Intro - Before I start, I would like to publicly acknowledge and thank Dave951 for his many posts about these Sharps rifles, plus for being so kind as to answer my PM messages and questions.
I had recently picked up a MINT 1863 Sharps by IAB for only $500, from a local ‘toy store’ that has no idea about the older BP arms. I didn’t have one, always thought about getting one … and have a good 1,000 RWS musket caps left to me by my late Uncle to use up … so it was a no brainer.
1864 Sharps 54-cal Loads: Left to Right
1 - Unsized bullet, 0.544 as cast, $0.50 each
2 - Same in $0.18 paper tube 'as a handle' to lube the TOP 2 lube grooves & keep lube out of under-sized ring-tail @ bottom
3 - Lubed, not sized, 50:50 Beeswax & Olive Oil
4 - Sized to 0.540", bore measures 537-538
5 - Sized - ready to shoot - 45-grns 3Fg powdah
*Paper tube 'glued' to ring-tail on bullet by clear nail polish, as that makes a 'fragile' connection that cracks apart when fired, where paper tube totally exits the bore.
6 - Rubber tube for shooting Minie or Roundball load, w/ loose powdah in the red tube. Use wood dowel to seat the round.
*Rear of paper tube sealed w/ tissue paper on end, where musket cap power just blows right through it to ignite the powdah.
For lube, my choice is a 50/50 mix of beeswax & olive oil. I make it in cakes as shown & just used a Hahn paper as a ‘handle’ to rub the lube cake against the 2 top lube grooves. This keeps wax off the ‘ring tail’ & it goes fast! I lube (20) in 5-minutes or less and I’d still be waiting for the wax lube cake to melt, if using a double-boiler, LOL!
Yeah, some lube after loading, but I put them through my sizer die after lubing.
I bought a 3/4" craft hole punch from eBay for $8 shipped & cut out a zillion 3/4" circles of combustible reefer paper disks in seconds, 10-sheets at a whack as it is so thin.
Then I thinned Elmer's white glue with water & 'painted' the ends of the 18-cent 54-cal paper tubes. Set the disk on wax paper, press the tube against lightly & let dry.
I painted around the interface of the tube end & paper & insert into plastic die. Presto! Hard paper cartridges to fill w/ powdah!
As a bonus, when trying different powders & grains, you can mark the tubes w/ a Sharpie.
Pretty cool huh? Yeah ... a bit MORE of a loading process than your typical muzzleloading, LOL! Cost me about $1.04 per shot, $21/20-shots. Yeah, if I cast my own I could lower the bullet proce, about 50-cents each from commercial sources.
No range time - yet! Maybe next week ...
I also intend to try Phil Coffin’s roundball load over loose powdah … after I get some > 0.530” roundballs, which is all I have on hand …
I had recently picked up a MINT 1863 Sharps by IAB for only $500, from a local ‘toy store’ that has no idea about the older BP arms. I didn’t have one, always thought about getting one … and have a good 1,000 RWS musket caps left to me by my late Uncle to use up … so it was a no brainer.
1864 Sharps 54-cal Loads: Left to Right
1 - Unsized bullet, 0.544 as cast, $0.50 each
2 - Same in $0.18 paper tube 'as a handle' to lube the TOP 2 lube grooves & keep lube out of under-sized ring-tail @ bottom
3 - Lubed, not sized, 50:50 Beeswax & Olive Oil
4 - Sized to 0.540", bore measures 537-538
5 - Sized - ready to shoot - 45-grns 3Fg powdah
*Paper tube 'glued' to ring-tail on bullet by clear nail polish, as that makes a 'fragile' connection that cracks apart when fired, where paper tube totally exits the bore.
6 - Rubber tube for shooting Minie or Roundball load, w/ loose powdah in the red tube. Use wood dowel to seat the round.
*Rear of paper tube sealed w/ tissue paper on end, where musket cap power just blows right through it to ignite the powdah.
For lube, my choice is a 50/50 mix of beeswax & olive oil. I make it in cakes as shown & just used a Hahn paper as a ‘handle’ to rub the lube cake against the 2 top lube grooves. This keeps wax off the ‘ring tail’ & it goes fast! I lube (20) in 5-minutes or less and I’d still be waiting for the wax lube cake to melt, if using a double-boiler, LOL!
Yeah, some lube after loading, but I put them through my sizer die after lubing.
I bought a 3/4" craft hole punch from eBay for $8 shipped & cut out a zillion 3/4" circles of combustible reefer paper disks in seconds, 10-sheets at a whack as it is so thin.
Then I thinned Elmer's white glue with water & 'painted' the ends of the 18-cent 54-cal paper tubes. Set the disk on wax paper, press the tube against lightly & let dry.
I painted around the interface of the tube end & paper & insert into plastic die. Presto! Hard paper cartridges to fill w/ powdah!
As a bonus, when trying different powders & grains, you can mark the tubes w/ a Sharpie.
Pretty cool huh? Yeah ... a bit MORE of a loading process than your typical muzzleloading, LOL! Cost me about $1.04 per shot, $21/20-shots. Yeah, if I cast my own I could lower the bullet proce, about 50-cents each from commercial sources.
No range time - yet! Maybe next week ...
I also intend to try Phil Coffin’s roundball load over loose powdah … after I get some > 0.530” roundballs, which is all I have on hand …
Last edited:
