgun shell. The problem was that the sabot would stay on the bullet for 50 or 60 yards making the combination very erratic and inaccurate.

One day out of sheer frustration, I made a jig and machined the powder skirt off a .45 to .50 MMP sabot. I then inserted this sabot inside the shotgun sabot and with our 300 grain QT .45, I was able to achieve groups of under 1.5" at 100 yards out of my 1100 Remington / Hastings barrel combination. I was sure that this was a fluke so over the next several weeks, I repeated this process every time I tried it. As the process was very labor intensive, I abandoned the project but stored this tidbit of useful information in one of the very small crannies of my brain.

The other day, my long awaited .357 to .45 high pressure sabots showed up. Day One I shot my CVA .45 with groups averaging about 1" using 120 grains of Pyrodex RS and 175 grain Dead Center .357 bullet. Day Two was my brand new 1:30" twist Knight Super .45 turn. It did not disappoint and turned in several groups between .625" and .875" with the same bullet and the same charge of powder.

My .50 caliber Encore was in my office feeling quite left out of this testing process. Rather than ending my shooting early, I decided to foul the barrel and see what would happen if I stuck one of the .357 x .45 sabots inside one of the long petal .451 to .50 high pressure MMP sabots.

I loaded the same 175 grain Dead Center bullet but only used 100 grains of powder to make sure that everything would cooperate. Immediately after firing the first shot, I walked downrange and recovered the black .451 x .50 sabot 25' off the muzzle. The orange petals of the .357 x .45 sabots were on the ground a few feet further down range. The bullet hole was perfect and very close to where the gun point of impact was on its last use. Realizing that this combination was safe, I decided to increase the powder charge to the same 120 grains of Pyrodex RS that had shot so well in the two .45 caliber test guns.

The results were consistent with those experienced with the shotgun slug. My initial group was under 1" at 100 yards. Choosing to believe that this was not something that could be repeated, I continued to shoot until I shot 10 groups in a row that were all outstanding; the best one being .593" and the worst one was still under 1.33". I don't think I would have been very quick to believe it if I had not done it myself. Check this out!