custom bp shotguns? And a turkey thanks

[AkDan]

Well I'm back.

First and foremost, a thanks to all those who lended a hand on the bp patterning awhile back. Had a great trip. Got into tons of birds, nothing short of a riot. My dad and I only hunted 5 days together, he managed a jake on the last morning with his 150 yr old bp shottie. I also shot a jake later in my hunt after 5 misfires on longbeards. Only later did we see the hammer wasnt hitting but the edge on the nipple and we figured it was blowing out the cap instead of hitting it flat and down the spark hole. Even with poweder in the channel it wouldnt fire on occasion. Had 3 just complete miss's with the mod barrel. That I can attribute to nothing as all three of those birds with the pattern I had out of the mod barrel should have done the job rather nicely. Finally took a the jake at 8 yards or so with the cyl barrel after cracking a cap on a longbeard at 15 yards with the cyl barrel. The miss fires were 99.9% the mod barrel as I missfired a cyl barrel patterening due to not popping a cap or two before loading after cleaning and knew my mistake after the miss fire occured however the mod barrel was nothing short of a headache. Reworking triggers, re working hammers, replacing nipples on a brand spanking new tool just to get it to do the job it was intended to do out of the box was a bit flustering a a hole lot of depressing with what is on the market currently.

I'm just curious as I thought I read on here somewhere there was someone making custom bp shotties? I'm looking for a double 10 gauge. I'm a bit more leary of buying some older guns as I really dont know much about what I'm looking for and what I can or can't do out of one, (like shooting steel, proof testing or if it's even shootable). Out of an unlined barrel can I shoot steel? bismuth? Just curious for waterfowling, if neither of those two what does a guy use?

I'm skippering a charter boat this summer again so my time is a bit short. Has taken me this long to find this site again (ugg) on my buddies computer. I'm out fishing most days.

ANy help would be greatly appreciated.

I'm hoping to take my old man to south or north dakota this fall for a few days of black powder rooster hunting. It'll be the two of us, there's plenty of room. It's still in the works as we speak. Sure would be fun to have a bunch of bp shotguns and a bunch of birds in the air!!!

Dan
[email protected]
907-322-0397 3 hours behind CST if you do call.

 

[F.G. Ford]

Hi Dan,
Happy to see you had a good hunt!
Now to your shotgun.... Is it a Pedersoli, or a CVA, or some other modern repro?
I have had a few Pedersoli side by side's and no problem, what so ever.
Now the CVA that is another story....nothing but problems. Poor line-up from hammer to nipple, soft springs, lousy trigger pull, poor wood.
I'm sure if you find one of the Pedersoli 12 ga. or 10ga.( 10's are heavy) you will enjoy your bird hunting a lot more.
Best Regards
Old Ford

 

[paulvallandigham]

I can't see any particular need for a 10 gauge shotgun, but this is America and you get what you pay for. With black powder shotguns, you can load them up and down, using more or less powder, and more or less shot, much more so than in a modern shotgun shell, where the case capacity limits what you can shoot.

Read V.M. Starrs article on Bob Spenser's site;
[url] http://members.aye.net/~bspen/starr.html[/url]

That will give you the basic knowledge about loading and shooting Black Powder shotguns that have no choke in the barrel.

As to shooting steel, you need a modern steel barrel made and marked that it can be used to shoot steel shot. Use Bismuth, or some of the other non-toxic shot in a ML shotgun that does not have that marking. Check Ballistics Products-- you can find a link here under member resources at the top of the index page- for the components and wads to shoot waterfowl with non-toxic shot. The shot is very expensive, as are the plastic wads, but if you are going to shoot non-toxic shot in a BP shotgun, you have to use them to protect the bore.

For upland game, use standard lead shot loads. In all double guns, you have to work up loads for each barrel separately and use pattern paper to determine where each barrel places its load on a target at a given distance. Most shooters will work up loads to put both barrels shooting to the same Point of Impact at a given range. Cylinder bored shotguns are limited to 25 yds or so for effectiveness. If you use some kind of shotcup to hold the shot in the barrel, and protect it from rubbing against the barrel as it moves out of the gun, you can improve the pattern density and the effective range by 5-10 yds, depending on the gun, and the shot size you choose to use. But just don't expect to take birds out at 40 yds and beyond with a cylinder bore gun no matter what you shoot out of it.

Going up in gauge size does not improve the range you can hit at, as the problem is with the lack of choke. There are modern guns, already mentioned that come with screw in choke tubes, both in 12 and 10 gauges. If you are going that route, by all means use the screw in choke tubes. They provide you with versatility that you can't get with cylinder bore barrels.

Finally, you have missed Jim Rackham's suggestion of using only Over Shot cards( wafers) as wads in a shotgun, rather than buying Over Powder Wads( aout 1/8" thick), cushion wads, ( 1/2-3/4" thick), and then OS cards on top of the shot. Jim uses only the os cards, putting a hole in each off center, but not hear the edge where the hole could cause the edge to fail to seal gases. The hole in the card allows air to go through it breaking up the vaccuum that builds under the card when loading, and allowing air to separate the cards so that they fall down to the ground shortly after leaving the barrel and don't punch a hole in your pattern. He uses 4-5 wafers over the powder, and 2 over the shot. He puts some lube between #4 and #5 card, I believe. I prefer to lube the barrel after seating the load in the breech area. The lube keeps the barrel from rusting during a hunt, and softens the residue so it can't stick to the barrel. I like to run a cleaning patch down the barrel between loads, to clear the flashchannel and nipple, and to pull the residue out rather than shove it back in the the breech where it fouls the powder charge. If you only have to carry OS cards, its much easier to go hunting. Powder, measure, shot, measure, cards, a lubed patches in a container. Add either percssion caps, or priming powder for a flint gun, and you are set to go. Extra dry cleaning patches in a second pocket for cleaning the gun between shots, and some kind of bag to put all the used patches into to avoid littering the landscape.

 

[AkDan]

the gun is a dixie pedersoli 10ga. Having patterning issues with one barrel shooting left still. Both barrels pattern pretty good but for some reason the mod barrel gave me nothing but fits. What I thought was excellent patterns at 25 yards with the mod barrel on paper proved worthless on the three times it fired, thats not including the many many times it DID NOT fire at all. Just flustering.

Being new to it, I'm going by my fathers recommendation that a bp 10's load is extremely close to a modern 12 and also allows us to load for goose and sandhills, a little more powder and a little bit more shot, I can always load down from there. I havent hunted fowl in many many years so his experience at the time is what I have to go by but I'm looking forward to getting back into it.

I've read as much as I can put my hands on, and tried everything including the over shot cards. The only thing I havent tried was the corn muffin mix for shot buffer or plastic shotcups. My father still has the shotgun to get things working right on the mod barrel and I hope to have it and get a chance to run some more loads through it before this oct. Fowl season up here starts sept 1 and they clear out of the interior of Alaska pretty hot and heavy by then.

I'll keep playing with the pedersoli and see what I can get with the patterns, shooting left, miss firing, hammers not hitting flat, the lock for the barrel on the stock is loose so there's a tad bit of wobble to the barrel when mounted and of course still trying to get the best pattern I can out of it.

Still wondering if there is a custom bp shotgun maker out there? Have searched all last winter for one before settling on the pedersoli and I have to admit I'm not very happy as is a local gunsmith in Fairbanks and my father as well.

anyways, thanks for the information.

 

Dan,
Re custom shotguns. I met this fellow at the skeet range at Friendship last year and he was shooting a custom double smoothie that he built. It shot really well. He does build them for sale and can probably build what you want. He can be reached at: Ed Palmer, 1380 Kellam Road, Centerville, Indiana 47330. His phone is (I don't have the area code) 855-5749. Good Luck.
Mark

 

[paulvallandigham]

On the hammers not hitting correctly, if they are striking the edge of the skirt, the hammer's neck should be heated up and it bent to center it on the nipple. If the hammer face( inside the skirt ) is not hitting the top of the nipple flush, then use a small grinding bit in a hand drill, or dremel tool, to remove the high spots on the face. Use lipstick, or marking dye, on the top edge of the nipple to mark the face of the hammer to show you where the high spots are. Grind away the marking dye, and try again. The amount of the " ring " of lipstick should be of even width, and be a complete circle striking a new nipple. Once you have that, all you really need to do is learn how to keep that gun clean, the flash channel clear, and dry and you should be in business. Use alcohol in your cleaning regime, to evaporate and dry out the flashchannel and nipple and the powder chamber in the gun. In Alaska, with the wet weather, and the cold, its far better to have alcohol on hand for cleaning than any oil or lube. You have to shoot the gun enough to learn how to do all these things correctly, and by rote, rather than by conscious thought. If you have to remember them intentionally, Murphy's Law says that will be when you forget something important. I don't know anyone who keeps a check list, taped to the stock of their gun so they don't forget loading and cleaning steps when they are hunting.

Ballistic's products has a plastic shotcups with serious vertical grooves in the outside of the cup. They can be trimmed to length before or during loading, as you would use a patch knife to trim patching material at the muzzle. Check them out in the on-line catalog.

 

[AkDan]

Thanks guys!!!

The odd thing about the mod barrel and being a newby is that the cyl barrel only missfired once, that was the time I did forget to run a fowling cap before loading.

The mod barrel would missfire at random for 3 different people.

Thanks for the grinding info. It's inside the hammer that's not hitting flat. I hope my old man can get it back to Alaska before this sept fowl season. You'd be suprised how dry this place can be. WHere I'm at right now it's a rainforest. Where I live the rest of the year it's basically a desert.

Thanks for all the info.

 

[Rebel]

There is no reason for a side x side not going off. There is a direct path from the nipple to the powder. I would try switching nipples and see if the other barrel misfires then. If so, just fet a new nipple.

 

[Christiaan]

AkDan, Pedersoli makes great guns but the worst steel nipples. The flasholes are too small on their steel nipples. Their beryllium nipples are great. Don't even donate the steel nipples to your enemies. They will hate you for it. Get replacement nipples and throw the steel ones in the sea.

 

[AkDan]

We originally thought it was a nipple problem but for some reason it was only the mod barrel that would missfire. When cleaning my nipples I use an old primer tin to soak them in while cleaning the barrels. When I'm done with with the gun I go to the nipples so there isnt 100% chance the nipples would end up in the same holes. We didnt mark them but I think we should have. After all was said and done and many many more rounds were shot, we had to bend both hammers in and one forward just a tad to get them to hit flat and we never were able to get the mod hammer to do so but we thought we had it fixed about mid trip when I ran back to MN before heading back south (was driving over hill and dale ).

Did replace the nipples with some redhots I believe they are. Dont remember as by the time we found the right ones and bought them I had to leave. Pops was going to run it through the ringer for me, havent heard anything about it since.

I'll let yall know what happens with the gun as she's back in MN and right now I'm running a charter boat (have today off) out of sitka Alaska.

Gonna call the fella above on the custom gun today also.

 

[Britsmoothy]

If you are carefull, you can bend slightly the barrel wedge in order for it to pull down the barrels into the foreend, just watch that you bend it the right way. If you study it it should become obvious :hmm:
Pedersoli nipples are too tight, I open mine up to approx one millimeter. Oh yes -if the tubes are loose in the stock that could cause nipple alighnmentissues and also it could be taking some of the inertia from the falling hammer!!!!!
Good luck freind.
My Ped 10g was very good, 1-1/4oz no7 4 os cards and equal fuel= ducks, woodcock, pheasant,partridge and rabbit :grin:

 

[AkDan]

Brit,

Not quite sure I follow with bending the wedge? Is this to help regulate things?

Mike,

I talked to Ed today. Thanks a ton!!!