My Day at the Range: Part 3

[LeMat1856]

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. sept 26 / 01:26a


for those of you that are new to this saga, i am in the process of breaking in (or just breaking !) a recently purchased lemat revolver. in part 1, i learned how to over load the cylinders and nearly cause the gun to vibrate to pieces. in part 2, i watched as the ramrod and loading lever flew out of their mount, battled with a nearly impossibly stiff trigger and almost sent the whole thing back for a replacement.

thanks to mr. vallandingham i now use synthetic lubricants (which greatly reduced the "stiffness" in both trigger and cylinders) and lowered my charges to 20 grains (from 40) which eliminated parts falling out of place. three cheers for experience.

wednesday, however, i really topped the charts.

while testing these adjustments i added some fiber wads to the 20g smooth bore. they're called "c" wads on track of the wolf's site. supposedly they will take some of the recoil out of the shotgun. that's not all they'll do.

with everything running lean and mean, the fire was literally pouring out of both barrels so much so that somewhere in my last volly, i noticed a bright light out in front of me (we shoot until 9pm outdoors here) that was flickering and obscured the target somewhat. i looked up and over the trigger sight only to see about 3' of bright orange flame leaping up from behind the shooters barricade - directly in front of me.

apparently, with all this wadding and hot lead, i had somehow ignited the grass and spend powder in my "lane" and it was quickly getting out of control. i yelled "fire ! fire ! fire !" (probably not the best choice of terms for a gun range, but...) and the rangemaster quickly grabbed a hose and doused the area with water which then turned the mess into a smokebomb that choked nearly everyone back to the parking lot. oy, vay. this is more fun than a barrel of monkeys.

thus, we end this saga on a happy note nonetheless. my lemat is not a lemon afterall, nothing fell off of it this time, and i'm getting much better burn per load than ever (no pun intended) which makes for less orange gunk at cleanup and no wasted powder.

so, you see, shooting black powder can be lots of fun even for beginners like me. the end.

~daniel~
:hatsoff:

 

[Many Klatch]

I set an indoor range on fire once with a Colt .44 Navy. The flames and sparks from the barrel caught the loose powder in the concrete floor expansion joint on fire. Thus we had a slow match burning across the floor. Quite a show!

Now you have a story that will top a lot of others the next time you and some buddies are sitting around the fire swapping tales.

Many Klatch

 

[gunner437]

Please, please tell us that this can be viewed on You tube!!!!! I'm still laughing!!!!!

 

[paulvallandigham]

I think you need to consider using only OS cards in that pistol. The thicker wads are known to be able to travel at least 25 yards!, And, if they are on fire- didn't you lube the wad edges, before loading them??-- they are going to pose a fire hazard, as you found out. Oh, heck, the weeds needed to be burned back anyway, NO? :rotf: They will be replaced by grass. The OS cards fall to the ground within 25 feet.

I have some 20 gauge OS cards( and wads) that I can't use in my gun, since its bore is oversized, and I now use 19 gauge OS cards. If that barrel is actually a 20 gauge, let me know and I can send these to you to try. If anyone else wants some of these 20 gauge OP and cushion wads, let me know by PM, also.

 

[grey8833]

And I thought I had bad days at the range. :rotf: :rotf: Keep these stories comming, it's why we all come to this site!

 

[JohnnyO]

Once at an outdoor range a man shot a tracer round [illegal in CA] and we all saw it bounce off the burm and into the adjacent field which immediately caught fire. Luckily it was November, so the fire was slow...but he yelled fire and ran out across the range to go put it out...he was lucky he wasn't shot in the process haha...
If it had been summertime that field would have been toast...

 

[Zonie]

I'm glad they didn't have to call out the La France Fire Truck to put out "La Fire" from your LeMat!
:rotf: :rotf:

 

[Grizzled Roberts]

I was shooting a 1816 reproduction flintlock musket. I was using muzzle loading shot gun type
fiber wads under the patch and ball. I had dipped these wads in liquid crisco for lubrication. I was at an outdoor range there were other people shooting modern guns a few benches away. I could not see it from behind the musket, but I was told
by the other people that something in my load was burning like a tracer downrange when I fired a shot. It had to be the crisco soaked wads. They burned out long before hitting the ground. A couple of weeks earlier I was shooting this load at a rendezvous on a trail walk. I guess I was lucky the ground was damp from a recent rain or I could have set the woods on fire. :bow:
Now on a trail walk I put the wad in my mouth to get it wet. So far my spit ain't burned :surrender:

 

[LeMat1856]

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. sept 27 / 00:10a

what more can i say. :redface:

klatch, you probably know what it feels like when the the rangemaster is kinda squint-eyed and looking right at you over their bifocals... not good.

and sorry, gunner437, no one had a camera for my one minute of fame. it would have been "clip of the week" for certain.

paul, i actually did slather on bore butter to both the 'op' card and fiber wad. apparently that's not 100% effective.

as to those cards, this took a long time to figure out: the lemat's 20 gauge measures .626" but the cards they sell as 20g are .625" and too small because they're made for use *inside* shotgun shells. what i needed was actually much larger - .672" / 16g - so the edges would bend over somewhat like a soda bottle cap (upside down). i found this by going back and forth to circle fly and track o' wolf.

i might be able to use the 20g wads, but if the 'os' cards are .625", then they also would be too small. apparently there are several versions of "20 gauge" in the market these days.

zonie, you and me both. can you imagine the headlines: "san francisco shooter burns down only public range within 30 mile radius of city. crowds lynch him on le' spot...!" (i had to put that in. it was just hanging there.) (oh, stop me someone, please.)

and, it's a nice idea but, grzrob, i ain't sticking no nasty, made-in-pakistan, piece of who knows what in *my* mouth, fireproof spit or not. there must be a better way than that. :barf: ha!

i thank you all for rubbing it in. makes it all worthwhile. please stay tuned for the next episode which will be available as soon as they forget my name and address. fortunately they don't know me at the richmond range...yet.

gotta go,
~daniel~

 

[paulvallandigham]

Dan: If your bore is actually .626, order 19 gauge( .629) cards from Track, or Circle Fly. Going up to 16 gauge is too much, and the cards will bend unevenly and won't provide the seal needed.

You miss the point. Lubing those thicker wads justs adds weight to them. That helps them carry further down range. I am surprised that you got the Wonderlube to burn, because it shouldn't. If you use some kind of oil- even cooking oil- you can possibly set them ablaze. The real problem was that the wads are too small for your barrel, and the hot gases were able to blow past them, or turn them in the barrel so that an oil-soaked edge was hit by the burning gas during the length of the barrel.

Try using the 19 gauge wads, instead, and use Wonderlube, or Bore butter for any lube you decided to put in the barrel, or under the ball or shot. You should not experience burning wads with this set-up. I have used it for years, as has dozens of members of my local club, and we always shoot over dried grass, weeds, and forest leaf clutter that would go up in a heartbeat if we were shooting incendiaries down range!

 

[Zonie]

LeMat:
I don't like to point out small spelling errors but I think you post needs a bit of correction.

You wrote:

"no one had a camera for my one minute of fame."

It should have been:

"no one had a camera for my one minute of FLAME .

:rotf: :grin: :rotf:

 

[LeMat1856]

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. sept 28 / 05:00a


very funny, zonie. one day it'll be your turn. then we'll see who's laughing...

paul,
this is getting complicated so i'll 'pt' my answer. there is new information from cabela that changes everything.

~daniel~