Weighing Swaged Round Balls

ColonialRifleSmith said:

I agree. People also can't take responsibility for being a horrible shot. Semper Fi.

Click to expand...

This is why God created smoothbores
When you hit you get to say ‘ a smoothbore takes learning and practice, any old Joe can shoot a rifle but you have to learn your skill to hit with a smooth bore
When you miss with a smooth bore you can say’ what’s you expect? It’s a smoothie, just a tad bit better then throwing rocks’

tenngun said:

This is why God created smoothbores
When you hit you get to say ‘ a smoothbore takes learning and practice, any old Joe can shoot a rifle but you have to learn your skill to hit with a smooth bore
When you miss with a smooth bore you can say’ what’s you expect? It’s a smoothie, just a tad bit better then throwing rocks’

Click to expand...

This is true. I'm not kidding about this story. I used to belong to Jefferson County Longrifles. There was this fella there who shot with a .62 caliber smoothbore Colonial Barn Gun with a Queen Anne Lock. He could hit a 1/2 x 12-inch piece of rebar hanging from a tree at 100 yards every shot. Never missed. Split the cards, cut the string, drive a tack, it didn't matter. He didn't miss. This fella' could really shoot. Semper Fi.
PS, I don't know for sure, but he be a former Marine. lol.

Might be a good move for Sierra to start making precision round balls, they could put Hornady and Speer out of the round ball business. Sierra Match King Round Balls (SMKR). Ad could read "Tired of balls with inclusions, out of round, or fluctuating weight?, try Sierra's new SMK round balls, perfect every time".

Gunny5821 said:

Might be a good move for Sierra to start making precision round balls, they could put Hornady and Speer out of the round ball business. Sierra Match King Round Balls (SMKR). Ad could read "Tired of balls with inclusions, out of round, or fluctuating weight?, try Sierra's new SMK round balls, perfect every time".

Click to expand...

You're on to something! Include a ballistic coefficient and they'll fly off on the shelves.

I know a place too get plastic patches….

Gunny5821 said:

Might be a good move for Sierra to start making precision round balls, they could put Hornady and Speer out of the round ball business. Sierra Match King Round Balls (SMKR). Ad could read "Tired of balls with inclusions, out of round, or fluctuating weight?, try Sierra's new SMK round balls, perfect every time".

Click to expand...

The teenage boy in me gets a laugh at most of these posts about weighing your balls and what kind of lube to use.

Shiloh said:

The teenage boy in me gets a laugh at most of these posts about weighing your balls and what kind of lube to use.

Click to expand...

Me too. I was always a big fan of the G. Gordon Liddy radio show back in the mid nineties, and listened to his show often. One day a lady called in and challenged him on his always saying "Virial, Vigorous, and Potent". He stated, "Well, I didn't want to publicly acknowledge the fact, but I recently had to undergo a testicular reduction" They lady said "Oh My", he stated, "Yes, they were as large as goose eggs and I got tired of sitting on them"

Shiloh said:

The teenage boy in me gets a laugh at most of these posts about weighing your balls and what kind of lube to use.

Click to expand...

Me too.

Burning question: If i were to weigh the .490 balls and weigh the powder would my infrequent cloverleaf groups at 50 yards shrink to the size of a .50 hole?

More likely than not. Of course, that depends on the skill of the operator. More likely, your cloverleaf groups would become boringly commonplace, with the occasional "one hole group." Remove more variables, master the basics, and practice.

ADK Bigfoot

The only time I weight a RB is if I'm casting and unsure the lead I grabbed is hard or soft.

Just for fun, I fired ten rounds of mixed weight .530 swaged roundballs against ten rounds of cast roundballs that were purposely loaded with sprues tilted off center. The swaged did only slightly better.

Okie Hog said:

Me too.

Burning question: If i were to weigh the .490 balls and weigh the powder would my infrequent cloverleaf groups at 50 yards shrink to the size of a .50 hole?

Click to expand...

They could.
For my self weighing ball is not something I want to do. However the more consistent you can do something the more consistent the results.
Hard core beach shooter, with their big rifles and two inch thick barrels clean between shots. Weigh the powder and store in glass tubes, use false muzzles, have barrel long brass tubes that the powder is poured in to to deposit right in the breech with out a chance one granule could stick to bore. And a compression measurement device is used on the ramrod to ensure the same amount of compression is used to seat the ball. And are not happy if their groups are much bigger then their ball

ADK Bigfoot said:

More likely than not. Of course, that depends on the skill of the operator. More likely, your cloverleaf groups would become boringly commonplace, with the occasional "one hole group." Remove more variables, master the basics, and practice.

ADK Bigfoot

Click to expand...

This is why I weigh my .40" home cast balls.

I've been a lifelong gear head and build my own engines, transmissions and do all of my fabrication. I could build the engine and get it running, then leave it untuned. Afterall it is running.......... right? I don't do that, I tune them to their best performance and potential. I drag race and everything on the car is tuned if you will, even the air pressure in the tires.

I can't handle lead fumes so I have to use swaged round balls .
For competition shooting I weigh them according to Dutch's method. Over 35+ years I have over 20lb of rejects which I use for plinking or in a high power slingshot .
I suspect the lite balls have voids in them and it is a matter of chance as to where the void is sitting in the loaded ball .
I believe off to one side would make more difference than one centered in the bore .
Last weekend I opened a new box of Hornady .395 balls and in 60 shots I found 2 which would not fit , I find that more of a bother than being under weight .

TDM said:

We all know swaged round balls vary in weight and that accuracy can suffer when they do. But I had never actually taken the time to weigh them myself. I had 47 RBs left in this box of Hornady .490’s.
Lightest - 176.2 gr. ( 2 balls, the other was 176.3 )
Heaviest - 178.3 gr. ( 2 balls, the other was 178.2 )
Besides these 4 balls, the other 43 ranged from 176.5 to 177.5 with the majority between 176.7 to 177.2

I was surprised and disappointed by the results. A 1/2 grain I can live with, but 1 and 2 grain differences are a bit much. Guess I need to start casting again.

Click to expand...

As a footnote, I weighed some 45 caliber round balls, and out of the four weighted there was five grains difference.

I haven't found weight to be a factor in shooting.
The Void deal may be a myth as I've never seen a RB with a void out of tens of thousands shot/cast.

I'll weigh a suppository projectile since it traveling at high speed.

IMPO some people should worry about buying green bananas vs a few grains of RB difference

1 to 2 grain diffence won't do jack squat even at 200 yards.

#blackpowderbill said:

I haven't found weight to be a factor in shooting.
The Void deal may be a myth as I've never seen a RB with a void out of tens of thousands shot/cast.

I'll weigh a suppository projectile since it traveling at high speed.

IMPO some people should worry about buying green bananas vs a few grains of RB difference

Click to expand...

Voids are internal, cuts dimples ,marks etc are external. Many round ball shooters have experimented with weighed round balls. Myself included. I have found that by weighing balls and sorting into batches of the same or very close weight ,accuracy can be improved over unweighed balls or ones with significant variations . When one is going for the best group, consistency rules. Do I weigh balls any more, no I don't. I no longer shoot in National events and I have better things to do

This a slightly old thread and it looks like it's been discussed many times, but I was curious this morning and did some measurements with my expensive scale.

It is kind of surprising that even my poor group of cast balls (some junk in surface and some small "pits") were so much more consistent. These are from the first time I ever cast balls!!

But, I really doubt I can shoot the difference between the two with my flintlock even at 50 yards with a good rest.

Hornady's balls had a large diameter variance, from 0.567-0.575.

My cast balls are all between 0.569-0.572

Old Hornady box
Avg- 282.11
Es- 4.6
Sd- 1.17

280.84
281.56
281.1
279.94
280.56
282.54
284.28
283.10
282.42
283.28
283.0
281.28
283.38
281.3
279.92
282.68
283.9
280.8
282.94
281.8
283.6
282.66
282.7
282.8
282.1
282.08
281.32
282.94
283.08
282.18
283.02
280.72
279.68
283.62
280.74
280.5
282.48
283.74
281.46
282.14
281.62
283.5
283.34
280.32
282.8
282.7
282.8
281.12
281.02

New Hornady box
Avg- 279.6
Es- 7.44
Sd- 1.48


279.36
280.2
278.66
280.8
277.76
280.18
279.78
277.62
281.44
279.7
278.8
278.52
278.66
278.22
279.84
279.34
277.96
277.72
278.2
278.36
280.1
278.12
279.26
280.1
280.84
278.44
281.42
283.96
280.82
279.24
278.38
281.62
277.76
277.66
279.24
279
279.94
281.5
281.18
279.1
281.22
280.22
282.22
277.52
281.38
276.52
281.26
281
279.26
280.5

Cast
All balls
Avg- 280.57
Es- 2.22
Sd- 0.56

Poor quality bunch
Avg- 280.42
Es- 2.22
Sd- 0.66

279.68
280.32
281.42
280.68
280.88
280.12
280.68
281.02
280.62
280.4
279.2
281.12
281.16
280.56
279.44
280.94
280.54
280.78
279.46
279.54
279.6
281.16
281.16
279.68

Good group
Avg- 280.74
Es- 1.48
Sd- 0.37
280.12
279.86
280.54
280.7
280.92
280.64
281.04
281.26
280.92
280.36
280.62
280.54
281.34
280.82
281.08
280.98
281.26
280.48
281.04
280.42
280.8
280.5

If you would weigh a few more I think we could get a better feel for this . Seriously I've run in that too. Thanks.