Paper cartridge & rifles

[strato50]

Hey all; just curious about using paper cartridges with a .50cal Kentucky or similar rifles, say, instead of the normal patch & ball.

Im not sure on whether this was ever used historically or what, or how popular paper patches are anyway. Pitch in any thoughts! Thanks.

 

[rafterob]

Paper patching works best for shallow rifled barrels. But give it a try and see what you get. For a quick reload in the field it will probably do what you want. A lubed cloth patch works best for sealing deeper rifling grooves and Gripping the under sized ball to impart spin.

 

[varsity07840]

Hey all; just curious about using paper cartridges with a .50cal Kentucky or similar rifles, say, instead of the normal patch & ball.

Im not sure on whether this was ever used historically or what, or how popular paper patches are anyway. Pitch in any thoughts! Thanks.

Some guys have tried and swear by using a paper cartridge that uses the wrap of paper in lieu of a patch. The ball end is dipped in lube. The cartidge is usually tapered like a percussion revolver cartidge and I assume that the paper is nitrated. Naturally, the powder end has to be bitten of and the charge poured first. I would think the trick is finding the right paper wrap/ball combination. I don't know if some sort of lubed wad is used but it might be a good idea. The British Enfield cartridge for the
Pritchett bullet used a two layer tube twisted at the top. Powder was poured and the bullet inserted into the bottom nose first with the straight part of the bullet sticking out. It was then wrapped in a outer layer of paper that wrapped the exposed end of the bullet and was twisted at the bottom. The bullet end was dipped in bees wax lube. To load, the powder end was bitten off, powder poured in, then the bullet end was partially inserted and the excess paper and tube broken off, leaving essentially a paper patched bullet to go down the bore.

Duane

 

[Zonie]

IMO, in a rifled barrel a paper patched ball will shoot very poorly. It will also lead the rifling grooves.

There are even a number of different kinds of cloth that don't work well for shooting patches because the weave and thread size is just too weak to take the abuse of being fired down a rifled barrel.

If some cloth can't take the abuse, a piece of paper doesn't stand a chance.

The shooters who do use paper patches are using them on long slugs.

On a long slug, the expansion of the slug into the rifling grooves does most of the sealing and the paper just serves to keep the lead off of the bore while the grease that's put onto the paper just before loading provides the lubrication.

Most of the paper cartridges that use a ball are intended to be fired in a smoothbore.
Those are a totally different critter than a rifle and even if the paper gets burned up in the process of firing it won't have much effect on the accuracy.

Paper cartridges with balls in them were usually Military and they were used because it greatly speeded up the process of reloading the gun on a battlefield.

 

[nkbj]

Some thick paper might be fun to play with in a barrel with well smoothed rifling. Would probably need to use something like your last cleaning patch or some meal as a gas dam behind the ball. But you could probably make it work if like Roger Miller used to sing "if it'll make you happy and you've a mind to". As hard as paper is there might be a way to make it very accurate.

 

[strato50]

Thanks for the info guys. I'll give it a try with some mid-grade paper Ive been using in my Bess. It's stiff but not very thick, and twists nicely without tearing which helps a lot in cartridge making.

I think with a generous amount of paper behind the ball compressed against my power charge, while also keeping the ball wrapped entirely around, I can get some decent performance.

Just got my .50 Kentucky flinter in the mail, so I'll take it shooting ASAP.