cabelas blue ridge 54 percussion...

[BrownBear]

In truth, I've never seen so much apprehension about filing a front sight and drifting the rear. It's never been that big of a deal to me no matter how much filing is needed. In fact, it's a whole lot of fun. Shoot different loads to find which groups best, then file and drift a tiny bit and shoot some more. I've always looked at it as a rewarding process and an excuse to shoot more and get really acquainted with a gun.

I'd sure find your load and file/drift your sights first- before even thinking about new ones. See what you're dealing with in terms of sight picture BEFORE spending more money.

Doing that will tell you how tall a front sight you need in a replacement. It will also tell you if you need one wider or thinner. Heck, it will even tell you if you need to change the rear sight.

Until you've done that, everything else is guesswork! And that's all we're doing here.

Guessing.

 

[Zoar]

Good point.

And, and this may sound crazy, but honestly and in my personal experience, Real Black Powder shot differently---to a different point----than the fake stuff in my flintlocks and percussions. Hence if I shot the fake stuff and filed my sights, I'd be shooting to a totally different spot when I switched to real Black Powder. Thanks to the encouragement and advice of those on this forum I went out and bought a case of real black powder after I was experiencing less than happy results with the "whatever it was" fake stuff I had started with. The sound is better too.

 

[cowpoke1955]

I guess I was lucky. When I first started 30 years ago with my .54 GPR, I settled on 80 grains (by vol.) of Pyrodex RS. I filed my front sight and drifted the rear. When I changed to FFg Goex there was no difference in POA or POI. Not sure how other Subs compare to Goex. As for the sights, I'm with BrownBear.

 

[54MAN]

thanks for the extra info... i did make it to the range today, ive forgot how much fun they are to shoot... and wow, point of impact was wayyyyy low.. about 6-7 inches low at 30 yards, yea bummer BUT i did pick up the lower front sight from dixie so hopefully i can drift the first one out and put the other one on... ok, powder charges... funny thing is it didnt really have a poi change from 75 to 90 grains... but i will say that i like the 75 charge much better, aside from the huge recoil difference lol... and cleaning, does real bp clean easier then pyrodex? the stuff seemed kinda sticky and hard to get out... and IF the bug were to bite me again, were would be a good place to get a smooth bore rifle? ive seen the brown bess but for a grand?....

 

[Zonie]

Pyrodex does take some extra cleaning when compared with black powder.

Use soap and water at first running the jag patched with a cleaning patch several times.
Then use clean water to wash the soap out followed by dry patches and then an oily one to protect the bore.

 

[BrownBear]

BUT i did pick up the lower front sight from dixie so hopefully i can drift the first one out and put the other one on...

If I'm telling you something you already know, I apologize, but here goes:

Drift that sight out of the barrel from left to right, as seen while looking from the breech end. Then drift the new one in from right to left.

As for Pyrodex, I move back and forth between it and real black. A lot of the cleaning effort in Pyrodex can be overcome if you use a grease or oil type patch lube rather than a water based one. It just stays softer. It's also a good idea to swab the bore real thoroughly with water, spit patches, or a commercial black powder solvent before you ever go home to do the thorough cleaning.