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I have seen this claim of the ball stripping the rifling many times over the years but have yet to see any actual evidence that it happens. Like many"facts", they derive acceptance from repetition only.

like prime covering the touchhole causing a fuse effect. Larry Pletcher's high speed photography has disproved that many times but the myth is still repeated often. So is the myth that stripping the patch doesn't happen.

You guys crack me up when you think that stuff at the time of the birth of these findings is the same today...so if it doesn't happen today it didn't happen then, and modern testing with modern equipment duplicates the original tech including the original wear and tear over time, and thus debunks these as "myths". :haha:

LD
 
marmotslayer said:
I have seen this claim of the ball stripping the rifling many times over the years but have yet to see any actual evidence that it happens. Like many"facts", they derive acceptance from repetition only.

Yes. True. Read what 40 Flint says in the post following yours. He is dead on with his analysis of what might cause perceived stripping.
 
My suggestion is to go with a1:48 twist as I've found it to be very accurate and easy to work up an accurate load with. My .54 is my most accurate rifle and does best with a .530 RB along with 75 grains of 2f Goex.
 
bull3540 said:
My suggestion is to go with a1:48 twist as I've found it to be very accurate and easy to work up an accurate load with. My .54 is my most accurate rifle and does best with a .530 RB along with 75 grains of 2f Goex.

I think that is what I am going to do but in a round about way. I came a cross a 1 year old Trade Rifle that has never been shot for a pretty good deal so I bought it. I am going to leave the 50 cal barrel alone for now.

Thanks guys for all the advice!
 
Yes, throwing a loose patch ball down the bore is going to result in a damaged patch and inaccuracy.

It's a far reach to conclude with absolutely no evidence that balls strip the lands and then refer to doubt of it as a "myth". :haha:

It would be interesting to test the idea but I'm not sure how it would be done :confused: Not much point anyway. There is strong core of people in the ML circles who define "tradition" as the clinging to myths, old wives tales and "conventional wisdom". It's human nature to find comfort in consensus regardless of it's basis in fact!
 
From The Sporting Rifle and Its Projectiles ”“Forsyth 1867

pp.71 ”“ 72 “Just so in a rifle barrel ; the sharper the rate of spiral the greater the tendency of the ball to fly from the grooves and go straight, instead of following the curve [of the rifling]. When it does so it is technically called “stripping,” and is of course fatal to all accuracy of flight. This tendency”¦.can also be counteracted”¦.namely by reducing the velocity, or by giving the ball a greater hold on the grooves; or by a combination of both.”

p. 97 “Formerly, the twist, friction, and tendency to “stripping” were enormous ; this necessitated deep grooves, indenting the zone of the bullet, and causing atmospherical resistancs of a most irregular description, which again, working in a circle, necessitated great spiral in the rifle for such balls. Now, the twist, friction, and tendency to strip are at the minimum : this permits an easy loading bullet, which leaves the muzzle a perfect sphere, and has very little tendency to irregular flight ; which again, permits the slight rate of spiral in the barrel that gives rise to these advantages.”

What we see here is an example that shows the problem had been solved by the middle of the 19th century. What Forsyth describes are barrels rifled very similar to ours today...which explains why we don't see stripping when we shoot. One might observe that the much earlier rifle barrels often were cut (although the above two quotes do not note this) without symmetric lands and grooves, that the grooves were thinner than the lands, as well as being what Forsyth considered "very deep".

Forsyth also writes about very large powder charges in very large bore rifles. Much larger than what we attempt today in both caliber and powder.

I submit, that "stripping" was NOT a myth. It simply continued forward from when it did apply. A great many hunters in the 19th century would not have been well versed on the cutting edge of round ball rifle barrel improvements. Plus the conical bullet had been introduced, and was quickly followed by fixed ammunition...thus the recent improvements died before becoming common knowledge. The old ideas, being widespread, continued in the odd places where muzzleloading rifles survived shooting the patched round ball.

IF we are going to proclaim this as a myth, then we need a barrel made from their steel, the steel of the 18th century, rifled as they did so, with their twist rates, perhaps even faster than 1:48 (1:32 was not unknown)...and with heavy charges, and see if stripping can or cannot happen.

LD
 
Well, I do not have a barrel made of 18th century steel but I do have a modern barrel muzzleloader and I have no doubts at all that a patched roundball "strips" over the rifling when it is used, resulting in inaccuracy.

The barrel is made for shooting paper patched elongated bullets and it is mounted on my Schuetzen rifle.


The barrel is a .40 caliber bore. It has a 1:18 twist and the rifling grooves are 0.0015 (one and one half thousandths) deep.

It is easily capable of putting 5, 350 grain paper patched slugs into a 1 inch circle at 100 yards.

The bullets are specially made paper patch slugs with no grease grooves and a slight cavity at the rear to fold the paper patch into.
Unfortunetly, the slugs are rather expensive.


To reduce the cost of shooting my Schuetzen I tried buying some .395 diameter lead roundballs.
I loaded these with lubricated cotton cloth patches ranging from .015 to .018 thick.

Using powder loads ranging from 40 to 80 grains, the best accuracy I can get with these roundballs is a 10 inch group at 50 yards.

The patches, even with a light powder load are badly frayed just like something that had skipped over the rifling grooves.

You folks may say, "It still wasn't skipping over the rifling grooves.", but I can think of nothing that describes what I've seen better than that expression.
 
Not sure what barrel steel has to do with it? :confused:

But, even though such acknowledged experts as Forsythe and our own Zonie conclude that it does happen, we still do not see any substantial proof.
 
LOL After all that!?

OK, need a new thread about your Trade Gun find...


...with pics.


:wink:
 
yea, found the rifle yesterday, just kinda fell in my lap and I couldn't pass it up. I appreciate all the info in this thread though, this old dog is always ready to learn new tricks. But now I need to be ready for when it arrives, need to make up some patch lube mix. :thumbsup:
 
Loyalist Dave said:
From The Sporting Rifle and Its Projectiles ”“Forsyth 1867

pp.71 ”“ 72 “Just so in a rifle barrel ; the sharper the rate of spiral the greater the tendency of the ball to fly from the grooves and go straight, instead of following the curve [of the rifling]. When it does so it is technically called “stripping,” and is of course fatal to all accuracy of flight. This tendency”¦.can also be counteracted”¦.namely by reducing the velocity, or by giving the ball a greater hold on the grooves; or by a combination of both.”

p. 97 “Formerly, the twist, friction, and tendency to “stripping” were enormous ; this necessitated deep grooves, indenting the zone of the bullet, and causing atmospherical resistancs of a most irregular description, which again, working in a circle, necessitated great spiral in the rifle for such balls. Now, the twist, friction, and tendency to strip are at the minimum : this permits an easy loading bullet, which leaves the muzzle a perfect sphere, and has very little tendency to irregular flight ; which again, permits the slight rate of spiral in the barrel that gives rise to these advantages.”

What we see here is an example that shows the problem had been solved by the middle of the 19th century. What Forsyth describes are barrels rifled very similar to ours today...which explains why we don't see stripping when we shoot. One might observe that the much earlier rifle barrels often were cut (although the above two quotes do not note this) without symmetric lands and grooves, that the grooves were thinner than the lands, as well as being what Forsyth considered "very deep".

Forsyth also writes about very large powder charges in very large bore rifles. Much larger than what we attempt today in both caliber and powder.

I submit, that "stripping" was NOT a myth. It simply continued forward from when it did apply. A great many hunters in the 19th century would not have been well versed on the cutting edge of round ball rifle barrel improvements. Plus the conical bullet had been introduced, and was quickly followed by fixed ammunition...thus the recent improvements died before becoming common knowledge. The old ideas, being widespread, continued in the odd places where muzzleloading rifles survived shooting the patched round ball.

IF we are going to proclaim this as a myth, then we need a barrel made from their steel, the steel of the 18th century, rifled as they did so, with their twist rates, perhaps even faster than 1:48 (1:32 was not unknown)...and with heavy charges, and see if stripping can or cannot happen.

LD

Going off of memory, wasn't he an advocate of narrow lands, heavy charges and keeping the twist slow to minimize the distortion of the projectile and flatten the trajectory?
 
My 16" twist .401 bore has pretty narrow lands as the piece was originally set up to use bullets with the rifling pre-engraved and mechanically fit to the barrel to reduce the amount of expansion needed to seal.



I can get squirrel head groups at squirrel shooting distances with .398 ball. Want to try a card wad and cream'o'wheat too just to see how it will work. But, for small game I may as well use these.



For .54 caliber, 48" twist seems to be as good as any. Back when we could see my brother used a .53 ball, ticking with neatsfoot oil, paper over powder, 110 grains (or was it 120?) of Goex FFg in his Renegade and cut half moons out of little critter skulls with great regularity. He shot some plumb amazing 100 yard groups with the old TC ladder tang sight.
 
screamin said:
bull3540 said:
My suggestion is to go with a1:48 twist as I've found it to be very accurate and easy to work up an accurate load with. My .54 is my most accurate rifle and does best with a .530 RB along with 75 grains of 2f Goex.

I think that is what I am going to do but in a round about way. I came a cross a 1 year old Trade Rifle that has never been shot for a pretty good deal so I bought it. I am going to leave the 50 cal barrel alone for now.

Thanks guys for all the advice!
That sounds like a good plan. My .54 is a semi custom that started life as a Lyman Trade Rifle. Being that it only comes with a right hand lock but me being left handed I had the breach plug changed over with a left hand L&R lock added along with a cherry stock made to fit me. The Trade Rifle butt plate, end cap and trigger guard were also used. If it hadn't have been so accurate to begin with I would have just had a full custom done but now the stock fits me instead of me trying to fit myself to the stock.
 
One of the loads I shoot in a 45-70 was developed for the "trapdoor" rifle. Mine is not a trapdoor. Mine has a 1:18 twist. The load is a .457 round ball coated in lube and seated on a Bp charge. When shot over 45 grains of Bp it's a tack driver. No sign of stepping the rifling!
 
I began with a 54 renegade in the 48 inch twist. I were gonna have it bored to 58 but thought heck ... nuttin to lose with messin with it so I set about with some valve grinding compound [fine] and began hand smoothing the bore.

after getting it to load and shoot round balls without destroying the patch's I began to realize that the ol rusty 54 was going to be a shooter.

now I load her with 80 grains GOEX Cartridge I have left under a self cast .530 round ball of pure lead and patched with some 100% cotton cleaning patch's ... this combo in addition to the musket nipple popping CCI musket caps will clover 3 into the same raged hole at 35 yards.

I been looking for a hunting rifle that would shoot round balls and I have found it ... the 48 inch twist is treating me rite.

maybe before sending off the 50 barrel ...you could shoot some balls covered in a valve grinding soaked patch around 20 or 30 times and see if you can make the old nasty shoot first ... it will give you a project till getting to the point that you can make a good educated decision on weather or not to get it bored out.
 
Well I got that 54 Trade Rifle and have been playing around with it, it is a 1:48 twist. Our pit is 75 yards deep so for now thats the shooting distance. I mixed up some juice and lubed and dried the patches going from 1:1 to 7:1 mix. This baby likes 3:1 pillow tick patches with a 530 ball, 80grs 3f but I still need to try 2f. 3 shot group, 2 holes overlapping on top of each other, 3rd hole 1" to the right.

I did use JB Bore paste for 100 strokes before I took it out. Did that with the Deerstalker I had too and that rifle shot 1 1/2" to 2" groups at 100 yards.

Next up, is a trip up the mountain to my 100 to 125 yard spot to fine tune it some more.

I'm really liking this rifle so far.
 
Mooman76 said:
Ask Bobby. He knows his stuff. I have hear that the rifling needs to make a half turn per barrel length. I don't know if there is anything to that or if it's just a tale.


X2
 
There is nothing to that. Barrel length has nothing to do with the twist needed to stabilize a ball or any other projectile.
 
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