Minie in a smoothbore?

[dooltubes]

I have a percussion .58 x .58 side by side double. The right barrel is rifled and I will try Minies in that. But the left barrel is smoothbore. How would a Minie work in that barrel compared to using a patched roundball of the proper size? What would be the proper diameter roundball for the .58 smoothbore? I will be using it on whitetailed deer.

 

[RussB]

I would not expect too much out of that left barrel. Minies, conicals, lee REAL's and such, seem to do much better if rifiling is present, to put that little bit of spin they need to stablize.

The faster the twist rate, the faster the spin...and the longer the projectile you can shoot....up to a point of PDR ( Point of Diminishing Returns).
As twist rate slows, bullet length shortens, until we get to the round ball and that is as "short" as you can make it. Consequesntly the absence of any twist dictates the shortest possible projectile, or round ball.

All this babble is not to say they won't shoot at all....they will shoot. It's just that accuracy is sadly lacking.

Russ

 

[musketman]

I agree, try it and find out...

One note, if you only shoot one side and the other is still loaded, deprime the loaded side before reloading the empty tube...

This drastically reduces the chance of the loaded tube shooting you if the cap is bumped while loading...

 

[Keith]

I also suspect the minie side would be more likely to have the projectile slide up bore under recoil or handling. The ball won't, as readily, because the patching holds it in place. :m2c:

 

[Rat]

Compared to a patched round ball, a minnie out of a smooth barrel is not going to shoot very well, I think it would be safe to say. I would think it would tumble...but I've never tried it!

I think the thing to consider here is that a tightly patched round ball will shoot VERY well from a smooth barrel. A tight ball/patch combo and a wonder wad might amaze you with how well it can shoot...especially out to 50 yards. I can't help but think that accuracy from a minnie out of a smoothbore would be....FUNKY!

Seems to me a minnie or REAL in your rifled barrel, and a tightly patched round ball in the other would be a very deadly combination.

There's no way for us to know the bore diameter of your smooth barrel. IF it's a true .580", you might want to try something in the .565 to .570" range...I'm thinking .565" would be the place to start.

Rat

 

[Rebel]

From what i have determined you want a ball .020-030 under bore size in a smoothbore. I agree that you are not likely to get any kind of accuracy out of that barrel with a mini.

 

[Gary]

Sure you can shoot a minie ball in a musket. Since there's no rifling, don't expect it to be any more accurate than the round ball. BTW, you can also shoot broken glass, nails, rocks, sticks out of your musket too. Those "damned rebels" at Bunker Hill (actually Breed's Hill) across the bay from Boston did that during the Revolution.

Aren't smoothbores fun? ::

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

If you use the right size Minie, it should behave about like the old "rifle slugs" that we used to use on deer in modern shotguns years ago. They gave deer killing accuracy out to 60 yards or so. A tight fitting Minie with a properly worked up charge behind it might even do a bit better than the old slugs. And a deer hit with a slug usually didn't go very far.

 

[Rat]

You guys might be right, and I may be wrong, but I'm betting that any kind of minnie is going to tumble out of a smooth barrel. A patched ball will be FAR, MUCH, WAY more accurate.

:imo:

Well now we need someone to try it for sure!

Rat

 

[Russ T Frizzen]

I agree that a prb will be more accurate, but a Minie, if it fits well and is used with the proper charge can be surprisingly accurate, within a reasonable range. The old shotgun slugs had no spin either and were pretty accurate. The Brenneke "rifled slugs" were supposed to be the best. They had raised spiral ribs running longitudinally on their sides. This was supposed to impart a stabilising spin to them. And who knows, maybe it did.

 

[bart_anastasi]

Which is exactly the point.

Smooth bore shotguns used a rifled- slug and unless you have a mold I do not know about there are no rifled mini balls in 58 cal or my own favorite 62 cal.

Grease groves on these things go around the bullet and not spiraling around like a rifled-slug.

Also such a contraption

 

[Stumpkiller]

As mentioned above, I don't think a mini

 

You guys might be right, and I may be wrong, but I'm betting that any kind of minnie is going to tumble out of a smooth barrel. A patched ball will be FAR, MUCH, WAY more accurate.

:imo:

Well now we need someone to try it for sure!

Rat

In fact, I have tried this with a 24 gauge trade gun, and it doesn't work worth a flip. You get some interesting holes in all sorts of locations on the target...big, long, jagged holes as the bullet hits sideways. I found that a patched roundball is what it was meant to handle. A minnie is designed to expand to catch the rifling in a barrel. If there's no rifling, it just gets pushed out. Ever throw a football without spiraling it? Sometimes it goes straight, sometimes it goes all over hell's-half-acre.

Use a patched round ball, they work fine and have for the past 600 or so years.

:results:

 

[weirdjack]

In fact, I have tried this with a 24 gauge trade gun, and it doesn't work worth a flip.

Yep...I tried them also in a North Star trade gun years ago. Same basic crappy results.
WJ

 

[kentucky bucky]

It would fly like a ruptured duck with a broken wing. :imo: