Hunting Rifle w/ Super Tight Bore - Help!

[Quirt Evans]

I've finally settled on a hunting load for this fall's combo traditional ML deer, elk, & bear hunt.

I'm using a 54 Renegade and found she really likes 100 grains of FFFG Goex and the T/C Maxi Ball or Hunter (430 grs).

I'm getting amazing tight groups at 25, 50 and 75 yards that is on par with my HP smokeless rifles. The rifle shoots extremely clean. At 100 yards the load started to opened up to 3" groups but that is acceptable since 98% of my shots in the area I'm hunting will be 50 yards or closer. Last few years most kills have been in the 12 to 35 yard range.

Anyway, what I've found is the bore especally the first 6" of the muzzle are extemely tight - too tight for a hunting rifle. I basically have to stand almost on my head to start the bullet and get it to clear the end of the muzzle. Once the bullet is started I have to use two hands to work the ramrod until it clears about 8" and then it is a smooth one handed seating the rest of the way.

During load workup I first tried the Great Plains bullets but got one stuck half way at the muzzle before the last driving band even engaged the rifling. I tried even using a short starter but it was stuck (and on a fresh clean bore). I had to pull it out with my Leatherman tool...I've tried Patched RB but again I have to beat the ball to get it started even using a .10 patch and with this twist it doesn't group reliably or consistantly. This rifle likes bullets.

Also I was cleaning the rifle after two shots so it wasn't an issue of fouling. I'm concerned that as tight as this bore is that after three rounds I'd get the bullet stuck half way down and never get 'er out!

If I was going to shoot competitively I'd have a "keeper" but for a hunting rifle I need something that can be loaded under stress in hunting/field conditions without the use of a mallet and short starter. My question is can one lap the first 6 to 8" and still retain some decent hunting accuracy or is this something that will improve with a couple hundred more rounds down the bore?

One person recommend I lap the bore with a patch saturated with toothpaste while another said use Ajax on a patch for the first six to eight inches. I don't want to ruin my rifle. Help!

Suggestions?

 

[paulvallandigham]

Load a patched round ball of .530 caliber and a .015" patch. Lube the patch with bore butter, and you are ready to go. You don't need that kind of load in that caliber for those close shots. And you don't neet the heavy maxiball to kill deer, or elk at those ranges.

 

[Quirt Evans]

Thanks for the prompt reply!

As I stated in my post I tried patched RB and I have been using a .530 ball but I need a mallet to seat the ball with a .015 patch. I then tried using .010 patch and no longer need a mallet but I have to use a short starter and basically jump up and down to get the ball to start.

There is some wisdom in your thought about staying with the RB but I'm going to have to go with a smaller ball and experiment with the patch thickness to get the right combo. I'm wondering how a ball would perform on a bear tho?

 

[jtmattison]

Make yourself a short starter with a longer than usual shaft. I make my own out of dowel and a 2 inch wood ball for a palm saver. Make it 8-9 inches long so you can whack those tight bullets in far enough to ease loading with the ramrod.

HD

 

[paulvallandigham]

Telling us that the barrel is " real Tight " doesn't really tell us anything. Please, measure the bore with calipers, and let us know what the land to land ( bore diameter) and groove diameter is on the gun. Only then can we help you. You can look for a .525, or .520 ball mold, and that sounds like it will work in your gun. I am thinking that your gun is not a .54, but rather a .53 caliber rifle, based on all your comments. Your short starter should have a wide, pool ball, or doorknob sized handle on it, so that you don't hurt your hand giving it the smack needed to seat the PRB. And, you should have a rounded crown on that gun barrel's muzzle. That will make getting the ball started easier. Coning is another suggestion to consider, but lets first find out exactly what that bore diameter is in this gun of yours.

Thank you for the follow up information. :thumbsup:

 

[bingo1952]

I built two different lengths for my light bench gun for starting conicals. One is 6" long and the other is 12". I used finials that were purchased at Lowes that were meant for the upright posts of decks. I sawed off the balls and made the rods out off 3/8" brass rod. They are about baseball size and you can give those a good whack and will not hurt your hand.

 

[longcruise]

Your bore is probably not just tight near the muzzle. It's probably pretty much the same full length of the barrel. What is probably happening is once you get the bullet started and pushed down a few inches it swages to fit the bore and the grease also helps it to slide along. I would not do a thing about lapping it. In fact, if your bore is a bit tighter at the muzzle, it may be a contributing factor to the good accuracy you seem to be getting.

So, you could measure your bore at the muzzle and then size your bullets to fit. That may take a custom sizer and you can have it made by lee precision once you know what size you want. The Lee push through sizers fit on your loading press and the bullet is pushed through nose first so that you don't have to worry about special nose punches, etc. etc.

You could also get a special mold but the sizer is much less expensive and can be used to size any slug to fit your bore be it home cast or purchased off the shelf.

 

[BrownBear]

I agree with Marmotslayer that swaging bullets would likely ease things a bit. But in a round-about way, so would lapping, at least as I expect lapping to work. It should only smooth the bore rather than increasing dimension.

And smoothing may be a big part of the answer. Check out this article on fire lapping muzzleloaders.

I make that point because of experience with my GRRW 58 cal, which in fact has a measureable "choke" or constriction near the bore. It's the most accurate ML I'm ever likely to shoot. But once you get past that first six or eight inches of constriction, bullet seating is really easy. And provided the patch/ball combo is not simply too large, even the starting takes little more than a sharp whack on the ball of the short starter with the nub, followed by a firm push using the longer shaft on the starter.

But the distinction is that the GRRW is silky smooth inside. Your comment about getting the bullet stuck half way down really makes me think you are fighting both a constriction AND roughness.

BTW- I started out with a .570 RB, more or less "standard" for 58's, in the GRRW. The bare ball actually hung on the rifling. Ended up going to a .562 ball, the next smaller standard size. It still takes a real sharp smack on the short starter when using ticking patches, but seating isn't so bad I won't consider it for hunting.

 

[roundball]

"...for a hunting rifle I need something that can be loaded under stress in hunting/field conditions without the use of a mallet and short starter..."

If you like what you're using and have excellent accuracy, etc, I wouldn't start all sorts of "bore engineering tasks" that might an an adverse effect. All my MLs are TC Hawkens with the same barrels.

It sounds like you're worrying needlessly about reloading a quick second shot...in my lifetime I've never had to have a "hurried" second shot...and in the past 18 years using muzzleloaders every deer has either fallen in sight of me or bolted out of sight past trees and brush before falling...in either case, a second shot was not needed or not possible.

I intentionally take about 10 minutes to completely clean, dry, lube, and reload a Flintlock and I always use a short starter...then I quietly go find the deer...he's either down and dead so waiting doesn't matter, or he's down/wounded and bleeding out...leaving them alone for a while before going after them is a good thing.

Now switch gears and think about the last 6-8" of bore:
At least in my experience I came to realize that even if I had decided to wipe between shots during a range session, I would still get gradual buildup in those last several inches because the up and down motion of the cleaning jag never actually left the bore, subsequently I was depositing more and more fouling in those last few inches. IMO, continuing that for a lot of shots just pressed that fouling into a hard layer practically like asphalt...but after cleaning, a cleaning patch would still come out white and I thought the bore was clean...not so.

Next time you clean it, consider using a tight fitting stiff bronze bore brush to really work over that part of the bore, then run cleaning patches back down and if you're breaking loose some layered buildup, your patches will be dirty again. Also, an excellent treatment that will at least eliminate any doubts is to use Shooter's Choice Black Powder Cleaning Gel...plaster it in there and let it sit 5 minutes, patch it out, then a couple dozen strokes with a brush...repeat that cycle until nothing else comes out of the bore, even after using a brush.

PS:
The directions say to be sure to clean off the bronze bore brush when finished or the gel will gradually dissolve it overnight...I know this to be true...powerful stuff.

 

[paulvallandigham]

Great comments, here, Roundball. I think you are on to something that better :thumbsup: explains why his gun seems to be tighter in those last 6 inches of his bore. I was hoping he would measure that barrel with calipers so that we all would have a better idea of what he is trying to describe.

 

[Chilidog]

I agree with Paul, great comments Roundball. I had never thought about what happens when you swab without exiting the barrel. Thanks :hatsoff:

 

[Bountyhunter]

The black powder PO-lice will not come get you if you carry some .520 or .525 balls for a quick follow up you know. My Hawken has a .53 barrel and it takes some effort to seat a ballet or GP bullet. I am careful about my shots, so I have not needed a second shot, but I always reload quickly with a .520PRB. Once you have driven any of the afore mentioned slugs 8" down the barrel, you have sized them and they will slide easy anyway. I dont like waiting after a shot. I like to get to the animal and get them field dressed within that time. Ten minutes can make the difference between sweet meat and nasty meat.

Lapping the bore with some toothpaste or ajax isnt going to ruin your barrel. You would have to scrub for hundreds of hours. I had a rough bore on a .54 rifle a couple years ago and I made a "patch" out of some green scotchbrite pad and put it over a .50 cal jag and worked that barrel for an hour before it even began to shine. When it would wear out, I would use another one. I used half a sheet of that stuff before I got the barrel slicked up. It shoots dead nuts now, and with a bore light it looks like a new barrel. You will wear out before your bore does lapping it with toothpaste or ajax.

RB has a valid point on the cleaning cycle and using full stokes when you clean out. Using a brush every few times you clean wont hurt anything either. The brush is lots softer than the barrel and will knock the crud out and leave the barrel. That barrel I was talking about first gave up black crud, then red rust, and then black crud before we got back down to base metal. With the bore light it looked like slick barrel though.

 

[bucktales]

In addition to what roundball says about the fouling , could it be possible to have lead fouling and buildup from shooting a lot of Great Plains conicals? Seen it happen to a friend's T/C WMC .50.

 

[Little Wattsy]

Make yourself a short starter with a longer than usual shaft. I make my own out of dowel and a 2 inch wood ball for a palm saver. Make it 8-9 inches long so you can whack those tight bullets in far enough to ease loading with the ramrod.

HD

GREAT advice!
Remember that if yer NOT hurting your self you wont hurt the gun OR the connical by WHACKING it, whack away! :wink:

 

[pchwcf50110]

i had a similar problem with a Kodiak 50 double rifle, Quirt Evans. it was a bear to load with Great Plains or T/C maxi's but shot great. when i finally slugged the barrels it was .500" and Great Plains bullets had a .509" front driving band while the T/C's had .507". they loaded just how you described: hard for the first 6"-8" then went right down so i agree with whoever stated it that the bullets are swaging down as you load them. Paulvallandigham suggested a measurement of the bore and he is correct as you will never known what you are dealing with until you find out. i have lapped bores with scotch brite before and it does slick them up but i think you would be better off with sized down bullets a .001" or .002" bigger on the front driving band than your bore diameter. that is snug enough to load easily yet stay put in a clean barrel. one thing that did happen with my Kodiak was that after pounding down 20 Great Plains bullets per barrel at the target range the bores were significantly smoother to load.

 

[tg]

"
I've finally settled on a hunting load for this fall's combo traditional ML deer, elk, & bear hunt."

I would also suggest the ball over the modern bullet and really get a taste of the traditional side of the sport, the heavy modern bullets are not needed for the game you are after.Once many try the ball they never look back.

 

[Quirt Evans]

Guys this is absolutely great! Thank you...okay here is some follow up info that might help.

1st, this rifle is fairly new - I bought it used but it had been used very little. I've shot about 50 Patched RBs and about 40 T/C Maxi Hunters in it so far. I've scrubbed the barrel carefully using full strokes. I'm not saying it doesn't have leading or build up but if it does it is the result of less than 100 rounds. I will heed the advice and try a bore brush with the product recommended and see what it produces.

2nd, the first 4 to 6" is the worst...after that it is a one handed ramrod show. The rest of the barrel is fine.

3rd, to clarify...when I said I got a GP bullet stuck half way...what I tried to say was it was stuck half way INTO the muzzle with half in the barrel and half sticking out...I used my Leatherman tool to eventually pull the bullet out.

Finally, I'm no machinist so I make no great claims on my bore measurements...so here they go.

The Groove Dia is .544 and the land is .525

I measured the GP Bullet that I pulled and it measured groove .546 and the lands .535. I measured twice. Something is obviously amiss in my measurements but at least this should get you a prelimenary measurement before I find someone who knows what they're doing with measurements.

I'm shopping now for a box of 520 or 525 balls to try and assuming this works may be my reloaded shot. I have no issue using the RB as that was my first choice when I started. But I was so annoyed with the tight fit from the .15 and then .10 patches with various lubes that I thought going the bullet route would be the "magic pill" cure all in loading. I found the bullet is as bad or worse in loading the RB. However, the bullet shot far superior as comparied to the RB. This rifle really likes bullets. RB's using FF or FFF group at 25 yards what the bullet does at 100.

 

[pchwcf50110]

i assume the .525" is a typo? if the lands are .535" that is a little tight compared to the 3 T/C .54's i've slugged. all had .540" lands and .550"-.552" grooves. my first ML was a .54 Renegade which i still have and it too prefers bullets. a friend's T/C .54 shoots PRB's better. that seems to be the case with the 1-48" twist, they seem to prefer one or the other.

 

[roundball]

"...a friend's T/C .54 shoots PRB's better. that seems to be the case with the 1-48" twist, they seem to prefer one or the other.

Totally agree...every TC 1:48" barrel I've owned regardless of caliber have been very accurate with PRBs

 

[Little Wattsy]

Guys this is absolutely great! Thank you...okay here is some follow up info that might help.

1st, this rifle is fairly new - I bought it used but it had been used very little. I've shot about 50 Patched RBs and about 40 T/C Maxi Hunters in it so far. I've scrubbed the barrel carefully using full strokes. I'm not saying it doesn't have leading or build up but if it does it is the result of less than 100 rounds. I will heed the advice and try a bore brush with the product recommended and see what it produces.

2nd, the first 4 to 6" is the worst...after that it is a one handed ramrod show. The rest of the barrel is fine.

3rd, to clarify...when I said I got a GP bullet stuck half way...what I tried to say was it was stuck half way INTO the muzzle with half in the barrel and half sticking out...I used my Leatherman tool to eventually pull the bullet out.

Finally, I'm no machinist so I make no great claims on my bore measurements...so here they go.

The Groove Dia is .544 and the land is .525

I measured the GP Bullet that I pulled and it measured groove .546 and the lands .535. I measured twice. Something is obviously amiss in my measurements but at least this should get you a prelimenary measurement before I find someone who knows what they're doing with measurements.

I'm shopping now for a box of 520 or 525 balls to try and assuming this works may be my reloaded shot. I have no issue using the RB as that was my first choice when I started. But I was so annoyed with the tight fit from the .15 and then .10 patches with various lubes that I thought going the bullet route would be the "magic pill" cure all in loading. I found the bullet is as bad or worse in loading the RB. However, the bullet shot far superior as comparied to the RB. This rifle really likes bullets. RB's using FF or FFF group at 25 yards what the bullet does at 100.

Remember that you are SEATING these bullets or conforming the lead to the rifleings in your gun. You are SUPPOSED TO use effort to form the lead to the rifleings (this is also why you want PURE SOFT lead in MLing). The GP bullets are GREAT and VERY effective. If you so desire, keep trying them, just whack-em on down in there.