My whitetail rifle is an older, cap-lock, .50 caliber CVA "Hunter-Hawken Carbine" that has a 24-inch barrel and weighs just 6½ pounds.
With the short barrel and light weight, it's nicely handy in the woods and recoil is easily manageable using 70 grains of FFFg Swiss or Goex and a Hornady swagged, .490-inch patched ball.
It will shoot through the average white-tail deer (130-160 lbs) at my self-imposed maximum range of 80 yards if I do my job and place the ball in the deer's "kill zone" just behind the shoulder on a board-side shot.
In addition, since I will only take either standing or walking shots and have never taken a running shot, most deer either drop where they stand or don't travel very far (25-30 yards) after the shot is taken. And with a .50 caliber hole on both sides of the deer, a good blood trail is common.
Therefore, I don't see any need for a larger caliber than a .50 caliber unless one is gonna hunt larger game (bear, elk or moose) in which case I'd opt for the .54 caliber with a larger, heavier ball... and at just 6½ pounds, I would hesitate to use a heavier powder load due to the increased recoil although when shooting at a deer, recoil has never been a noticeable factor.
I've always kinda compared a .50 caliber black powder rifle to a modern .308 or .30/06... a very common center-fire deer cartridge while a .54 caliber rifle is more like a .338 Winchester magnum comparatively.
That said, I'll admit that my big game hunting rifle was a .338 Win. Magnum for over 40 years until I grew older and more wary of the considerably heavier recoil of the .338 with my heavy hand-loads and "retired" my 1961 Model 70 for a 1953 Model 99 Savage lever-action rifle in .300 Savage... a very light-recoiling cartridge compared to even the .30/06 cartridge.
Then, my black powder shooting buddy got me into black powder and I haven't fired a center-fire rifle since except to check the .300 Savage's "zero" prior to going whitetail hunting outta my hunting buddy's cozy cabin in the mountains of Pennsylvania.
Now I've "retired" the ol' Model 99 as well and use my little CVA Hunter-Hawken Carbine for deer in Ohio... my "home" State. I can't handle all that "vertical" Pennsylvania walkin' anymore. :grin:
Since I've never shot deer loads in a .54 caliber, I'm not qualified to make a comparison between a .50 caliber and a .54 caliber, but a deer hunting powder charge of 100 to 120 grains (as mentioned in a previous post) of BP in a .54 caliber compared to my 70 grain load in my .50 caliber CVA Carbine seems like "over-kill" to me.
Incidentally, that 70 grain Swiss BP load outta my Carbine off the bench-rest prints "clover-leaf" type 3-shot groups at 50 yards... even with my tired, almost 78 year old eyes. :wink:
Keep your powder dry... and always make the first shot "count"... :v
Strength & Honor...
Ron T.
