Observations while working up load

[C Barker]

The past few days have been spent trying to work up the best load for my flintlock. It is a .45 cal 42" swamped B Colerain bbl. I have tried .010 and .015 oxyokes lubed with Bore Butter that didn't hold up very well. A .020 oxyoke lubed with either BB or Ballistol a la Dutch is hopelessly too thick. Seems .018 ticking with BB is the patch of choice with .440 Hornady balls (.445's with 10 or 15 thousands patches didn't work -- patches didn't hold up). That might all sound good in print, but it's not that simple.

I started with 40 grains Goex 3F with the .018 patches lubed with BB and worked up in 5 grain increments. 40 grains not so good, 45 grains a little better, 50 grains sweet, 60 not as good. So for 25 yards 50 grains seems to be the ticket. :grin: At least for targets and close-in small gamers. (I proved my cheapness by trying 25 and 30 grains Goex 3F and they shot nice 3 inch groups at 25 yards! ) Today I tried to find a load for deer with the 45 cal. I had heard that sometimes rifles have two sweet spots. I shot 70 grains Goex 3F from 50 yards since I already knew what 60 grains did at 25 yards (less than satisfactory grouping and figured it would get worse at 50). 70 grains was an absolute failure grouping unless you consider the old "hit the paper plate" as satifactory. :youcrazy:

I apologize for all this background stuff :yakyak: but I needed to set the scene for the question. Has anyone run into a similar situation when trying to increase the load for hunting? I'm not really sure that 50 grains 3F in a 45 cal is okay for deer and I'm a bit hesitant to try 80 grains of 3F (don't know the bbl powder load specs). Have I gone wrong with patches, powder or ball size? :idunno: I would really appreciate your input, experience, insights, help, etc. with this. Thanks for your patience and help. :bow:

 

[necchi]

The background info is good.
When you went "a la Dutch" How did you mix and dry? Do you have Dutch's papers or are you going off the grape vine?

I ask cause I think the BB is too slick, when you increase the powder charge it's beginning to "skip" instead of spinning,,

I've been using Dutch for years with great success, the mix and drying is key to proper lube. And you need to swab after each shot for it to work as recomended.
Others use BoreButter and it works for them, but ya can't really mix the two systems to any advantage.

 

[nchawkeye]

No discussion about the accuracy of a patched round ball is complete without discussing what the patches looked like after shooting...

Lube, powder type and charge don't mean a dang thing if you are burning or cutting patches...
What did they look like??? Any cuts, burn throughs??? Could you use them again...

Second...I've seen quite a bit of difference in accuracy between lubes used...There are a ton of different lubes and everyone has their favorites...Just experiment and see what works in your gun...
Finally...In a round ball barrel with cut rifling .012-.015 or so deep and a proper twist for caliber I don't buy the 2 sweet spot theory...In my .54 I can go from 50-120grs of FFF Goex with no accuracy problems as long as I start adding a wad to protect the patch when I get above 90grs of powder...In my .40 it runs from 25-70grs with good accuracy...

In a factory gun with shallow button rifling this isn't the case...

 

[roundball]

My .45cal PRB deer loads have always been 90grns Goex 3F, T/C factory .018" precut/prelubed pillow ticking and Hornady .440"s in the following barrels:
A couple TC 28" x 1:48" barrels
A couple TC 32" x 1:66" barrels

Same load in my current 42" B-weight Rice barrel except that I use thicker .022" patches due to the round bottom groove barrels .

Single ragged hole at 25yds, cloverleafs at 50.
================================================

Just a personal observation...speaking only for myself...I stopped making this hobby harder on myself than it needed to be long ago...particularly when I'm doing something like load development.
My approach is to avoid all the home made gimmicks and simply stick with known, proven matching sets of nominal size commercial components made by high quality manufacturers who have refined their approaches over decades:
Precut/prelubed TC or Oxyoke patches, and Hornady/Speer balls.
Takes very little time and expense to establish what load works best in a given bore, I document it, and enjoy.

THEN...if I want to...I can start experimenting with home made this or that, made on a Thursday under a full moon, with an eye-of-newt thrown in for good measure...if I want to.
But I quit wasting my time and money on such things long ago...there's nothing I want to shoot that I can't shoot with factory off-the-shelf products which produce single ragged holes at 25yds and cloverleafs at 50.

Others mileage may vary of course...

 

[jethro224]

If the rifle is still new, and cutting patches, you might just have to shoot it some more to get the barrel broken-in.
If the patches are burnt maybe a wad would help?
You could try a .445 ball with the .015 patches.
Did you try 55 grains?
It's against the common "rules" but some guys find 2F works better in their .45 caliber rifles. Worth a shot. :wink:

Keep at it. :thumbsup:

 

[Rifleman1776]

I'm not really sure that 50 grains 3F in a 45 cal is okay for deer and I'm a bit hesitant to try 80 grains of 3F

.50 grains for deer is a bit light. Assuming your gun is safe the 80 grain charge will work just fine. However, with my .45, I finally settled on a 65 grain charge for deer. It was plenty adequate out to, my self-imposed limit, 100 yards. For hunting purposes, the choice of 2Fg or 3Fg is academic. I would choose the triple-F.

 

[matt denison]

"It's against the common "rules" but some guys find 2F works better in their .45 caliber rifles."

Jethro finally said it. IMHO there are no "rules" of FFg or FFFg. Try everything regardless of the caliber. Some guns (barrels) just want FFg, some want FFFg. You may be suprised how much difference one or the other can make.

I have a .54 cal. that will not shoot FFg but shoots tiny groups with FFFg. On the other hand I also have another .54 cal. that insists on FFg. Go figure.

 

[Rifleman1776]

I have a .54 cal. that will not shoot FFg but shoots tiny groups with FFFg. On the other hand I also have another .54 cal. that insists on FFg. Go figure.

That is what makes this game fun. :wink:

 

[C Barker]

This is kind of a blanket response to all who put in their 2 cents of which I am most appreciative.
:hatsoff:
Necchi, I have Dutch's material and it works great in 50 cal which has typical Lyman shallow grooves. Never thought of Bore Butter maybe skipping down the bbl. :hmm: Hopefully this week(end?) I'll have the chance to try out some of the 7/1 and 8/1 Dutch's magic method on pre-cut .018 ticking and some drill strips.

Nchawkeye and Roundball, just talked to my daughter in Rolesville for the latest update and hope you two are also okay with this Irene stuff.

Nchawkeye the .018 BB-ed patches come out fine and mostly "re-shootable" if I wanted. The .015's are a different story. They show signs of blow by's, tears (not cuts) and sometimes burn marks. The bbl has had over 200 shots and even the cleaning and drying patches come out with no tears or cuts so I think the lands' edges are worn down as they should be. The grooves are .016 round bottom according to the folks at Colerain.

Roundball, I've read on the forum about using thicker patches with round bottom grooves. Question is how do you do what you do using .022 patches? :idunno: I can't even get .020 down without some real effort and then they don't shoot as well as .018. Go figure. The drill cloth I use in the 50 calibre measures in between the ticking patches (.018) and the .020 patches so that might work out okay. Unfortunately or fortunately, there are no newts around here so voodoo magic is limited! :haha: And that's why I don't want to mess with all these secret formula concoctions that people come up with. As with you, I like KISS approaches to things. And that's not a put down of Stumpy's M-Juice or M-Snot. It's just me trying to keep it simple--maybe laziness is part of it too! :grin:

Rifleman and RB, I'll give 80 grains 3F a try and see how that goes. I wish someone knew the specs and safe load capacity for Colerains.

Again thanks to all for your input. :thumbsup: :bow: :hatsoff:

 

[roundball]

.022" patches

3rd party's 'patch system'

I used to use .018" with square bottom grooves and .010" under bore size balls...but .016" round bottom grooves create a more spacious bore and had to step up to .022" patches.

So for purposes of this discussion, assuming you're using fairly standard size square bottom grooves for round balls, with a .010" under bore size ball, yours should load an .018" PRB with a short starter no problem.

My other suggestion was a delicate attempt to get this point across:
Lose the 3rd party patch system.

Get some proven fatory precut/prelubed patches and go enjoy sighting in your rifle...you're just adding a dimension of unpredictable complexity at a time when you need to be using known proven quality products to minimize the unknowns, minimize the variables.

Job-1 is to first just see what your barrel will do using commonly accepted industy standard components...made for the industry standard dimension barrel that you have.

(THEN....you can go try your eyes-of-Newt thing again LOL )