Josh Smith
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How Reliable Are Muzzleloaders?
- Thread starter Josh Smith
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Take your muzzleloader out on a woodswalk or any other ML event and you'll see how reliable your muzzleloader is. More importantly you'll see how reliable your loading process is. In the case of a well built ML the reliablity depends as much on the shooter/loader as the equipment.
A person that doesn't have a clue about ML will have misfires with any style ML. :haha: I can back that up from direct experience.
Somebody that studies and practices with a flintlock will shoot high scores. Or in the case of hunters will harvest the game.
You do your part and reliability follows.
A person that doesn't have a clue about ML will have misfires with any style ML. :haha: I can back that up from direct experience.
Somebody that studies and practices with a flintlock will shoot high scores. Or in the case of hunters will harvest the game.
You do your part and reliability follows.
vern faulkner
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Muzzle loaders are by nature very unreliable and in most cases dangerous to discharge. Why a person would place himself in such harms way is beyond me. So as a public service, I now offer the shooting public a means to free themselves of the danger involved. Just send those retched things to me and I will properly dispose of them. Keeping the world safe. No, you need not thank me. Just doing a moral duty long over due.
Vern
Vern
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On a trip in about 1975 in northwest Texas with a drugstore 45 Japanese Kentucky, my first front stuffer. Stalked turkeys and put the sneak on them by sticking to a dry creek wash, crab walking and crawling. Eased the barrel through the vines and bushes on the edge of the draw, took dead aim at a turkey neck thirty yards away, squeezed the trigger and it went pop, sss-boom. Man, turkeys exploded out of there like a covey of quail. Ate frogs and rabbit that night. Since then that cleaning thing was muoy importante.
Don't much think today's production cartridge ammo much more reliable than muzzle loaders frankly. Only segment of that I've never had a misfire with is shotgun fodder. I'd say CF rifle but I've shot so little of that in my life it's not a valid measure. Rimfire and pistol ammo...lots of misfires over time. You either have ignition or you don't, the platform is not significant to my eye. One does not get to inspect the primer on factory cartridge ammo...
No failure to fire in the field with either caplocks or flintlocks, but have had a few at the range. Mark that up to shooter error.
End of the day, I've never had a handload FTF and I've loaded a bunch. Never had a FTF on a caplock or flinter when it counted, so I call it a dead heat.
No failure to fire in the field with either caplocks or flintlocks, but have had a few at the range. Mark that up to shooter error.
End of the day, I've never had a handload FTF and I've loaded a bunch. Never had a FTF on a caplock or flinter when it counted, so I call it a dead heat.
Pete Gaimari
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Trip while crossing a stream, and drop the gun in the water.
Now, which one is reliable?
Now, which one is reliable?
Pete Gaimari
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Danbo said:
Sad to say I do. :redface:
I was stalking a deer, and didn't pay enough attention to my footing.
Did that deer give you a score based on Olympic standards, degree of difficulty and all that?
:grin:
Serious aside for a moment, I've known a bunch of folks that walked that soggy trail. Couple of them didn't clear the barrel (CF) after and to hear them tell the tale, it's a good way to turn a small bore rifle into junk after you jerk the trigger. Sometimes you're better off if it doesn't shoot right away. Unless you want to open a used parts department.
:grin:
Serious aside for a moment, I've known a bunch of folks that walked that soggy trail. Couple of them didn't clear the barrel (CF) after and to hear them tell the tale, it's a good way to turn a small bore rifle into junk after you jerk the trigger. Sometimes you're better off if it doesn't shoot right away. Unless you want to open a used parts department.
Pete Gaimari
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Danbo said:Did that deer give you a score based on Olympic standards, degree of difficulty and all that?
:grin:
Serious aside for a moment, I've known a bunch of folks that walked that soggy trail. Couple of them didn't clear the barrel (CF) after and to hear them tell the tale, it's a good way to turn a small bore rifle into junk after you jerk the trigger. Sometimes you're better off if it doesn't shoot right away. Unless you want to open a used parts department.
I made no attempt to hunt anymore. I didn't trust the gun anymore. I'm sure it wouldn't have fired anyway. It was uncapped, and when I cleaned it out the powder was mush.
Had I been hunting with my Marlin 30-30 I would have blown it out the best I could, and continued to hunt.
A ML is dependable when everything is right, but sometimes the conditions that make everything right are beyond our control.
