Confused about rifled barrels & Minnie Balls

[preventec47]

After 40 years of shooting centerfire modern weapons in the past year I have become interested in muzzle loading and in an attempt to learn a bit about it and see many
shoot I located and attended one of the Skirmish Society shoots close to my area ( Atlanta)

I live in what was a very busy Civil War area and there are a few museums displaying
lots of old rifles and hundreds of recovered minnie-balls so I was surprised to see
(at a gathering that was intended to be competitive accuracy wise ) that all of the
contestants were shooting roundballs although some I believe and the winners were
shooting rifled barrels. As best as I could understand minnie balls were not
forbidden by the rules or anything ....... so if my understanding of the evolution
of guns..... involved minnie balls in rifled barrels.... Why weren't they shooting with
minnie balls. I asked and some said their round balls were more accurate.

Relating to me selecting a gun to purchase..... are minnie balls in rifled barrels
more accurate and if so, why weren't they shooting them ?

From what I could tell these Skirmish groups are the largest group of active muzzle loading shooters across the country ... so why are the majority ( all at the shoot I attended - probably 30 guys) still using round balls ?

Ultimately I want to distill some answers here into criteria for selection of and
the purchase of an accurate muzzle loader.

 

[Sparkitoff]

There are a lot of potential answers to your questions. First consideration would be what caliber the rifles are. Next would be what rate of twist. Then what level of historically correct replication is needed/required? Lastly, maybe whether the longarms are percussion or flintlock. When a move was made to .58 caliber a lot of infantry used mini-balls. Mini-balls are not inherently more accurate in rifled barrels across the board. It depends greatly on the rifling including # and type of lands and grooves and rate of twist. It also depends on the mini-ball construction such as hollow base, solid-flat base, lube grooves. etc. Round balls are more readily accessible on the commercial market and cheaper. They are also easy to make at home. A mini-ball would have to be tailored to the barrel to be accurate. Lots of good info and knowledge here that far exceeds mine....they will chime in soon.

 

[preventec47]

In response, this is purely for my enjoyment as a hobby so there are no historical correctness factors in the aspects of the gun. I enjoy precision in my hobbies and am to some degree lazy and would like the latest state of the art but
dont mind some historical resemblance if my gun. I believe that means percussion as opposed to flintlock.
If you tell me that somehow round balls are more accurate than spinning minnie balls (bullets ) from rifled barrels
then that is like saying Santa Claus does not exist.

My simple understanding from a distance all my life was
that the soft hollow base of a minnie ball would expand under pressure to engage with the grooves to make them spin. I can see that a tumbling minnie ball would likely
be less accurate than a round ball.

I dont have any preferences for caliber and would accept
whatever seems to be the most popular and maybe for that reason more selections of rifles exist and supplies etc.

Many years ago I latched onto the neatness of the early rifled barrels being ( I think ) 69 caliber and how cool throwing a cannon ball downrange was and I began to
keep a lookout for available used guns but as I became more and more familiar with lightweight 12 ga shotguns I began to realize large recoil was not my friend. Since some of the 69 calibre projectiles were 600 grain and bigger I am certainly now open to smaller calibers.

I always remember what is popular is popular for a reason but in this case I am perplexed that there are not more muzzle loaders shooting minnie balls instead of round balls.

What if we were looking at a narrow subset of muzzleloaders being benchrest and longrange shooters
... they are using minnie balls arent they ? If so,
good. What are they doing ? I'm pretty sure ( guessing)
that guys shooting 400, 600, 1000 yards are not shooting
round balls ? ? ? Am I right ?

 

[Rat]

I have found that getting really good accuracy from a minnie rifle can be very complicated, and sometimes difficult, whereas all three of my m-rifles will shoot round ball quite accurately, with minimum load development. I'm not sure what the accuracy standards were, back in the day, for the service rifles, but I don't think it was what you would call "great". "Good enough" to hit a man for sure at 100 yards, or a horse beyond that, and capable of many repeat shots, was the main criteria. In any shooting match other than long-range, that allowed round ball, it probably would not make sense to shoot minnie balls instead. If my rifles are typical of the breed, (two replica 1863 Remington contract rifles, one 1861 Springfield) most of the minnie rifles will shoot more accurately with round ball, with moderate to light powder charges. And that may not be true for the guy who has done extreme and extensive load development and experimentation with a minnie. But for us mortals, I think that's true.

 

[Britsmoothy]

The mini ball was developed to speed up loading, not necessary to better a ball.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

The mini ball was developed to speed up loading, not necessary to better a ball.

BRAVO give the man a prize!

The minie ball was for combat speed-loading of the rifled musket. As late as 1867 big game hunters, including those who went after dangerous game such as tigers, rhinos, and elephants, advocated the patched, round ball over the elongated, skirted bullet.

LD

 

[Flint62Smoothie]

A mini-ball would have to be tailored to the barrel to be accurate.

NO TRUER WORDS NEED TO BE SAID ...

Match the minie to the bore and you’ll have excellent results! I’m lucky to have a few friends who shoot the No/So Skirmish and they’ve taught me a lot. One has a set of 8 or 10 bore plug gauges from 574 to 582 or so and he slugged my bore then told me what to buy. I ended up buying ‘as cast’ minies from The Cast Bullet Shop (VERY reasonably too) and push them through a 0.578” sizing die from Lodgewood.

They also taught me how they work up a load, in 2 grain increments to get the best accuracy at 50-yds, then trying it sgain at 100-yds, where they might then try 1-grn less or heavier to fine tune it. They got me shooting 1-ragged hole groups at 50-yds benched, but all their shooting is 100-yds I believe, offhand too! At out informal shoot they put a 6” square gong out @ 100, but hung it as a diamond.

Offhand he hit it 6 out of 8 times ... and he knew on the the missed he didn’t follow through well enough.

 

[Zonie]

preventec47
As was mentioned, Minie' balls were developed to speed loading while taking advantage of some improvement in accuracy because of the rifled bore. They were not what we would call target bullets.

Minie' bullets can be quite accurate but they need to be sized to be .001 to .002 smaller than the bore size.
Because of machine tolerances, most of the original guns bores could vary over .010. That wasn't a problem for military use where shooting a man size target at 100 yards was good enough but for real accuracy in modern competition it isn't good at all.
Modern replicas of the rifled muskets of the Civil War era often have similar tolerances in their bores so the only way to get real accurate shooting is to measure the exact bore size of your gun and then get a sizing die to size the Minie bullet for that barrel.

Patched roundballs shot in rifled guns on the other hand are much easier to get to shoot accurately out to 100 yards and a bit beyond.
Lead roundballs come in several different sizes and the material used for patches can be easily found from .010 to .020 thick.
The barrels on guns rifled for shooting patched roundballs are also much more accuretly machined than the original or modern rifled musket.
Often bore size on modern patched ball shooting rifles only vary .001 or less.

All of this makes finding the right ball diameter/patch thickness combination much easier than the rifled muskets and their Minie' balls.

As for the guys shooting long ranges with their muzzleloading rifles, most of them are shooting elongated lead bullets. Not Minie' balls.
These bullets are often patched with paper patches, lubed right before loading.
Working up a load for these guns is not easy but for the person who wants to do the work, some exceptional accuracy can be obtained.

By the way, the barrels on Rifled Muskets, made for shooting Minie' Balls have rather shallow rifling in them and patched lead roundballs like to be shot in barrels with deep rifling grooves that can grab the cloth patch firmly.
That makes accurate shooting of patched roundballs difficult in a Rifled Musket.
I've tried a number of ball/patch/powder combinations but getting one of my Parker Hale Enfields to shoot a patched roundball accurate enough for serious target work hasn't been very successful.

 

[Britsmoothy]

Minnie balls often have to thin a skirt at the rear and thus on leaving the muzzle can be blown out an make the slug resemble a shuttle cock.
If your fortunate it will be consistent every shot but for most they have to plug the hollow base or better still alter their mold to thicken the skirt.

B.

 

[hawkeye2]

It takes a lot to blow the skirt on a mini, the 60 grain service load won't do it. We often make new base plugs for our molds that produce a thinner skirt and deeper cavity to improve the seal.

 

[Okie Hog]

The Minie bullet was invented by Claude Etienne Minié (1804-1879). It became popular during the Crimean War. Minie' later managed the Remington Arms Company.

By definition all Minie bullets have skirts. If the projectile has a solid base it's something else.

i started wondering about bore diameters of Civil War rifles after picking up hundreds of .58 caliber Minie bullets on Civil War battlefields and firing ranges. Some rifles were apparently very hard to load. The noses of many bullets were damaged by being whanged with the heavy ramrod.

Years ago i miked the bores of numerous Civil War rifles. They sometimes vary more than ten thousands of an inch between rifles. Enfield rifles had the most consistent bore diameters.

 

[preventec47]

The mini ball was developed to speed up loading, not necessary to better a ball.

I'm embarassed to ask this but why is a minnie ball faster to load ? Is it because it goes down the barrel easier because
you do not use a patch ? Well if that is the case... why
not push the ball down the barrel without a patch ?

I seem to recall they named the minnie ball after the guy who invented it whose name was Minnie like he was some hero. Today it sounds like no big deal. I'll tell you this -
in the local civil war museums they only display hundreds of
found minnie balls by guys with metal detectors. I have never seen round balls displayed.

Somewhat related... I wonder if muzzle loaders on average equal the average of 12ga magnum slugs in smooth bore shotguns?
What about rifled barrel shotguns ?

Another question.... many years ago I recall at a gun show they were selling copper coated bullets that I am pretty sure were for use with muzzle loaders. Am I wrong about that ?

Also weren't there some manufacturers who were making bolt action muzzle loaders that had screw out breech
caps that were designed for modern smokeless powders ?

I'm trying to think.... maybe those copper jacketed bullets were for those kinds of rifles ? ? ?

 

[Coot]

The Minie "ball" is faster to load as it is very slightly undersize relative to the bore vs the patched round ball which (including the patch thickness) is over sized relative to the bore & must be loaded with some pressure & changing grip (to keep the force on the rod near the muzzle) on the ramrod to prevent breaking (a wood) or bending (a metal) rod due to the friction resistance. The patch & ball is engaging the rifling all the way down as well as when fired. The Minie almost slides down the barrel with little resistance (until fouling builds up after multiple shots) and only engages the rifling when the weapon is fired, the pressure of the combusting powder forcing the "skirt" of the Minie to expand into the rifling & imparting stabilizing spin. If an unpatched (& slightly undersized) round ball were to loaded, there would be nothing to engage the rifling & thus no stabilizing spin imparted. In emergencies, where a fast shot (generally at closer range) was more important than an accurate shot, loose, unpatched balls could be loaded.

Copper bullets encased in plastic sabots and powder made into large pellets are used in modern "in-line" "muzzloaders" which are neither traditional nor authorized for discussion on the Forum.

 

[Zonie]

I'm embarassed to ask this but why is a minnie ball faster to load ? Is it because it goes down the barrel easier because
you do not use a patch ? Well if that is the case... why
not push the ball down the barrel without a patch ?

The Minie' ball loads faster than a patched ball because unlike the patched ball with a patch on it, the Minie' ball is smaller than the bore size when it is loaded. That allows it to slide easily down the bore of the gun even if the bore has a coating of black powder fouling on it. When the gun is fired, the gas pressure causes the hollow base of the bullet to expand and engage the rifling. The spin of the bullet caused by the rifling greatly adds to the accuracy at long distances.
A undersize ball without a patch on it does not expand enough to cause it to engage the rifling in the barrel when the gun is fired so it does not spin. That results in accuracy that is no better than it would be if the ball was a loose fit in a smooth bore barrel.

I seem to recall they named the minnie ball after the guy who invented it whose name was Minnie like he was some hero. Today it sounds like no big deal. I'll tell you this -
in the local civil war museums they only display hundreds of
found minnie balls by guys with metal detectors. I have never seen round balls displayed.

There were millions of Minie' balls made and shot during that war. That's why so many of them have been found.
This is not to say there weren't any roundballs shot too. Early in the war smoothbore muskets were also commonly used and these were loaded with round balls just like in the days of the Revolutionary War. There were also troops armed with unaltered Springfield 1842 muskets. These were often loaded with "buck and ball" loads and were devastating to the soldiers who had the misfortune of being hit by them.

Somewhat related... I wonder if muzzle loaders on average equal the average of 12ga magnum slugs in smooth bore shotguns?
What about rifled barrel shotguns ?

The question is too vague to answer easily. Generally speaking, the velocity of muzzleloader fired slugs is slightly less than the modern counterpart. That doesn't mean muzzleloaders are less lethal.

Another question.... many years ago I recall at a gun show they were selling copper coated bullets that I am pretty sure were for use with muzzle loaders. Am I wrong about that ?

Also weren't there some manufacturers who were making bolt action muzzle loaders that had screw out breech
caps that were designed for modern smokeless powders ?

I'm trying to think.... maybe those copper jacketed bullets were for those kinds of rifles ? ? ?

I don't recall seeing plated bullets made for muzzleloaders. There was a time that Remington offered plated roundballs for muzzleloading guns but they didn't catch on and Remington stopped making them.

As for the muzzleloader that was supposed to shoot smokeless powder, yes it was sold a few years ago. After a number of people were hurt by exploding guns, the company stopped making or selling them.

 

[nchawkeye]

It sounds like you are throwing all muzzleloaders into the same category...Not all rifled barrels are made the same, they are made specifically for a certain projectile...The earlier American Longrifles were usually slower twists with one full revolution per 48-66 inches, they were also rifled .015-.018 deep, made for round balls and greased patches, they were very forgiving in their loading...As mentioned, before the Civil War the minie was developed...Guns made for these projectiles had faster rifling as it takes a faster twist to stabilize longer projectiles...Also, since these guns didn't use greased patches but relied on gases to unset the base of the bullet to engage the rifling then the rifling was much more shallow...

Now, you bring up copper plated bullets, we don't discuss these on this Traditional Form but I suspect what you saw was modern copper plated bullets for those more modern guns we don't discuss...

Without seeing the guns that were shot in the original shoot you mentioned it's hard to make an educated guess as to what guns were being fired...

 

[will5a1]

It sounds like you are throwing all muzzleloaders into the same category...As mentioned, before the Civil War the minie was developed...Guns made for these projectiles had faster rifling as it takes a faster twist to stabilize longer projectiles...Also, since these guns didn't use greased patches but relied on gases to unset the base of the bullet to engage the rifling then the rifling was much more shallow......

Everything I've read indicates the M1861 Springfiled had a ROT of 1-78, and I think the M1863 did also, can't speak to the Enfields. I'd measure my original M1861 but I'm too lazy to dig it out of the back of the safe.

 

[Rat]

I've always been under the impression that most of the replica CW rifles had a very slow twist, and assume that would be the reason mine shoot a round ball well. Not "serious target work" well, but well enough to keep it in the vital area of a deer, bear, cougar or elk at 100 yards. My Armi-Sport 1861 shoots ball very well, even with charges up to 100 grains, but the POI is far from where the R-E-A-L bullet hits, so I leave it sighted for that bullet, as the REAL is very accurate, and it gives me the option of a little more power if I want it. Usually I hunt with a .62 Jeager and round ball though. Sometimes my Brown Bess, once in a great while with the 1861 or one of the 1863 Remington Contract rifles (replicas) if conditions get really crazy sopping wet. I have heard that some of the Enfield reps have a faster twist, the Parker Hales maybe?

 

[ResearchPress]

What if we were looking at a narrow subset of muzzleloaders being benchrest and longrange shooters... they are using minnie balls arent they? If so, good. What are they doing ? I'm pretty sure ( guessing) that guys shooting 400, 600, 1000 yards are not shooting round balls ? ? ? Am I right?

Here in the UK we shoot .577 Enfield rifles in MLAGB National Rifle Championship matches out to 600 yards. This was generally the maximium range used in the 19thC for target shooting competition with such rifles. A club I am in has an aggregate match at 600 and 800 yards for military muzzle loaders. Minié bullets (after the co-developer Claude-Étienne Minié) are used - patched round ball don't feature.

Most long range shooting with muzzle loaders is however done with .45 cal rifles shooting cylindical bullets weighing 530-560 grains. During the 1860s and 1870s in the UK, the muzzle loading match rifle evolved into a very specialised form, with half stock, pistol grip, aperture sights, and no provision for a ramrod. Rifling pitch was typically 1 in 22 - 1 in 18.

David

 

[TFoley]

I've always been under the impression that most of the replica CW rifles had a very slow twist, and assume that would be the reason mine shoot a round ball well. Not "serious target work" well, but well enough to keep it in the vital area of a deer, bear, cougar or elk at 100 yards. My Armi-Sport 1861 shoots ball very well, even with charges up to 100 grains, but the POI is far from where the R-E-A-L bullet hits, so I leave it sighted for that bullet, as the REAL is very accurate, and it gives me the option of a little more power if I want it. Usually I hunt with a .62 Jeager and round ball though. Sometimes my Brown Bess, once in a great while with the 1861 or one of the 1863 Remington Contract rifles (replicas) if conditions get really crazy sopping wet. I have heard that some of the Enfield reps have a faster twist, the Parker Hales maybe?

The Parker-Hale 'reps' are not 'reps', but manfacturing continuations, usually with the ROT replicated as per the original Patterns and gauges from which they were made.

 

[gemmer]

A rifle musket designed to shoot a properly fitted minie will shoot better than a patched round ball and load easier. Any serious rifle musket shooter would scoff at the idea of using a patched ball just as a dedicated long rifle shooter would about using a minie. And, a rifle musket will shoot just as well as that long rifle. I beat long rifle shooters with my original '63 Springfield and '41 Mississippi in off hand matches all the time. I'm not an exclusive musket shooter, in fact I shoot my long rifles a lot more. My long winded point is shoot the ball or bullet that the gun was designed for.