Cabela's (Investarm /Lyman) rifle

[po68f]

I purchased an Investarm rifle .54" caliber made for Cabela´s. The same rifle was marketed by Lyman as "Trade rifle".
Which round ball size should I use for target shooting?. .530" or .535"

Thanks

 

[mooman76]

Try .530 first. You can always use a thicker patch if it needs it but can only go so thin.

 

[Black Hand]

I used a .530 ball with 70-75 grains of FFFg in mine.

 

[azmntman]

.530 80 gr here

 

[Zonie]

As the others mentioned, a .530 diameter ball is a good place to start.

After trying different patch thicknesses, lubes and powder loads, if your interested in getting the best accuracy out of your gun, you will probably want to try some .535 diameter balls.

That will give you a good excuse to go thru the "find the best powder load, patches and lubes" exercise again. (Nothing like a good excuse to go shoot some more. :grin: )

The .535 diameter balls just might turn out to be more accurate than the .530 diameter balls were.
You'll never know until you try them.

As you may know, each one of these guns is different.
What works very well in Fred's Great Plains Rifle or Hawken or whatever, might not work worth a hoot in your "identical" GPR, Hawken or whatever.

 

[Dr5x]

I would suggest using a .535 ball. You can use the .530 ball with a thicker patch, note, it has been my experience that the less your fit depends on the patching and more on the lead in engaging the rifling the more likely you will achieve aCCURACY.
THE PURPOSE OF PATCHING IS TO PROVIDE A GOOD SEAL AROUND THE BALL SO THAT NONE OF THE POWER OF THE POWDER GOES BY.
WITH .45 CALIBER RIFLES I FOUND .445 BALLS RATHER THAN .44 BALLS WERE MORE CONSISTENT.

DUTCH SCHOULTZ

 

[Tom Compton]

I use .005" under bore size i.e. .395 in my .40 and .535 in the .54. And still use thick patch material.

Before buying a mold for a new caliber I buy a box of each (.005 and .010 under bore) and see which works best.
TC

 

[Henry2357]

I have always used 530 in my Trade rifle, but now with this thread I'm thinking i'll try the 535's

 

[Tallswife]

.530 with 80gr

 

[Toomuch51]

As mentioned, start with the .530 (with the depth of your rifling I would start with .015 patching). From here you can adjust to larger ball or thicker ,or thinner, patch to get to what your rifle likes best.

 

[Dr5x]

Mountain Joe
If you are doing well with .530. Don't change to .535 just because of this thread. It's something to think about and maybe try a few .535's
Using a few sample .535 balls may be harder to load with your current patching.
If it ain't broke, don't fix it
If you're an accuracy nut, it's fun to fool around seeing what very tiny changes can do to your groups. but before you make any changes be sure to write down exactly what you were doing before making the change.
Relying on memory alone can be teachers,

Dutch

 

[Henry2357]

Dutch, your advice is sound. I am happy with the 530's and loading is effortless. Joe

 

[AZbpBurner]

A few years ago I got a 35 year old Cabelas/Investarms 'Sporty Hawken' - rubber buttpad & checkered stock. Many shooters contend you shouldn't need a short starter or mallet, & to use a thinner patch or smaller diameter ball, but I get amazing accuracy using a .535" ball with a .018" patch.

I'm using an adaptation of Dutch's "Dry Patch": mix 5 parts Denatured Alcohol to 1 part Castor oil & soak the patches, then let the alcohol evaporate out. Loading is easy & fouling is negligible.

 

[Dr5x]

Short Starting??
When you short Start, you are extruding the patch wrapped ball into the rifling of your barrel. You are forcing the lead into th the rifling grooves and the rifling into the patching and lead of the ball.. If you can do this with thumb pressure alone you must have a reasonably strong thumb or relatively shallow rifling.
If you shoot with accuracy while doing this struck with it.
My rifling was always on the deep side and I needed to give the SS a hell of a whack.
I have seen rifles with very shallow rifling shoot very well although I am amazethat that shallow rifling can get a strong enough hold to keep that all to hang on well enough to that rifling, But it does
If you are thumb starting and are not getting any kind of groups your problem will be located in your ball/patch combination fit.

Dutch

 

[Dr5x]

ASZbpBurner,
When you mixed the Castor oil with the alcohol did it blend into a single clear mix, or did it separate into two distinct different items in the same container?
If they made a nice blend that could work as well as the Ballistol.
I also think the alcohol would evaporate more rapidly.

Dutch Schoultz

 

[zimmerstutzen]

Many years ago, I cobbled together a Franken gun of mostly Investarm parts. One barrel was a bargain bin percussion 54 cal Investarms I got for $10.00 at Dixon's. One of the rifling grooves was not cut. So it had one extra wide land. I put it together into a hawken style and never even finished the stock. I had several barrels for it, including a 40 inch 45 cal H&H barrel. The 54 bargain barrel actually shot reasonably well considering. It was no bench rest 100 yd gun, but I could keep them touching at 50 yds offhand. At 75 yds the groups opened alot. I used spit, 535 balls, 50 grains of 3fg and cotton flannel for patches. I always use a short starter, but that combination went in easily with barely probably only about 15 pounds pressure.

 

[BrownBear]

I have seen rifles with very shallow rifling shoot very well although I am amazethat that shallow rifling can get a strong enough hold to keep that all to hang on well enough to that rifling, But it does
If you are thumb starting and are not getting any kind of groups your problem will be located in your ball/patch combination fit.

That pretty thoroughly sums up my experience with Lyman/Investarms and TC. The TC's generally shoot well from the start, but Lyman/Investarms barrels tend to be a little rougher brand new with sharper lands and crown, requiring a break-in period.

Tight patches in the new Lyman/Investarms result in lots of cut or blown patches until things smooth out after 100 shots or so, or some aggressive bore scrubbing with a Scotch green pad and crown touch up with thumb and 400 grit paper.

Once the bore and crown smooth out, it pays to get tight with patches in Lyman/Investarms. There's little to distinguish them from TC at that point. Further down the road, after 1,000 shots or so you may see Lyman accuracy dropping off a little, at which point it's time to use a slightly thicker patch.

All the folderoll with the Lyman/Investarms seems to pay off, because that 1,000+ shot bore is likely to be more accurate than the TC, new or old. My experience anyway. My oldest Lyman GPR (54 cal) is up around the 4,000 shot mark if my logbooks haven't skipped a few sessions here and there (likely), and it just seems to have gotten better and better with long-term use. A couple of other GPR's seem to be on the same course. My TC's have shot better at first, but are overtaken once the GPR hits the 100-shot mark, then slowly surpassed as the GPR is shot more and more.

 

[Dr5x]

Brown Bear,
You ARE a Nit Picker.Welcome aboard.
I never had any break in problems with new boreshaving had good luck two Green Mountains and my first replacement barrel from I don't remember who 40 some years ago..

When a rifle appears to be falling of after some hundreds of rounds. it's probably not because the bore has gotten smaller a very tiny bit, Logically it has more than likely gotten a wee tad larger.
If you suspect this try shimming your load by placing a thin )very_ sheet of paper between ball and patch ito see what effect that slight increase in compressed diameter of your load has on your average groups.
Sometimes that very slight change can be very surprising.
Everything you do when loading affects your group

Dutch

 

[AZbpBurner]

ASZbpBurner,
When you mixed the Castor oil with the alcohol did it blend into a single clear mix, or did it separate into two distinct different items in the same container?
If they made a nice blend that could work as well as the Ballistol.
I also think the alcohol would evaporate more rapidly.

Dutch Schoultz

Castor Oil is completely soluble in Denatured alcohol, (but not in isopropyl) so it remains mixed. I tried the same with some olive oil, however olive oil isn't soluble in DA, so it separated out.