rabbit03
50 Cal.
- Joined
- Apr 1, 2005
- Messages
- 1,143
- Reaction score
- 17
John your absolutely right, I am no stranger to off hand but appatuere sights and wind flags are something I am going to have to master too. Thank you for the help this past weekend. Because of your help the Hawken is shaping up very nicely.
Below are a few targets that were created with the new Hawken 'Big 58', as I am calling it since it really does roar when it goes off. John L. shot the first two targets showing that the Hawken sure likes the .575 round balls and a tight ball and patch combo. The third target was shot by yours truly. The photos show how accurate the Hawken really is with its Green Mountain Barrel and the patch combo that John L. has come up with. The groups are all (5) shot groups also. John also introduced me to something called Black Solve which I feel in part is responsible for the accuracy. Misting with the Black Solve makes loading ALOT easier and the resulting groups don't lie either. I was skeptical of the Black Solve at first and asked John if this was something new on the market. He told me that it had been sold by Dixie (I think) for many many years. I am slow to accept new things sometime so this was good news. I shot a target using the Windex type of swabbing between each shot and the groups opened up a bit. So for now I am going to stick with what works as in the photos. I am not sure if the caliber itself is just inherently accurate or it is because of the barrel, or perhaps it is the tweaking that ol' John L. has done on this rifle that has made it so. But most likely it is a combination of the sum of all of the above that makes it that way.
Both John L. and myself experienced a fouling problem and the reason was soon discovered by John L.. He found that for whatever reason, the flash hole at the bottom of the nipple and the connecting fire channel to the pattent breach powder chamber were misaligned. This was due to the nipple hole not being drilled deep enough which caused a small right angle to be formed at the juncture of the two. This was causeing the fouling to build up at that point and raise havoc with the ignition. John unbreeched the rifle and used various tools including his dremmel tool to mill out that area and make the transition a smooth one and not so abrupt. So far it is working great as the target shot on 05/22/06 shows. The accuracy has always been present from the first shot and now the igniton seems to be great also. Ignition is important since I am going to go bear hunting with it!
I will be doing lots of testing with 2F and 3F charges, patch/ball combos to see just how well it will perform with each.
I am still taking my time in building/finishing the rifle and don't want to hurry it. I am going to be working on developing some accurate loads for the 50yd and 100yd distances for the X Stick matches in the future. And then I will get down to finishing the stock and the metal parts.
More photos and stories of the Hawken Big 58 to follow soon,
rabbit03
Below are a few targets that were created with the new Hawken 'Big 58', as I am calling it since it really does roar when it goes off. John L. shot the first two targets showing that the Hawken sure likes the .575 round balls and a tight ball and patch combo. The third target was shot by yours truly. The photos show how accurate the Hawken really is with its Green Mountain Barrel and the patch combo that John L. has come up with. The groups are all (5) shot groups also. John also introduced me to something called Black Solve which I feel in part is responsible for the accuracy. Misting with the Black Solve makes loading ALOT easier and the resulting groups don't lie either. I was skeptical of the Black Solve at first and asked John if this was something new on the market. He told me that it had been sold by Dixie (I think) for many many years. I am slow to accept new things sometime so this was good news. I shot a target using the Windex type of swabbing between each shot and the groups opened up a bit. So for now I am going to stick with what works as in the photos. I am not sure if the caliber itself is just inherently accurate or it is because of the barrel, or perhaps it is the tweaking that ol' John L. has done on this rifle that has made it so. But most likely it is a combination of the sum of all of the above that makes it that way.
Both John L. and myself experienced a fouling problem and the reason was soon discovered by John L.. He found that for whatever reason, the flash hole at the bottom of the nipple and the connecting fire channel to the pattent breach powder chamber were misaligned. This was due to the nipple hole not being drilled deep enough which caused a small right angle to be formed at the juncture of the two. This was causeing the fouling to build up at that point and raise havoc with the ignition. John unbreeched the rifle and used various tools including his dremmel tool to mill out that area and make the transition a smooth one and not so abrupt. So far it is working great as the target shot on 05/22/06 shows. The accuracy has always been present from the first shot and now the igniton seems to be great also. Ignition is important since I am going to go bear hunting with it!
I will be doing lots of testing with 2F and 3F charges, patch/ball combos to see just how well it will perform with each.
I am still taking my time in building/finishing the rifle and don't want to hurry it. I am going to be working on developing some accurate loads for the 50yd and 100yd distances for the X Stick matches in the future. And then I will get down to finishing the stock and the metal parts.
More photos and stories of the Hawken Big 58 to follow soon,
rabbit03
