What is the maximum load you feel is safe in a .50 cal? Assuming a new gun, safe barrel, etc.
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Maximum Load?
- Thread starter Claude Mathis
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The correct answer with the most obvious margin of safety of course, is to use the manufacturer's published load data for a given caliber and projectile.
However, using a Hornady .490 patched ball in a .50cal TC Hawken (15/16" barrel), TC's max load is published at 110grns FFg, and I've personally used 120grn.
I suspect there is probably a lot more margin to play with given manufacturers concerns over liability, but I have no interest in taking more risk experimenting ::
However, using a Hornady .490 patched ball in a .50cal TC Hawken (15/16" barrel), TC's max load is published at 110grns FFg, and I've personally used 120grn.
I suspect there is probably a lot more margin to play with given manufacturers concerns over liability, but I have no interest in taking more risk experimenting ::
"roundball" is correct... Use the manufacturer's suggested load, minimum to maximum... Now, if you custom built a new muzzle loader and need to evaluate what a maximum load would be I follow this rule; 1. With 5/32nds barrel wall I would not go any more then 60 grains, 2fg or 3fg. 2. With 3/16th barrel wall I would go no more then 80 grains, 2fg or 3fg. 3. With 7/32nds barrel wall I would not go any more then 100 grains, 2fg or 3fg. 4. With 1/4 or more barrel wall I would go no more then 120 to 150 grains, 2fg or 3fg... To me, these are safe loads... Remember, if your not getting complete powder burn in a barrel then it is pointless to load within the manufacturer's recomendations, high or low... Spitting unburned powder from the muzzle does you no good whatsoever. You gain nothing in velocity or accuracy... 
Guest
For me it would depend on how deeply the dovetails were cut. I have seen too many comercial Hawkens with rung barrels at the barrel tennon dovetails. Dovetails needn't be more than 1/16" and that's deeper than necessary. .050 is all that's really needed.
; That said, I'd load whatever I wanted to shoot as 4140, if that's the steel used in the barel, has immnese strength compared to the absolute maximum that could be generated by BP. With 1080 or some other normal BP steel, I'd use any load that had been safe in the damascus barrels of yesteryear of the same configuration and still be miles safe. For the .69 muskets, 130gr. 2 or 165gr.1F would be right and for the .50 rifle, as not too much is gained over 110gr. to 120gr. anyway, depending on barrel weight. If the mfg'r said no more than 100gr. - well that's the max I'd use in HIS barrel.
: This is all with round balls - slugs are another matter and is generally when the commercial Hawkens ringed their barrels. I'm not referring to the ring caused by only short starting the ball and firing it. THAT one is distinctive.
: I well remember the barrel test Turner Kirkland did some 35 years ago with a piece of Itialian .44 barrel, probably 1080. He took an 8" to 10" (approx) piece of barrel, breeched it with a plug in each end and drilled a fuse hole in the middle. He filled the barrel with 3F and touched it off with a firecracker fuse. ALL that fire came out through the hole without enlarging the barrel. This also shows the ball has to be on the powder. I would also lay odds that 1/2 or 1/4 a barrel of powder would have blown it into fragments due to an area for the pressure to build. I have seen 1" .54 barrels blow from the ball being 2" off a normal 120gr.2F powder charge. The same barrels will take 160gr. powder with a ball with no adverse problems. My 1 1/8" with shallow dovetails .69, with a mistaken 2 charges of powder(330gr.) behind one 484gr. ball, did no damage except to my collar bone. Not having the ball HARD on the powder is a problem with beginners the world over & cannot be stressed too much nor too often.
Daryl
; That said, I'd load whatever I wanted to shoot as 4140, if that's the steel used in the barel, has immnese strength compared to the absolute maximum that could be generated by BP. With 1080 or some other normal BP steel, I'd use any load that had been safe in the damascus barrels of yesteryear of the same configuration and still be miles safe. For the .69 muskets, 130gr. 2 or 165gr.1F would be right and for the .50 rifle, as not too much is gained over 110gr. to 120gr. anyway, depending on barrel weight. If the mfg'r said no more than 100gr. - well that's the max I'd use in HIS barrel.
: This is all with round balls - slugs are another matter and is generally when the commercial Hawkens ringed their barrels. I'm not referring to the ring caused by only short starting the ball and firing it. THAT one is distinctive.
: I well remember the barrel test Turner Kirkland did some 35 years ago with a piece of Itialian .44 barrel, probably 1080. He took an 8" to 10" (approx) piece of barrel, breeched it with a plug in each end and drilled a fuse hole in the middle. He filled the barrel with 3F and touched it off with a firecracker fuse. ALL that fire came out through the hole without enlarging the barrel. This also shows the ball has to be on the powder. I would also lay odds that 1/2 or 1/4 a barrel of powder would have blown it into fragments due to an area for the pressure to build. I have seen 1" .54 barrels blow from the ball being 2" off a normal 120gr.2F powder charge. The same barrels will take 160gr. powder with a ball with no adverse problems. My 1 1/8" with shallow dovetails .69, with a mistaken 2 charges of powder(330gr.) behind one 484gr. ball, did no damage except to my collar bone. Not having the ball HARD on the powder is a problem with beginners the world over & cannot be stressed too much nor too often.
Daryl
I used to load 180 gr 2f in an old CVA Mt rifle i had in .50 cal. Didn't ever really need that kind of powder charge, but i was younger and dumber then. Never seemed to do any hurt to the rifle though.
I read somewhere that the old time way of figuring the max charge that would be consumed in a bbl was to wait for a snow, and then fire successively greater charges, the gun held horrizontal, over the snow until the shooter saw unburned particles of powder in the snow, meaning there was more powder than could be burned. I've never tried this, never plan to, just mention it as a piece of the 'lore'...Hank
That works, but if you use a moist lube there will always be soaked powder near the ball that won't ignite. (More the longer the load sits unfired). Another rule-of-thumb I have encountered was to start low and add powder until the report "cracked" when fired. This would be due to the ball breaking the sound barrier (1,116 fps at sea level - Newton had it calculated just shy of actual and he died in 1727). When I try this I find it just gets louder, not "crackier." This might be a small-bore trick.
A good, safe starting point is to use one grain of powder for every hundredth inch of ball size. (i.e. 53 grains for a .530" ball, 49 gr. for a 0.490" ball). Work up from there.
In my exhuberant youth I used to stuff in much more powder than I find the need to now. My hunting load for the .54 with roundball is only 90 grains. In the past I was cramming in 120 grs. A hole clean through a deer is still a hole clean through a deer. If I were trying to guarantee a kill where a bison or moose foreleg might be between me and vitals I would load hotter.
Dixie's catalog lists the Tower proof loads for various calibers. I'm not going to list them here for fear someone might try one. I could never see the need (or sense) of using half those amounts. Any modern, well cared for and properly constructed muzzleloader should take very stout loads. BUT, as Daryl mentioned, seat a ball short of the powder and you're holding a pipe bomb up to your cheek. With the loose fitting slippery plastic sabots in use it becomes a very real danger. I have had loads spring back from the compressed air trapped in the barrel. This happens often with clean barrels and shot loads. Mark your ramrods and check the load occasionally (deprime first) when leaving a load in place.
There's no "reset" button on firearms, hands or eyeballs.
A good, safe starting point is to use one grain of powder for every hundredth inch of ball size. (i.e. 53 grains for a .530" ball, 49 gr. for a 0.490" ball). Work up from there.
In my exhuberant youth I used to stuff in much more powder than I find the need to now. My hunting load for the .54 with roundball is only 90 grains. In the past I was cramming in 120 grs. A hole clean through a deer is still a hole clean through a deer. If I were trying to guarantee a kill where a bison or moose foreleg might be between me and vitals I would load hotter.
Dixie's catalog lists the Tower proof loads for various calibers. I'm not going to list them here for fear someone might try one. I could never see the need (or sense) of using half those amounts. Any modern, well cared for and properly constructed muzzleloader should take very stout loads. BUT, as Daryl mentioned, seat a ball short of the powder and you're holding a pipe bomb up to your cheek. With the loose fitting slippery plastic sabots in use it becomes a very real danger. I have had loads spring back from the compressed air trapped in the barrel. This happens often with clean barrels and shot loads. Mark your ramrods and check the load occasionally (deprime first) when leaving a load in place.
There's no "reset" button on firearms, hands or eyeballs.
Guest
The main problem with that is the fact that 56% of any charge of power burned becomes solid residue, some of which spews out the muzzle, some stays in the form of fouling. The snow would receive all that doesn't stay in the barrel.
: One of the determining factors for round ball shooting in the miitary guns was guaged by ball weight. This went as in a % of ball weight, such as 1/4 ball weight, 1/8 ball weight. 1/4 ball weight was deemed to be the full long range load and 1/8th was close range load. I haven't figured thsese out for small balls under .69, but would probably be quite small charges.
: Another method, if mfg'r didn't specify, would be 1/2 ball weight for cals. up to .62. These would be moderate pressure, as in 90gr. for a .50. 110gr. for a .54, 150gr. for a .62. All would develope pressures less than about 12,000LUP. & be safe in about all barrels. 1/2 ball weight would become hard on the shoulder with the 16 bore. and larger, not to mention possibly excessive pressres for about any rifle or smoothbore of those sizes.
Daryl
: One of the determining factors for round ball shooting in the miitary guns was guaged by ball weight. This went as in a % of ball weight, such as 1/4 ball weight, 1/8 ball weight. 1/4 ball weight was deemed to be the full long range load and 1/8th was close range load. I haven't figured thsese out for small balls under .69, but would probably be quite small charges.
: Another method, if mfg'r didn't specify, would be 1/2 ball weight for cals. up to .62. These would be moderate pressure, as in 90gr. for a .50. 110gr. for a .54, 150gr. for a .62. All would develope pressures less than about 12,000LUP. & be safe in about all barrels. 1/2 ball weight would become hard on the shoulder with the 16 bore. and larger, not to mention possibly excessive pressres for about any rifle or smoothbore of those sizes.
Daryl
Guest
My "personal opinion" (for what thet's worth) is,... any powder charge greater then 2 "times the calibur" with FFG, in any roundball muzzleloader, has purty well reached it's PODR (point of diminish'n return) and is a waste'a good powder!! :: /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cool.gif ::
Guest
Well once again ol' rollingb has it about perfect!
Boy do I hate to admit that! After all it's mostly HIS FAULT that I got into flint guns in the first place!
Danged cuss is a terrible influence on a fella. :bull:
I never did believe that "shoot over snow" baloney.
As was said over one half the powder consumed remains as solids that we affectionately know as fouling.
I'd doubt anyone would learn much trying to study the snow with a magnifying glass to determine what is really unburnt powder or what is black fouling. It would be a real PITA.
This is where a chronograph would come in handy. If a ten grain increase in powder nets only 50 f.p.s. then the 10 grains is waisted.
Some people still don't realize that the charge wieght adds to the recoil of the gun.
At any rate, rollingb's theory is pretty well spot on in my not so humble opinion. :haha: ::
Boy do I hate to admit that! After all it's mostly HIS FAULT that I got into flint guns in the first place!
Danged cuss is a terrible influence on a fella. :bull:
I never did believe that "shoot over snow" baloney.
As was said over one half the powder consumed remains as solids that we affectionately know as fouling.
I'd doubt anyone would learn much trying to study the snow with a magnifying glass to determine what is really unburnt powder or what is black fouling. It would be a real PITA.
This is where a chronograph would come in handy. If a ten grain increase in powder nets only 50 f.p.s. then the 10 grains is waisted.
Some people still don't realize that the charge wieght adds to the recoil of the gun.
At any rate, rollingb's theory is pretty well spot on in my not so humble opinion. :haha: ::
Hey Maxi, I didn't say I believed the shoot over snow idea, just that I'd heard it...personally, I'm a believer in the powder to caliber theory....I start there and move up or down in 5gr increments...mostly looking for accuracy...a thought though: if we keep de-bunking the old wives' tales, how are we going to keep the mystic goin' for the newcomers? Hank
Guest
hank. Personally I subscribe to the double the charge per caliber as a starting place theory of the blue shoulder.
Ooooouch! Yup jest right! ::
Ooooouch! Yup jest right! ::
Guest
That would put you into the normal service charge range for the big bores. The 1800 sevice chage for the .69 muskets was 165gr. powder, a full 10 gr. of that was considered for the pan. Later on, in the 30's perhaps, the charge was dropped to 130gr. as powder quality became better. Once the muskets were rifled, the powder charges were dropped again to 70gr. for the .69 Minnoe. I am not congnisant of the British service charge(s).
Daryl
Daryl
Hi all;
I'm a fairly new guy here, so my thoughts might be unorthodox. My answer about the the maximum load is that it doesn't matter!
First, read the published MAX of your barrel manufacturer and then stay the heck away from it. There aren't enough of us smokepolers to start with so let's not injure ourselves doing stupid things!
Around my parts, the guys talking about the MAX loads are invariably the "in-line" guys and the guys that want to shoot sabots, and power-belts and other such things. These guys are actually after an additional deer season, and don't have much interest in the history, the romanticism, the fascination of muzzleloading itself.
When I started out with smokepoles a few years ago, I was reading and absorbing everything I could find. One fellow stated that one of the hardest things about learning blackpowder rifles is "forgetting" most of what you already know about smokeless powder rifles. This was one of the most enlightening statements I've ever read. It helped me a great deal on my blackpowder learning curve. The notion that so many things are so different between the large slow projectiles of my smokepoles versus the 243 Winchester and the 30-06 that I'd used for so many years, is a large part of why smokepoling is so darned interesting.
Lots of the in-line crowd are trying to "recreate" the characteristics of the smokeless rifle using BP. Shucks, one manufacturer even makes a "muzzleloader" that uses smokeless!
Myself, I own three 50 caliber muzzleloaders. Two T/C's and one traditional flintlock that I built.
I never load with FFg to the "three digit level". T/C's published MAX is somewhere around 120 grains... I never load even 100 grains. My absolute personal MAX is 90, and that is only for tinkering around. I do my hunting with 75 or 80 grains FFg. It's plenty of power for Whitetail deer. I shoot paper and targets with 70 Goex FFg, or sometimes 65.
The "magic" of the roundball is that it's effectiveness is NOT determined by extremely high velocities like a centerfire high-powered rifle.
My experience and my advice to any younger fellows is to stay away from the MAX loads. For a 50 cal roundball load, start at 1.5 times the caliber, which is 75 grains of Goex FFg. Find the load that your rifle shoots the most accurately and forget the MAX.
Now, the flaw in my logic is this.... Some guys are thinking that they want to go after elk, moose, black bear, or something larger. The answer is still not to boost up the powder charge. You can choose a larger caliber; 54 seems most common. Or, a second option is to use a Maxiball or one of the other heavier "bullets" if you have a medium or fast twist barrel. I've done this with my T/C's which have 1:32 and 1:48 twist barrels. The penetration of a heavy maxiball is awesome...unnecessary for whitetail, but something you might want to use for larger game if you don't have or can't afford another rifle in a larger caliber.
Well, sorry I'm rambling, but I'm hoping I might help some younger fellow just as the "old-hands" at BP helped me out years ago.
Greetings to all,
Ironsights Jerry
I'm a fairly new guy here, so my thoughts might be unorthodox. My answer about the the maximum load is that it doesn't matter!
First, read the published MAX of your barrel manufacturer and then stay the heck away from it. There aren't enough of us smokepolers to start with so let's not injure ourselves doing stupid things!
Around my parts, the guys talking about the MAX loads are invariably the "in-line" guys and the guys that want to shoot sabots, and power-belts and other such things. These guys are actually after an additional deer season, and don't have much interest in the history, the romanticism, the fascination of muzzleloading itself.
When I started out with smokepoles a few years ago, I was reading and absorbing everything I could find. One fellow stated that one of the hardest things about learning blackpowder rifles is "forgetting" most of what you already know about smokeless powder rifles. This was one of the most enlightening statements I've ever read. It helped me a great deal on my blackpowder learning curve. The notion that so many things are so different between the large slow projectiles of my smokepoles versus the 243 Winchester and the 30-06 that I'd used for so many years, is a large part of why smokepoling is so darned interesting.
Lots of the in-line crowd are trying to "recreate" the characteristics of the smokeless rifle using BP. Shucks, one manufacturer even makes a "muzzleloader" that uses smokeless!
Myself, I own three 50 caliber muzzleloaders. Two T/C's and one traditional flintlock that I built.
I never load with FFg to the "three digit level". T/C's published MAX is somewhere around 120 grains... I never load even 100 grains. My absolute personal MAX is 90, and that is only for tinkering around. I do my hunting with 75 or 80 grains FFg. It's plenty of power for Whitetail deer. I shoot paper and targets with 70 Goex FFg, or sometimes 65.
The "magic" of the roundball is that it's effectiveness is NOT determined by extremely high velocities like a centerfire high-powered rifle.
My experience and my advice to any younger fellows is to stay away from the MAX loads. For a 50 cal roundball load, start at 1.5 times the caliber, which is 75 grains of Goex FFg. Find the load that your rifle shoots the most accurately and forget the MAX.
Now, the flaw in my logic is this.... Some guys are thinking that they want to go after elk, moose, black bear, or something larger. The answer is still not to boost up the powder charge. You can choose a larger caliber; 54 seems most common. Or, a second option is to use a Maxiball or one of the other heavier "bullets" if you have a medium or fast twist barrel. I've done this with my T/C's which have 1:32 and 1:48 twist barrels. The penetration of a heavy maxiball is awesome...unnecessary for whitetail, but something you might want to use for larger game if you don't have or can't afford another rifle in a larger caliber.
Well, sorry I'm rambling, but I'm hoping I might help some younger fellow just as the "old-hands" at BP helped me out years ago.
Greetings to all,
Ironsights Jerry
Welcome Ironsights, This sport of muzzleloading needs all the traditionalist it can get! Younger people are influenced far to much by the inline manufactures for them to understand what "Traditional" muzzleloading is all about. Hopefully this will change and our youth will understand the romanticism connected with frontstuffers and what our forefathers used before the advent of cartridge and non-cartridge clones (inlines).
