53 Enfield accuracy

[moose30273]

Folks, I am having problems hitting the target with my 53 Enfield replica. I am shooting Minnie Bullets I cast from a Lee mold.(soft Lead) Have been lubing the base and shooting them over 60 to 70 grains of 2f GOEX. Off of a bench at 50 yards I am getting groups in the 24" or so range. Also my Minnies are keyholing (sic?). Anyway, I am thinking that maybe I need to cut my charge down. As I may be blowing out the skirt on the Minnie. The bore of the rifle is pretty good. There is one slightly rough patch about 8" from the muzzle but I do not think this is a problem. I like the idea of shooting Minnies. I am just not having a lot of luck. Any suggestions?

 

[MDIvancic]

Folks, I am having problems hitting the target with my 53 Enfield replica. I am shooting Minnie Bullets I cast from a Lee mold.(soft Lead) Have been lubing the base and shooting them over 60 to 70 grains of 2f GOEX. Off of a bench at 50 yards I am getting groups in the 24" or so range. Also my Minnies are keyholing (sic?). Anyway, I am thinking that maybe I need to cut my charge down. As I may be blowing out the skirt on the Minnie. The bore of the rifle is pretty good. There is one slightly rough patch about 8" from the muzzle but I do not think this is a problem. I like the idea of shooting Minnies. I am just not having a lot of luck. Any suggestions?

Have you slugged the bore to find out what size Minie you should be shooting? Most people try to be within a couple thousands of the bore size. Not all .58 cal are created equal. My gun likes a Minie sized to .575, but others shoot better with a Minie sized to .577.

I don't think its the charge as my wife regularly shoots with 60 grains and gets good accuracy. I shoot my 1861 Springfield with 40 grains and get good accuracy at 50 yrds and 100 yrds. I suppose it's possible you are blowing out a skirt, but you should hear the round whistle as it goes down range if this happens. What are you using for lube.
_________________
Michael Ivancic
Iredell Blues
4th North Carolina, Company A
N-SSA

 

[ozark57]

This same thing has happened to me while shooting the Lee traditional Minie. I used to pack a lot of Crisco in the base and that seemed to cause it to keyhole. I have shot up to 100 grain and have not blown off the base. Are you using pure soft lead? Wheel weights don't make good Minie's as they will not expand for good contact with the bore.I lube with 50% Crisco, 50% bees wax.

 

[Trot]

Three possibilities, lead is too hard, minie too small, poorly cast minies with voids in them. Measure your bore and measure your minies, they should be within .002 of bore size. Weigh them and make sure they are all the same weight, discard any light ones.

 

[nkbj]

That sounds like a case of UMS (that's undersized minie syndrome). Yes, I too have suffered from the pain of keyholing and shattered target frames.
The most recommended remedy for a hunting load is round balls with a tight patch. Sounds like sound advice as it will up the velocity. A batch of balls is cast up and I fully intend to try it here after breakfast. The Zouave really is a handy rifle and my only complaint is it's a caplock.
Got a question for you...you ever thought that maybe since no one is shooting at us that there's no reason for the front band on a minie to not engage the bore? Starting to think that a Zouave is just like any other military arm, as if to say there's standard issue ball and then there's "match" ammo. Think maybe I'm gonna have to have a mould modified and test that theory.

 

[TFoley]

Folks, I am having problems hitting the target with my 53 Enfield replica. I am shooting Minnie Bullets I cast from a Lee mold.(soft Lead) Have been lubing the base and shooting them over 60 to 70 grains of 2f GOEX. Off of a bench at 50 yards I am getting groups in the 24" or so range. Also my Minnies are keyholing (sic?). Anyway, I am thinking that maybe I need to cut my charge down. As I may be blowing out the skirt on the Minnie. The bore of the rifle is pretty good. There is one slightly rough patch about 8" from the muzzle but I do not think this is a problem. I like the idea of shooting Minnies. I am just not having a lot of luck. Any suggestions?

Well, Sir - the charge is about right - 68gr of FFg [2.5 drams] is the official service charge, so to my thinking the other comments are probably on the mark.

Your gun is not so much making a group as hosing...by rights it SHOULD be putting them into a couple or three inches at 50 yards - usual accuracy off-hand.

You did not tell us what make of gun you have - this can be pretty important, as some makes are known to be well over-sized in the bore. I have a P-H musketoon that is dead-on .580, and a genuine item that is actually .590".

Don't give up on it, though!

tac

 

[moose30273]

More information. Ok my rifle is a Euroarms. It's bore measures (get back to you on that one) The Minnies I shoot measure .577 on the nose. Measured 5 last night with no variance. I do try to reject the ones with any sort of defect in the cavity. I have not been weighing them other than a cusory one every now and then. I have been lubing them with a beeswax and olive oil mixture. I fill the base with it. The lube sets up pretty hard and I wonder if this is throwing the balance of the minnie off. I don't remember having this problem when I just slathered on some Bore Butter when I first started shooting the rifle. But then I was just playing with the thing at that time, not really shooting for groups. I had been doing an experement with the lube and different amounts when I got a stuck Minnie and have not experemented with changing the lube since.

 

[ozark57]

As I posted earlier, I had this prbolem when I filled the base with lube. It could be that it is not permiting the base to expand enouph of fast enough. I just lube the grooves now. The traditional Minie is quirky.

 

[MDIvancic]

More information. Ok my rifle is a Euroarms. It's bore measures (get back to you on that one) The Minnies I shoot measure .577 on the nose. Measured 5 last night with no variance. I do try to reject the ones with any sort of defect in the cavity. I have not been weighing them other than a cusory one every now and then. I have been lubing them with a beeswax and olive oil mixture. I fill the base with it. The lube sets up pretty hard and I wonder if this is throwing the balance of the minnie off. I don't remember having this problem when I just slathered on some Bore Butter when I first started shooting the rifle. But then I was just playing with the thing at that time, not really shooting for groups. I had been doing an experement with the lube and different amounts when I got a stuck Minnie and have not experemented with changing the lube since.

I haven't really worried about weight of the Minie yet. I'm lubing with SPG using the spring loaded luber from Northwest Trading Company (I think they call it a center luber or something like that). It doesn't fill the cavity, however it does give the wall of the cavity a good coating.
_________________
Michael Ivancic
Iredell Blues
4th North Carolina, Company A
N-SSA

 

[poordevil]

I have the Parker-Hale musketoon and shoot very under size, smooth sided Prichett styled bullets and never had them tumble. I dip the bullet in 50-50 +- bees wax and mutton tallow. I get one ragged hole for 10 shots at 50 yards standing, which is probly 2 inches or so. Try dipping or smearing the lube on the outside. I keep a rag under my belt to wipe my hands from time to time as the lube gets messy at the muzzle

P

 

[Pigman]

You may not be ramming the round down hard enough. My springfield shoots the same load an traditional mini's. When ramming I push the round down and then hand to throw the rammer down a couple of times to fully seat the mini. I can tell it is seated when the sound the ramrod makes is different. if I dont do this it keyholes the rounds no mater how tight fitting they are.

Foster From Flint

 

[rebelyell]

I amy be mis-understanding. The purpose of lube (at least in my limited understanding) is to keep fouling soft. As such, I have always lightly lubed the outside of the minie. I don't really see any use for lubing the inside of the cavity (I know a guy who I shot N-SSA with who liked to lube the inside because it gave contrails like jets).
I just fill the grooves on the minie.

Hope this helps...

 

[ResearchPress]

I just fill the grooves on the Minie.

As I do. I was never keen on the idea of lube in the base. There always seemed the possibiity of lube migrating to the powder and affecting ignition. With the grooves lubed I can shoot a competition course of fire (13 + 1 fouler) without cleaning.

David

 

[paulvallandigham]

I have always thought, and seen other shooters do it, that if the base of the minie is filled with grease, a base wad, or " OP WAD" needs to be used to keep the grease from fouling the powder charge, and to keep it from being melted on the way up the barrel. Melting the grease changes both the weight, and balance of the minie ball, as it travels down range, making for inaccuracy. Just as we have found original minies with wooden base plugs still in the back of the lead bullet, I have found minies in backstops that still had crisco or other grease still in the cavity.

From talking to and watching shooters who do not grease the base cavity, filling the cavity with grease should not be necessary. They fire excellent groups, PROVIDED that the minie is sized to within .002" of the bore diameter of the barrel, AND the groove depth is NOT TOO DEEP. :thumbsup:

 

[ResearchPress]

Would not the use of an over powder wad effectively seal the grease into the base of the bullet, thereby rendering it useless as a lube? Surely there's also potential for the wad to prevent the expansion of the skirt of the bullet?

As you note, properly sized bullets with the grease grooves lubed produces fine accuracy, and without the added variables inherent in lubing the base cavity.

David

 

[paulvallandigham]

Yes. The guys who put the grease in the base cavity are simply trying to prevent any base wad from sticking in the cavity after the bullet leaves the barrel. The grease is never intended to lubricate anything.

I thought about what they are doing, and decided that it just didn't make a lot of sense. You have no control on how well that grease will STAY in the base cavity during flight, and that is much more likely to send the ball off POA than anything else, IMHO. A good, thick, OP wad to seal gases and thereby protect the skirt on these bullets does make sense to me, as that seems to be the next most likely cause of flyers in these guns. ( Better yet, use a mold with a smaller cavity, and a thicker skirt!)

I think the key for these shallow grooved barrels is sizing the bullets close to bore size, which is what you do, Dave, if I am not mistaken. The grease then grease grooves( as designed) and go shoot the gun! :grin: :thumbsup:

I learned that lesson the hard way, messing around with an imported .45 rifle that had "hint of rifling" in it. After trying two different ball diameters, and three different patch thicknesses, and several different patch lubes, I settled on a combination that I could load without a hammer, and just shot the gun. It proved amazingly accurate( to me!). ?The more experienced members of my gun club would come by to inspect the gun, and when they looked down the muzzle at the " rifling" they would get big grins, and ask me, " How are you getting such accuracy out of a gun with such shallow grooves, if you call them that?"" It became of parade of old members, who on showing up at a shoot, would be corralled by one of the men who had already seen my gun, and would drag him over to see my gun. Giggles and head shakes would follow. According to "lore" my gun was breaking all the rules. :shocked2: :blah: :rotf: :surrender: :thumbsup: