Pedersoli Brown Bess Supplies

[Tonyd]

Am buying a Pedersoli Brown Bess from Dixie and want to order needed flints, mold and wads from same place even though there may be better sources--just don't want hassle and extra shipping to start out with.

FLINTS: Want to try either Grey English in 1" or 1 1/8"--which size would be better? OR--go with Arkansas 1" cut flints (supposedly get 250 shots without resharpening?) Which way is better and which size? One sparks better than other, etc.?

MOLD: Dixie lists two different sizes for the Bess in two places in their catalog--.735 and .730. Which size would be best? Problem with .730 is that I cannot find a mold at Dixie for it, while the .735 is available in a Lyman.

WADS: Have heard that an overpowder wad and even a compressible, lube saturated wad on top of the ball also is good. Realize is not authentic, but am interesed in accuracy. Know have to experiment--i.e., have done all sorts of things with my other three ML rifles in past--.58 mini, .45 RB and .451 target. Regardless, would like any and all loading combinations you all have tried--may save me some time working up a combination. Will probably be ordering wads and need to know if get 11 guage shotgun--assume they are .751 dia. and would work to seal in a .750 Bess? Also , do I need to get fibre type wads and/or card wads?

Thanks in advance and have really enjoyed the forum

Tony in Seattle

 

[Grenadier1758]

I'll deal with the simple things first.

The Pedersoli Bess is a 11 gauge smoothbore. So get the 11 gauge supplies. Get extra over shot cards.

Since you are looking to seek the utmost accuracy, which is something of relative term with a smoothbore musket, there is a lot of it depends to be considered. You have no rear sight. At best you have the slot in the tang screw and the front sight is your bayonet lug. Some documentation will refer to that rectagular piece of metal as a sight. Remember that your eye will become the rear sight and you change elevation by the position of your cheek on the comb if the stock.

I know of more than a few people who have very good success with the 0.735" ball. This ball is large enough that you should consider the bare ball approach. I would use one over shot card on top of the powder, then the ball and an over shot card to hold it all in place. Patching material will only make the gun difficult to load. I had good success with mine using a 0.715" ball and 0.017" cotton drill patching. With the lube it held the ball in place and was easy to load.

Use the 1 1/8" English flints. Not only are they traditional, the wirk great. The cut agates will soon take the case hardening off the frizzen. You will have to consider the wear on any bess from any maker. The sythetic flints aren't really any better than the Englilsh flints.

Take care and let us know what you have decided.

 

[Wes/Tex]

Grenadier is right about the bore of Besses. The original military load was a .690" ball in paper cartridges. You might consider getting some different sized balls from someone like Track in .690", .715" & .735 and give them a try to see what your gun likes best. Some folks like to use bare balls, and the recommendation about using balls close to bore size is a valid one. Also agree about the English flints. They'll work better longer than the cut type flints. Just take it slow and try different things, you're gun will tell you when it's happy! :winking:

 

[TVG.75]

Sir,
I just must reply to Your post as this subject is near and dear to me.
Grenadier1758 and Wes/Tex have already answerd Your questions, I would just like to add my $.02 worth.
I have an older, used Pedersoli Bess with a less than outstanding looking bore that measures .748 Dia. I have had remarkable success with a bare .722 Dia. ball, once I spent considerable time learning what this firelock took to get it to shoot as I saw fit.( I could not hit an
8' tall x 4' wide sheet of plywood at 100 yards ??!!! ) I go to club shoots and rendezvous, so I fire a number of shots in succession and the first couple shots are the worst. I fire a "fouler" ( blank ) or two to load the bore with fouling, patch the next two - four shots and by then the bore is so full of fouling I spit on the ball and just ram it down, then an over powder card to hold it. The more I shoot, the more fouling, the tighter the groups. Clean up is not bad, compared to scrubbing copper fouling out of modern guns!
I only carry 11 ga. over powder cards for ease in shooting shot, as I can load fast and not mess with any other components. One over the 80gr charge of 2f and one over the 1 1/2 oz. (654 grs. by weight) load of #8's.
As for flints I have NO ignition problems with English flints of 1" or 1 1/8". Both work fine with my musket. I say big flints, big pan, big touch hole, if she sparks she WILL go off! And sparkin' aint a problem. I think the "cut flints" are harder on the battery, I got a rifle with one once, it looked sharp but did not spark well and I could not knapp it. I had to turn it over approx. every 10 - 20 hammer-falls to get spark again. English flints worked in the same lock as one would expect of a flint. This was my limited exposer to them anyway.
My mould came with the gun, it is one of the Dixe moulds with no sprue cutter ( $44.95 on page 290 in the 2006 catalog) I cut the sprue off with a good pair of cable cutters, then tumble 100 balls at a time in my old brass tumbler. When finished I must look hard to find where the sprue was, and the ball can now go down the bore in any direction.
I have also been toying with an N E I mould lately in .740 Dai. but can not comment as of yet.
I have been long winded enough for my first ever reply/post, I could go on and on, but I wish you the best and loads of fun with your musket.
I read this forum very often and will hope too see posts of your results and thoughts.

 

[Rick Davis]

My most recent experience in your topic list was with Dixie's molds. I bought a 0.735" ball mold from Dixie in the 1980s that works well, except it lacks a sprue cutter. So, I used diagonal cutting pliers to trim the castings. Recently, I ordered a 0.680 ball mold from Dixie, and found it *much* lower in quality. The ball cavity was far off-center, making quality casting very difficult due to the uneven heating characteristics of the varying thickness of the iron mold. Also, the cavity was out of round. The sprue channel didn't make a nice, clean squared off entrance into the ball cavity. It increased diameter rapidly near the ball cavity, almost as if someone cut the sprue channel with a countersinking tool. This made sprue trimming very difficult, assuming I had a good casting run (see comments about heating, above).

I wrote to Dixie about these two issues, and pointed out that their earlier molds did not have these issues. They replied (very politely) that it was tough luck, take them or leave them. They weren't about to fix them since their supply of mold blanks were dwindling anyway. As I look at Dixie's mold page, I see they're *still* selling the same mold.

Sidebar: Dixie is finicky about spelling. Type "mold", or "bullet mold" in their search engine and it won't return anything. You **must** type "mould" (note extra u) to find thier molds.

This led me to look for something better, and I found what appears to be a period-correct mold for only $20 more than Dixie, and without the attitude: check -> here

 

[TVG.75]

PA RIFLEMAN,
THANKYOU FOR THE HEADS UP!
IF THE CURRENT QUALITY OF THE DIXIE MOLD IS AS YOU STATE I WILL STAY CLEAR. I WOULD NOT WANT THE TROUBLE YOU HAVE HAD.
I TOO HAVE BEEN LOOKING AT THE MOLD ON SMILING FOX FORGE, YOU FOUND, IN .678 DIA. FOR SOME OTHER ARMS I HAVE. THE MORE AUTHENTIC LOOK APPEALS TO ME.