45 smoothbore and shot

[Britsmoothy]

Can any body instruct me from experiance with reguard to usung shot in a smooth rifle of .45? Shure would appreiciate some pointers like shot load caperbilities and the kike :grin:
It,s with reguard to a Armsport jahger Kentucky carbine model I hope to view soon with a view to using it for sqirrell and rabbit. Thankyou.

 

[DCF]

I have a 45 cal smoothbore - it shots like an undernourished 410! no choke and not much shot means you need to get rather close.
I'd go for a pedersoli mortimer or something with a bigger bore - 20 bore plus for me these days with shot!

 

[paulvallandigham]

YOu are oinly going to be able to shoot 1/2 to 5/8 oz. of shot in that small .45 cal. smoothbore. Stick with 1 to 1 1/2 dram loads. ( 27.5-41 grains) Use a cleaning patch for your over powder wad, or buy some 45 cal overshot cards, if you can find some, and use them for both overpowder wads and overshot cards. Don't expect much of a pattern. You are actually going to be bless with that shorter barrel, as you will flatten the shot less because it rubs against the barrel for a short amount of time. It should be good for rabbits and squirrels between 10 and 15 yards. Juse #6 or #5 shot to maintain pellet energy even at those ranges.

 

[paulvallandigham]

YOu are oinly going to be able to shoot 1/2 to 5/8 oz. of shot in that small .45 cal. smoothbore. Stick with 1 to 1 1/2 dram loads. ( 27.5-41 grains) Use a cleaning patch for your over powder wad, or buy some 45 cal overshot cards, if you can find some, and use them for both overpowder wads and overshot cards. Don't expect much of a pattern. You are actually going to be bless with that shorter barrel, as you will flatten the shot less because it rubs against the barrel for a short amount of time. It should be good for rabbits and squirrels between 10 and 15 yards. Use #6 or #5 shot to maintain pellet energy even at those ranges.

 

[Britsmoothy]

Thank you for your replys. I will start around 30 grn and 5/8oz no7 shot- I do like this load in my .410. I only intend to use it in small timber so range ain,t much of an issue. I do have a mortimer in 12 and it,s good but if I where to use ball it,s a bit strong for squirrel and rabbit. Perhaps a .45 will get me back to one of my favourite hunting methods- muzzle loading :grin: Today I converted a lee bullet sizer to bring .457 balls down to .4375 as I can get these easy around here, I can open the sizer up a touch if I need to.I hope to use these for short range and will cast .440 balls for a strong patched loading etc. I shall make a card punch if I think there is potential, I may try screwed up newspaper- we will see.
Sir, do you hunt with a 45 smooth bore? If so what and how (loading wise)

 

[CoyoteJoe]

I once did a small survey of old smooth rifles and found there were more of them under .50 caliber than over .50, so it appears that the original owners must have found small bores to be good for something. I suspect they were used far more with ball than with shot. Manufactured birdshot was expensive and do-it-yourself shot was very time consuming to make and of very poor quality at best--- all for just a squirrel? The same amount of expensive powder and lead would be much better spent as a ball load to bring home deer, bear, elk, moose or buffalo. Still, I've always been intrigued by the idea and wonder what a .44 caliber 48" smooth rifle can do with shot.

 

[paulvallandigham]

pattern a .410 with the smaller casings, and you will get an idea of how that .44 with the 48" barrel will pattern. Not very well. The shot column is too long, allowing most of the pellets to rub against the side of the barrel. Very little shot makes it to 30 yards still in some kind of pattern. The 24. ga.(.579") is a good gauge, but not popular here, inspite of all the .58 cal guns that have been sold here. The 28 ga.(.550") seems to be the most efficient gauge for delivering good patterns with choke, of the small gauge guns. You almost can't find a 28 ga. gun that does not shoot well, and its darn hard to find them on a used gun rack!

I would leave the .44 and .45 cal guns for roundball use, only, and if I wanted a shotgun of small bore diameter, I would get a 28 ga. gun. Extremely light loads, no recoil, and very efficient for taking birds out to 30 yards, and some a bit further. Unlike modern cartridges where you are restricted to small charges of shot, in a ML shotgun you can all more shot if you think you need it, or if you think it helps the pattern at the longer ranges.

 

[DCF]

....errrr...ball..... for rabbit and squirrel.....are you in Britain?

 

[Britsmoothy]

Thanks coyotyjoe, if I get it I will let you know how it goes. It,s interesting about the popularity of .50 or less smoothbores of yesteryear and you are probs right about using ball mainly. I often wonder if a small amount of shot was purchased to enable folk to harvest say perched or roosting birds as darkness fell for example or maybe some folk had access to reeds around a pool and would hide to await a passing duck etc :hatsoff:

 

[Britsmoothy]

err... ball.... for squirrel and rabbit is illegal in Britain. God bless the good forsight of our big brother in preventing us from doing something foolish.

 

[DCF]

...like enjoy ourselves!

 

[markinstettler]

Although that may have been the effect of the legislation, I'm guessing its spirit was to reduce wasted meat and wounded animals. But you know what they say about good intentions...

Personally and almost without exception, if I aim my rifle at something that is alive, the intention is that I'll eat it and waste as little as possible. That means if I can't expect a successful head shot, I don't pull the trigger. That's also the reason I don't shoot at squirrels around here, they taste strongly of conifer sap. My dog won't even tough them. But both my dog and myself agree that ground squirrels are a different story.

Oops. I've strayed a bit.

 

[paulvallandigham]

Mark Pine nuts do leave a bitter taste to meat, whether it is squirrel or deer. You can remove much if not all of it by soaking the meat in water with salt to pull the blood out of the meat, and then use clean water to pull the sall out of the flesh. I have also soaked meat in water with baking soda, or with vinegar, in it to neutralize flavors and odors I didn't like with success. If you use vinegar- making the water acidic- you want to have an equal soak in clean water to remove the vinegar. Both salt, and vinegar will help tenderize the meat, in the process, making for high quality eating when you are through.

I only offer this information because I hate seeing people passing up some great EATS simply because no one ever told them how to prepare the meat for cooking. Some of these tips came from my mother in law, who worked in a meat packing plant in Michigan, where local hunters would bring their big game in for processing. Her husband also hunted small game when my wife was very young, and that was often the only meat they had to eat in those days. She had to learn to cook the meat so it was edible, and being Japanese, she was particular sensitive to anything that smelled or tasted bad.

For example, my first Wild Boar left much to be desired in both taste and smell! I used these methods to make the meat tolerable enough to cook in the kitchen oven I can assure you that I would not have been able to do so if I tried to cook the meat as it tasted and smelled when it came out of the freezer paper!

 

[Britsmoothy]

Thank you all for your replys :bow: I have viewed the said piece today and have decided against it :shake: Cosmeticaly it was,nt to bad but it had issues around its nipple and a broken ram rod but worst than that the bore was manufactured really poorly with tooling marks etc.The slight rusting in the bore I think I could of got around. All these prob are correctable I know but they where asking to much, I made a conservative offer but they declined so I left it,Some where there is a better example so I wait Good luck and Gods blessing :hatsoff:
Now wheres my pipe :winking: