Balls or Sabots?

[pseibel]

What do you mean by primitive styled weapons being abel to use sabbots? Which rifles would they be?
You say "not many sabots are made to shoot well in 48 twist rifles so conicals are your best bet" I know my rifle is a 48 twist but what are conicals?
Weapons are not new to me just muzzel loaders. I see there is a wealth of information here and I realy appreciate it. Hopefully by this weekend I will get to fire it.

 

[walruskid1]

a conical is a bullet shaped projectile like a modern cartridge bullet as opposed to a round ball. a minnie is a conical.

 

[Pittsburghunter]

A conical is a full bore bullet like a maxiball. There are also other conicals out there like the REAL made from the Lee mould. With a 48 twist I like bullets less than the 370g maxi although it shoots fine. I punch better targets with lighter ones.

A full bore bullet does not use a sabot and is made from pure lead. It is the same size as your bore and uses no patch at all.

Some good shooting examples are the Maxiball as I already pointed out the REAL bullet and Ballets made by Hornaday also shoot good. These are lubed with Wonderlube or whatever you have for bullet lube and shoot great.

Just get out and shoot and see what your gun likes. :thumbsup:

 

[arcticap]

Many shooters use a wool Wonder Wad bore button in between the conical bullet and powder to act like a gas check and help improve accuracy. You should be aware that after you ram & seat a conical bullet that it needs to stay seated down on the powder or wad before you shoot it to protect from the remote possibility of harming your barrel. It may be safer to carry the muzzle of the gun in a somewhat upright position to help keep the bullet properly seated.
You can also check this periodically in the woods by first uncapping your rifle and then using your ramrod if in doubt.
This is usually not a problem with a properly fitted patched round ball or a plastic sabot. However, plastic sabots can be much more difficult to load.
I think Zonie supplied you with very good advice. Become more familiar with loading and shooting patched round balls (PRB's) to gain experience. They are relatively accurate, powerful, easy to load, & produce less recoil. :blue:

 

[crockett]

You may shoot sabots and use pellets with your rifle but if you are like most of us you will drift towards the round ball and black powder. The patched round ball doesn't leave any fouling and good old hot water will clean up the black powder. The black powder substitutes may have less fouling but they are just as corrosive. The important thing to remember is once you go black powder/ round ball you never go back to sabots and black powder substutitues- that says alot.
And yes YOU DO NEED A COON SKIN HAT(just fun'in) :front:

 

[tobias]

I hope you don't mind me jumping in the middle here but I am brand new to both this forum and muzzleloading. I have a CVA Hawken in .50 cal. The man I bought it from insisted that I shoot Sabots. I have shot about a hundred rounds of these through and have tried to clean it. I am having trouble now with it not firing after about 3-5 rounds. The #11s snap but there is no kaboom. Also the guy that sold me the rifle said that I should be shooting 100grns fff. I am sore, frustrated and bruised but I still love the thing and won't give up. Any suggestions on cleaing it? Btw, I was also told that the reason the rifle is misfiring is because the breech plug needs replacing? again I say ? How do I replace that?

 

I hope you don't mind me jumping in the middle here but I am brand new to both this forum and muzzleloading. I have a CVA Hawken in .50 cal. The man I bought it from insisted that I shoot Sabots. I have shot about a hundred rounds of these through and have tried to clean it. I am having trouble now with it not firing after about 3-5 rounds. The #11s snap but there is no kaboom. Also the guy that sold me the rifle said that I should be shooting 100grns fff. I am sore, frustrated and bruised but I still love the thing and won't give up. Any suggestions on cleaing it? Btw, I was also told that the reason the rifle is misfiring is because the breech plug needs replacing? again I say ? How do I replace that?

Welcome to the forum , Tobias ! I'm no expert gunsmith , but to the best of my knowlege , the breech plug has nothing to do with fireing the rifle . If a rifle is properly mantained , the breech plug should never need to be replaced or even removed . You need to learn to clean your rifle properly . I hope you've been cleaning your rifle as soon as you're done shooting it for the day , it is essential that you do . You need to clean the nipple and drum (the part the nipple screws into) to give the fire from the cap a clear path to the powder in the barrel . 100 grns. of 3f sounds like a max load , to me , how well does it shoot with that load ? Try starting at 60 grns. and work up to the load you like best with the sabots . You can also try shooting patched round balls with a starting load of 40 grns. and work your way up to a good shooting load . The 1:48 barrel that came with my 20 year old TC Renegade (.54 cal.) will shoot 310 grn. saboted flat point lead bullets like a champ with 70-90 grns. of 2f , but it does not do well with round balls when the charge is 60 grns. or more :results: . As for your ignition problem , after you make sure the nipple and drum are clean , get some RWS (they can be hard to find) caps and give them a try . They are expensive , but :imo: it is money well spent . Also make sure to use REAL black powder (if you can get it) . You have come to the right place to learn about muzzleloading :thumbsup: , there is much to learn and you can learn it here . There are plenty of posts here , about gun cleaning , and everything else you might need to know (just use the search engine). BTW , the guy who told you you needed to replace your breech plug , probably thought you had an inline . We don't do inlines here on the Muzzleloading Forum . Other than that , come on in and enjoy yourself :thumbsup: :hatsoff:

 

[Zonie]

tOBias: Welcome to the Forum!
I am looking at a picture of a CVA Hawken and it looks just like the CVA Hawken I had years ago.
By that I mean, it has a side "drum" which the nipple screws into. This is a round bar about 1/2 inch in diameter sticking out the side of the barrel.
It may have a "clean out screw" going into it from the outside. If it does, remove the screw and the nipple and use a pipe cleaner wetted with water to clean out the channel which connects the nipple with the bore of the barrel.
That should solve your missfire problem.
Oh, also when you load your gun, make sure there is no cap on the nipple, and that the hammer is at "half cock". The idea here is to leave a vent for the air inside the bore to escape thru, and in the process it will blow some powder back under the bottom of the nipple. This should provide instant ignition every time.
If your using real black powder, you should not need hotter precussion caps. If your using Pyrodex or 777, the hotter caps will provide better ignition.
If you can't find RWS caps, you might look for CCI Magnum caps. They work just as well, they cost less and more places have them.

The guy who said you need a new breech plug is full of...let us say, bad information. (we can't swear here because the owners daughters read these things).
The breech plug on a side lock gun is almost Never removed. In fact, on some guns like the Thompson Center Hawken it is almost impossible to remove.
On a gun with a precussion side drum, the breech plug has absolutely nothing to do with ignition.

As for the Sabots and the 100 grain loads, I suspect the guy is giggleing every time he thinks of telling you that.
There is absolutly NO reason for you to punish yourself with that kind of load. Not even for hunting Deer.

I would suggest that you buy a box of .490 or .495 diameter lead balls, and some .015 patches. If you can't find patches, buy some tightly woven COTTON cloth which is about .015-.018 thick. If you have access to a WalMart, buy some blue and white striped, or red and white striped "pillow ticking" for the patching.
Lube the patch with the commercial "bore butter" stuff or Crisco, or Vegetable oil, or just spit.

For a .50 caliber gun shooting round balls, start at about 50-60 grains of powder (FFg, FFFg, Pyrodex P, Pyrodex RS or 777). Black powder is best.
When shooting this load you will be amazed at how much fun you can have without being kicked to death.
With a 70 grain load, you will be shooting a 180 (roughly) grain bullet at about 1550 FPS. Far from puny, it still won't kick hard. With a 90 grain load and a round ball, your gun will, with a well placed shot bring down an elk with one shot.

Another good thing about shooting the patched balls. MONEY.
The balls will cost you about 8.5 cents each and the patch will cost from almost nothing (if you make your own) to about 5 cents each. Most of the Sabots I've seen cost more than that without the bullet. Give it a try.

 

[tobias]

Zonie; Thank you for your help here. I have become so rattled at this rifle's may or may not shoot that I had put it aside for a while hoping I would find somebody somewhere that could help me. One of the last times I shot the rifle(not the last call it the climbing back up on the horse thing) I was loaded with 100grns. Pulled the trigger then snap, only the primer fired. I waited for several seconds to lower the rifle and about the time I pulled it from my shoulder KABOOM! The thing cracked my cheek bone and almost flew out of my hands. I did not know about cleaing the barrel lug where the nipple goes in so I will give it a try. Also when I got the rifle it had a bit of rust visible just inside the barrel and I promptly set about cleaning it with boiling hot water and dawn detergent. I scrubbed the thing til there was no residue of anykind on the patches. But after I posted the first message in here I noticed some more building on the business end. I have bore butter as a preventative, do I need to do something else? Thanks again for all your help and advice.
Tobias

 

[Zonie]

Risking a mob of people who will disagree with me, I'll say Bore Butter, or TC1000 or any of the other good smelling lubes used in black powder guns for greasing the cloth patch or the grooves on the slugs works just great for what it was intended to do.
It was intended to grease patches and slugs.

A lot of people have had very poor luck using it for rust prevention.

As you may know, greases and oils which are made from petroleum react with black powder (and Pyrodex) to make a hard black fouling that ruins accuracy and makes removing the nipple dam near impossible. For this reason, stay away from using these.

I have had fairly good luck with Birchwood Casey Sheath. I think it is a petroleum product, but it drys to a coating so thin that the bad effects don't seem to happen.

After reading some folks praise of Ballistol, I bought some and used it in 5 of my gun barrels. Two months later, when I wiped those guns bores, every one of them showed signs of rust. To say the least, I am not a happy shooter.
I have gone back to Sheath.

 

[gordy]

Welcome to the Forum.All that the others have told You is right on the money.It sounds like the person who sold you the gun,didn't do a great job cleaning,chances are the breech area needs special attn.You may have to obtain/make a scraper to clean up the face of the plug and the fire hole.Can't elaborate as I have to leave for work five min.ago.Good Luck. :front: