I recently purchased a Chambers Kentucky .54 cal. Pistol. Went to the range to shoot and really love it. The issue I have is not having enough hands to load it. I don’t want to put it in a stand for fear of breaking the stock why pushing the ball home. Soooo, I feel like I need 3 hands to handle everything for loading. How do you handle loading????
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Loading a Kentucky Pistol
- Thread starter Gvilleddie
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Use the stand to clean and to hold the pistol between shots. Use the stand to hold the pistol to load your powder charge and to place the patch and ball on the muzzle. THEN pick up the pistol by the barrel and seat the ball. You shouldn't have to hammer a ball when loading.
ADK Bigfoot
ADK Bigfoot
rafterob
62 Cal.
For pistols it is also helpful to have a load that can be started easily, like thumb pressure.
This! I couldn’t imagine a range session of repeated loading without it, just plain too easy and convenient. If it starts to take excessive force to load from fouling, it’s time to run a wet patch or two down her, which for me is about every 5-10 shots. At no time has it ever felt like I was going to break the stock. I would say there’s less risk of damage by using a stand to load, you have way more control. I caveat all this by saying this is a newb’s observation, lol
It isn't a single excessive force loading that tends to break a stock. It is a slow process where the wood has a micro crack in it that forms and slowly it gets bigger inside of the wood as one loads with stock stress each time. Then one day you go to load it and you barely put any umph to it at all and it suddenly snaps like balsa wood.
Ask me how I know....
Ask me how I know....
Rudall
40 Cal
There are dozens of YouTube videos showing people loading pistols by holding it in one hand and loading with the other. That’s how I do mine. I can’t imagine why you need three hands.
A pointer to help load a pistol is to get one of those palm saver balls that screws onto your ramrod or make a separate loading rod with one of those balls or a T-handle. Don’t use a ball/patch combo that is excessively tight. It’s just not necessary in my experience.
Thx for the input. Just didn’t think that I should be putting pressure on the stock using the stand. I think I need to use a thinner patch. E..
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NRA /NMLRA match shooters are required by the rules to load in a stand. Those that are most worried about breaking a stock reinforce their stocks with thick pins or screws drilled from under the breach tail and or furniture. Same issue and solution for long guns. Another common solution seen on the line is a custom base to fully support the pistol...c
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I never even thought about this. I don't have a stand and don't have any particular problem loading my pistol. I already have patch and ball laid out, then I fill the powder measure, pick up the pistol and hold it upright by the barrel with my left hand. dump the powder and set the patch and ball over the muzzle while holding it in place with my left thumb. Right hand uses ball starter then short range rod and done.
Not that I can't see where a stand could be useful for storing the pistol muzzle up between shots. I know at the shoots hosted by my club they require muzzle up at all times till on the firing line. I've only seen rifles being shot there but assume that same rule would apply to pistols.
Not that I can't see where a stand could be useful for storing the pistol muzzle up between shots. I know at the shoots hosted by my club they require muzzle up at all times till on the firing line. I've only seen rifles being shot there but assume that same rule would apply to pistols.
This^. Although I have loaded my Plains Pistol from the pouch. The hook on the pistol comes in handy then for hanging the pistol off the belt while I measure powder. Balls and patches were in a bullet-board and I had a combo short-starter/pistol rod from TOW that comes in handy. I recently shortened the TOW pistol rod as it was about 3” longer than I needed for my longest barreled pistol. I cut the rod off the ball, cut off an additional 2 1/2”, carefully drilled the ball out, and glued the rod back in with JB Weld. I like having stuff just right and not a lot longer than necessary hanging around.
The events I've been at you had to load from a stand. Yes, if you whack it hard and the grain through the wrist isn't good- could break the stock. I've never found an easy way to do it. I went with a thinner, easier to load patch.
Yep, thinner patch, thats what I do too, no problems.
Robby
Robby
There's a lot of discussion about putting a contoured spacer behind the grip. You can really see it on the hinged revolver loading stands.
I’ve been loading a .535 ball with a thin patch and it’s pretty tight. I ordered and just received a box of .530 balls. Need to see how these load. What size RB’s are others using? E..
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