Not too shabby

[Stormrider51]

In 50 years of muzzleloading, I'd never owned a smoothbore. Rifles were where it was at, particularly the long elegant Pennsylvania rifles. This time around I decided to get a gun that could be an all-round piece for hunting and general plinking. I wound up with a .62 cal (20 gauge) Virginia smoothbore flinter. I like the idea of shooting patched ball or shot as the situation and game dictates.

My first trip to the range was a disappointment. I ran the target back to 25 yards and proceeded to load 'er up with 70 grains of 3Fg followed by a .600 RB wrapped in a .020" thick patch. Right off I could tell that the patch was too thick. I fought the ball down the bore and seated it snugly on the powder. A dab of 4Fg in the pan and I settled down for my first shot off a nice steady sandbag rest. The ignition time was very fast. I was happy with that. Then I looked downrange at the target. I couldn't see a bullet hole which was a surprise considering what a huge hole I should have put in it. I mean, the target was only 25 yards away. I ran the target up to my shooting position. Nope, no hole. I had missed entirely. My faith in the smoothie plummeted.

Okay, maybe it was the overly tight patch/ball that sent things awry. I loaded again but used the only other patch material I had on hand, an old flannel shirt I had cut up for cleaning patches. Couldn't hurt to try. This time I didn't even need a short-starter. I seated the ball in the muzzle by thumb pressure alone, cut the patch at the muzzle, and ran it down easily with the rod. Prime and shoot. Still no hole in the target. Several choice comments came to mind.

Time to move the target closer and see where these darned balls are going. How about 15 yards? I can THROW balls into the target at that distance. Same 70 grain charge, same thin patch. Prime and shoot. Ah-Ha! The ball hit 5" low and 4" to the right of point of aim. I loaded and fired twice more. Nice small group but way low and right. Time to quit for the day. Time to think about this a bit.

I started to act like a gunsmith, which is what I do for a living. Back at the shop I examined the crown. It was really bad, uneven in depth all the way around. At least the muzzle was square and true. I should have checked that before I went and wasted powder and ball at the range. I locked the barrel in my lathe and re-cut the crown. Now there was the problem of sighting. The gun had only a small front sight, no rear. I decided that adding a rear sight was the way to solve the problem. Fifteen minutes on the milling machine and I had installed a rear sight that would pass a PC inspection. Minimal but there.

I went back to the range this morning. 70 grains 3Fg, thin flannel patch, prime, sandbag, and shoot at 25 yards. Bingo! A clearly visible hole right on the money for elevation but slightly to the right. That's more like it! I gently tapped the rear sight over to the left just a hair using a brass drift rod and light hammer. Load and shoot again. Dead center. Can't ask for much more than that at 25 yards. Now let's give it a real test.

I moved the target back to 50 yards and had to laugh at myself because with a rifle this is an easy shot but I was wondering if the smoothie would even be on the target. Only one way to find out. I loaded and fired. Nice hit windage wise but about 1.5" low. Let's try upping the powder charge. 80 grains 3Fg this time. Same patch, etc. Dead on. The next two shots just tore the center out of the target. The fifth and last one went in high and I blame myself for that. I had become overconfident and hurried the shot. If I throw out the last shot and the first one (loaded with 70 grains instead of 80) the group is about 2". Even with the two "bad" shots included the gun still shot into less than 3". I'm going to insert the photo of the target if I can figure out how.

Sitting here at the computer, I had time to think about this new not-rifled gun of mine. What did I find interesting and/or surprising? The performance with the thin patch, for one. If I can get that kind of accuracy using a patch that let's me start the ball by thumb pressure alone, who needs a short-starter? I was surprised at the accuracy I got once I ironed out the problems, too. I need to play at differing distances and try different loads but I know that at 50 yards or less I'm good to go for deer. Now I need some birdshot so I can try some loads for that. Looks like I've got my all-round gun.

Storm

 

[rabjr]

Very niice Stormrider51. Smoothies sure are a lot of fun. :thumbsup:

 

[paulvallandigham]

Very nice story, Stormrider51. I like the way you carefully checked the crown first, to see why the gun was shooting so far off at the closer ranges.

You may want to try FFg powder in that gun, and use OP wads under the PRB. I think you will find that with the wads, you can reduce the amount of powder used, and get the ball hitting the same POI. T
he limited data I have shows that 70 grains of FFg will give you 1191 fps MV, and 80 grains of FFg will give you 1291 fps. MV. I personally don't think it serves any purpose pushing a RB over the speed of sound out of a smoothbore gun, because all that velocity is shed in the first 20 yards, and all you do is cause the ball to have to deal with problems relating to that transonic zone, but If you shoot when the winds are fairly calm, you can produce targets like the one you show. I don't have any data on velocities for the 20 gauge RB using FFFg powder. Sorry. I would expect them to be 10% faster, but again, that is all lost in the first 20 yards.

 

[Stormrider51]

Paul,
Anytime a rifle hits my shop with a complaint of poor accuracy I do a "muzzle to buttplate" inspection. In other words, the crown is the first thing I check before working my way back. It's often surprising what the crown on a high-dollar modern factory rifle can look like under magnification and good light. In the case of this smoothbore I was just in too big a hurry to go shoot it. New Toy Syndrome. As I was shooting at the indoor range of one of the gunshops I'm contracted to, I paid for my lack of patience by embarassing myself in front of customers and friends. Ol' John, the gunsmith, who can't hit paper at 25 yards. At least I redeemed myself the next day although I'm sure that's not the story I'll hear about the most.

I'll be trying 2Fg and a few other things in the coming weeks. Thanks for the advice. I do appreciate it. I learned a rule of thumb as a kid of 2Fg for .50 cal and above but I've never been able to prove it to myself beyond doubt. I owned one .45 cal that loved 2Fg and didn't shoot as well with any amount of 3Fg. I also had a .58 cal Zouave that preferred 3Fg. One of the wonderful things about firearms is that they provide us with a challenge to wring the greatest performance from them. Two seemingly identical guns can have different preferences.

I've read folks who report best accuracy with:
1. PRB alone
2. Fiber wad followed by PRB
3. Fiber wad, unpatched ball, overshot wad.

When you recommend using a wad are you saying that I should also use an overpowder wad?

Thanks,
Storm

 

[paulvallandigham]

Walter's Vegetable Fiber Wads come in at least 2 thicknesses, .030", and .060", from what I was able to learn with a little searching. I use the thin ones in .50 caliber in my rifle.

I used the 1/8(.125") OP wads, made by Circle Fly, in my shotgun and fowler, but am switching to using the OS card( .010") per JiM Rackham's suggestion. If I am sealing powder, I like to use the thicker, 1/8" OP wad, or 4 of the OS cards, as Jim recommends. The reason I am switching from the OP wads to the OS Cards is that I do see the OP Wads traveling too far( 20 yds) down range, and that tells me that they are heavy enough to be bumping the shot column from behind. I don't think that the Fibre wad that is only .030 is thick enough to seal gases in a smoothbore using a PRB. The OP Wad is, however. I don't have any experience with the thicker .060 vegetable fiber wads, but I would have to assume that they are thick enough, or close to being thick enough, to seal the gases, particularly if two such wads are used over the powder.

When I was using OP wads, then a wet lubed cushion wad, in my 12 ga., I would put an OS card down on top of the cushion wad, so that there was a dry, hard, flat surface to push the shot charge out the muzzle evenly. I saw an improvment in patterns over using only the spongy cushion wad behind the shot.

The problem I had was all that liquid in the cushion wad made it very heavy and thinned the inside of my patterns. I began by cutting them in half with my finger nails so I would use ONE Cushion wad to load 2 barrels. That seemed to help the patterns out of the 12 gauge.

However, when I got my fowler, I didn't want to fool around with an extra half of a cushion wad,, althought it worked in that gun, too.

That is when Jim Rackham posted his observations, experience and field results using only OS cards. The more I read, the more I thought Jim had found the answer.

The only thing I do differently than Jim is he used a daub of grease between the third and fourth OS card on top of the powder, and behind his shot load, to lube the barrel. I lube the barrel after seating the 2 OS cards on top of the shot. I found that this reduces or eliminates lead streaks in the barrel- not a fun thing to clean out-- which lead to better patterns as the gun was shot again and again( I didn't see any difference in patterns fired from a clean barrel, but patterns began to deterriorate as the lead built up, and velocities varied more widely).

I think the lube helps the shot slide down the barrel, rather than rubbing a flat on the pellets, and leaving lead on the barrel. I can find no difference in how soft the residue is when the gun is fired, and the barrel is as easy to clean between shots as it was lubing it with Jim's method. I like his idea of only having to deal with one form of " card/wad".

I do have a whole bag of pre-lubed 20 gauge fiber/cushion wads, that are 1/2" thick, and will try them out by splitting them into quarters or thirds, and see how well they work in lubing the barrel. But I suspect that if that barrel ahead of the shot is not greased, the lead rubbing on the barrel will repeat, and patterns will not be as good. I suppose I can use both, just to use up the bag of wads. The Patterns will determine whether that is a good idea or not.

As for powder choices, I always recommend trying both. With a chronograph, you can make an honest comparison on MV, and get a good reading on the SDV. I like to recommend using FFg powder in flintlocks, at least when the caliber is .40 and over. Most of the time, you are going to get the lower SDV, and the faster ignition, using FFg powder. You may have to burn a bit more to get the velocity at that " sweet spot " in barrel harmonics, but its worth it in faster internal ignition. I do know some large bore guns---I am remembering specifically the first .62 caliber RIFLE anyone in my club owned-- that preferred 3Fg rather than 2Fg powder, and we had several good shooters fire groups with the gun so that the owner was not fooling himself. We did not have a chronograph back then, and looking back, I wish we did. I suspect that the difference in group size was based on the slower velocity using the FFg powder, and the harmonics for that barrel. The owner of that gun swapped a lot of FFg powder to club members for FFFg powder after he found its preference. He killed his first wild boar with the gun. So, once again, try both powders.

I recommend FFFg in percussion guns because the data repeatedly seems to show that in percussion guns, you get a lower SDV if you compact the powder, and FFFg powder seems to compact much better, and give a lower SDV to begin with. When I was watching the re-enactors shoot at posts, and other spectator targets, they were using 60 grains of FFFg powder in their .58 cal. rifles. And, you don't need magnum percussion caps unless you are shooting Substitute powders. Use the standard #11 percussion caps with Black Powder.

 

[KHickam]

Nice gun - Did you make it? Trying to figure out the right gun for me.


Keith

 

[Stormrider51]

No Sir, I didn't make this one. It was put together by a gent named Greg Christian from this forum. As for deciding what you are looking for, consider what you want to do and where. Here in central Texas it's easy to find shots on deer at 50 yards or less. I also have quail, doves, squirrels, rabbits, and turkeys as potential game animals. The smoothbore makes sense given those factors. It's an all-around hunting gun as long as I accept the range limitations.

In years past I focused on deer hunting with small game as an off-season extra. I seldom went after birds. I used a rifle for the greater range and accuracy. It worked for what I was doing at that time. I also won a match or two along the way.

The bottom line is to decide what you really want to do with your gun and at what distance. The smoothbore offers great versatility but limited range. The rifle is more restricted as to the game you use it on but offers much greater accuracy. Of course, you can always have both a rifle and a smoothbore.

Storm