Colonial load

[bldtrailer]

if you're having trouble with the sights try a simple peep sight to co witness your open sights (cause you to mount the rifle the same every time) then you can remove after working up loads if you want to

this one was made from an old dog lic,

 

[M. De Land]

M Dr Land, sounds like we share the exact obsession. I WILL find the right load, hopefully close to what you achieved. I thought I had gone too far using .535 AND an .018 patch, but I see I have not. Your perseverance paid off. You now have a forever rifle and need no other, but who can stop with just one flintlock?

I mostly use my .45 cal guns now days both in flint and percussion for target work. The .54 Douglas barrel was purchased and fit to my TC in .50 cal that I ringed with a maxie ball.
At the time we were shooting a lot of steel silhouettes and I needed the larger cal to knock over the bear steel at 200 yards.
This is percussion not flint but then I loose my place at times on which thread I'm on.

 

[bldtrailer]

the other thing to try (for green mountain barrels) is to smooth out the cut rifling (suggested to me by Mr Dixon) 50-100 strokes of fine steel wool w oil did wounders for a couple of my rifles(see if patches are getting cuts)

went from this

to this

same rifle after smoothing out rifling and load workup all shot w 490 ball

 

[longcruise]

M Dr Land, sounds like we share the exact obsession. I WILL find the right load, hopefully close to what you achieved. I thought I had gone too far using .535 AND an .018 patch, but I see I have not. Your perseverance paid off. You now have a forever rifle and need no other, but who can stop with just one flintlock?

I think the "right load" tends to be elusive. At least it seems that way based on the trials and tribulations of our members here. I've come to think that any quality barrel without defects will shoot very well all up and down the powder scale if the bore is smooth, the crown is clean, and the patch/ball is a tight fit. I know that is a rather bold and contrary statement but I've seen it over and over with multiple guns.