I know about the dry ball club; but is there a no ball club?!?

[azmntman]

I always put ramrod back into thimbles when I shoot (to keep everything the same shot to shot). If Its not in place I would have likely shot it by now, if its missing I can tell by the feel..

Why does it increase recoil so much, would think it would just zoom out? I am not sure but think they make an air powered arrow rifle now? any body hear of one??

 

[Elkeater]

I had a lead ball behind an iron tipped rr, 50" barrel, .54,40g 3f, maybe 10th shot from a new rifle. I seldom use the rifle rr at the range except for this time. The lead got around the tip and locked it up. The forward 16"s of rod snapped off and hit target. Still makes me cringe.

 

[Zonie]

I always put ramrod back into thimbles when I shoot (to keep everything the same shot to shot). If Its not in place I would have likely shot it by now, if its missing I can tell by the feel..

Why does it increase recoil so much, would think it would just zoom out? I am not sure but think they make an air powered arrow rifle now? any body hear of one??

To answer your question, I just weighed the wooden ramrod in my Lyman GPR. My postal scale says it weighs 2 ounces.
To figure out how much that weighs in grains we have, 7000 grains per pound/16 ounces per pound = 437.5 grains per ounce. 437.5 times 2 ounces = 875 grains.

So, in addition to the weight of the ball or bullet in the barrel, add another 875 grains of weight. THAT'S a lot of weight to be shooting out of your gun. No wonder it kicks so hard.

 

[azmntman]

DANG!

 

[Mark Herman]

Have seen (and had) dry balls, have seen no balls and seen ram rods shot down range but the funniest day at the range was when a fellow pulled his rifle out of the case and had left his lock at home. Was cleaning the rifle and forgot to replace it the night before. Talk about a senior moment!!!
Mark

 

[GREENSWLDE]

I think a few of us have done that or forgotten to pick up the Flint wallet and Loading stick..
Forgetful-
OLD DOG.

 

[tenngun]

I do have some pyrodex. That I shoot over the top of a kicker charge.
I shoot 65 grains of black or 45 of pyrodex over 20 of black. And have a set of measures for racks in my bag
Until I got used to loading that way I had tons of ‘whooffffs’ as I had shot with just the 20 kicker.

 

[45man]

Once when shooting BPCR, a fellow drove several hundred miles and forgot all his cartridges. Someone else had the same caliber and let him shoot his, great bunch of guys! Many times those that lived close had to rush home for something. we were not that old so I blame it on a rush to go.
The worst was a friend that came to hunt and finally killed a deer. He took out a pocket knife that looked like it shaped stone for the pyramid's. Then he had no drag rope or strap.
Joe gets lost a few feet off the trail and does not like to hunt afternoons because it will get dark. He uses a GPS to go to the gun shop that he has been to many times. I walk out in the dark without a light since turning one on shows a wall of brush. I even found the way out of the PA forest when we got lost tracking a deer. Left the compass in the coat at the trail. I have a built in direction finder.
Yet I still will dry load if interrupted. no problem as I made the proper tools to pull a ball.

 

[toot]

count me in!!

 

[Ben Meyer]

Hey, my son will be doing his first reenactment next weekend, the Battle of Blue Licks in KY. We were wondering about the shooting. Do you pour a charge then a wad of newspaper or something? How does it generally work? Does this REALLY foul the barrel, and do you do anything preventatively to combat this? I doubt he touches off more than a handful of shots from his KY flintlock. Any advice? Thx

I'm a reenactor, so I participate in the no ball firing .

 

[Grenadier1758]

How you load for a reenactment will depend on the rules at that particular reenactment.

Blank loads at a reenactment really should have nothing in the bore but powder. Even paper can be a projectile of sorts and using a ramrod to push paper down the bore for a louder report is not allowed.

So, yes, the barrel will get fouled up pretty quickly. Usually the fouling doesn't adversely effect subsequent reloads. You do need to tap the side of the breech to get as much powder to the breech as you can. There is nothing one can do to reduce the build up of fouling in the barrel during a reenactment. Its one of the things that we have to live with. You do have to clean the gun, fortunately all you need is water and a jag to wipe the bore.

The unit your son will be reenacting with should go over all the loading procedures

 

[Ben Meyer]

Thx Grenadier. I know theres a mandatory safety meeting 3 hrs before the actual reenactment. I assume they'll go over it all then. Gun/shooting wise, what does one generally bring? Do you or they supply the powder? Does he need a flash guard or anything special we might not already have?

 

[Grenadier1758]

He should have a flash guard and a hammer stall. The hammer stall is a small leather bag to fit over the frizzen.

The unit most likely furnish the powder rolled into paper cartridges. Your son should furnish his own flints and have his cartridge box. Of course he could use his shooting bag to hold the loose cartridges. Vent pick, pan brush, cleaning patches and a bit of oil to use on the metal parts will be useful.

 

[GomezMunoz1951]

I have been petty lucky in not forgetting the ball. I did have one incident where I was loading my Navy Arms Buffalo Hunter (Basically a sawed off Zouave) and I was talking to a fellow shooter and suddenly stopped and tried to remember how much powder I had put in the thing. I figured it was maybe a little over what I usually shoot. So I put a patched round ball in it and rammed it down. I was firing from a kneeling position. When I shot it,it kicked like a mule and I fell over backward. Man I ended up with a bruise on my right arm from shoulder to elbow. Luckily the gun is built like a cannon. The owner of Navy Arms took one to Africa and shot a rino or hippo (not sure which) with some real heavy loads.

Now for my black powder cartridge shooting, I have not been so lucky. I shoot Cowboy Action Shooting and I load my .44-40 and .45 Long Colt and 12 ga shells with black powder. I got some all brass 12 ga shotgun shells. I was trying to find out how to seal the shells and saw something that said to use wax. So I did up a bunch and at the next shoot when it came to the shotgun targets the first two shells shot great when I dropped in the next two in my Mule Ear double and shot both rather quickly and it sure didn't sound right. I pointed the barrel toward the ground and left two nice little mounds of pellets. Apparently the barrel was hot enough to melt the wax, even though the second shots were fairly quick. Lesson learned DO NOT USE WAX.

And finally one more "goof" which was partially my fault. I bought a bag of .44-40 brass at a gun show and went home and reloaded them. I noticed that every now and then one would be a little bit harder to put through my press so I made sure they were well lubed. I went to a shoot and when it came my turn I loaded my Navy Arms 1860 Henry and got ready. I fired 4 shots and the dang thing jammed on me. So much for that stage. I looked and saw a shell sticking part way out of the chamber. I dug it out and was trying to figure out what the heck happened. The thing looked perfect, and then I looked at the bottom of the case.... .44 magnum. So I went through all my reloads and found 10 .44 magnum shells. So now if I buy brass I make sure to go through them.

 

[GREENSWLDE]

Always let your Head rule your heart..
Read the Head stamp.It might save your eyes or Life..
USE a muzzle loader. You can't get the wrong thing down a too tighter hole..

 

[nhmoose]

Iv'e used the I forgot the ball every time I shot the 300 yard bench match at the old FT TY shoots.

No one believed me then either.

 

[ppg1949]

Yup, I'm a dry baller. I knew something was wrong when my range rod almost went down to my empty barrel mark. I didn't have a ball puller but I was able to dribble enough powder into the clean out hole to fire the ball out. It probably was a funny sight seeing me push powder in the clean out hole with a tooth pick but thankfully I was alone. The ball came out with a "poot" and dropped about twenty feet ahead of me. Out of spite, I reloaded it and fired it. I guess I taught that bad ball not to go down a barrel with no powder.

 

[Thunder14]

Yep I was so excited with my new rifle I pulled the trigger flash from the pan but no K-BOOM.Yep now I now how to use a ball puller then I learned how to take out liner and prime flash hole and shoot out next time.Yes in deed muzzleloading is a learning experience.Thas why I always bring two rifles to the range on flint one percussion cover all my bases now.

 

[Treestalker]

Once back in the dream time at a shoot I became engaged in a conversation -of profound import- with a flintlock shooter next to me. My rifle, not having been invited to said conversation, exhibited it's disparagement and failed to fire two patched round balls and no powder. It is amazing the effect that incident has subsequently had on my normally loquacious and engaging personality. It has done nothing for my attention to loading procedures, as evidenced by my continued miserly efforts to reduce powder consumption and thereby staunch carbon emissions on a personal level.

 

[Treestalker]

Did you hear about the guy who read so much about the dangers of smoking that he quit reading?