Pedersoli Enfield

[bigted]

My 1861 Enfield made by Pederosoli, is such a hoot that I regulated the cheek height to fit me so I do not get the snot slapped outta my face. Now I know that the resale is ruined by this modified stock, but, I have no intention of ever getting rid of it ... I like this rifle this much.

I like this well built rifle a lot. Nice wood and all put together well with detail work in a solid sound peice of armament.

At first I was frustrated by the lack of accuracy with minne balls. The only minne that does well is the lee .575 extreme wide flat point. It shoots .570 PRB's very well tho. A .015 patch lubed with mink oil is easy to load and I have discovered two 1.5 Old E powder charges it likes, 70 grains and 105 grains. Both will stack em on top of each other if I do my part at 35 yards. Gotta stretch my yardage next but if they will not group at 35 ... stands to reason they will not get better at longer range.

I have read of the patent breech but find no such in my rifle , it is bore diameter back to the touch hole from the nipple bolster.

Next I have read of a 1 in 48 inch twist, but not so with mine. With a tight patch on my cleaning rod I marked it and pulled it back out and discovered a 1 in 60 or so twist.

All in all the more things I discover about this rifle, the more I think this must be an early model rifle. It is marked Pedersoli - cal 577 behind the CW00xxx number on the left breech area in very small print. The lock is stamped with the crown at the rear and TOWER with 1861 on top of it in the middle of the plate. With the exception of two number 25's along with small proof marks, that is the only markings on this rifle.

At any rate, thats my tale. Any hints or suggestions or maybe further knowledge concerning this wonderful rifle would be excellent.

 

[Smokey Plainsman]

My 1861 Enfield made by Pederosoli, is such a hoot that I regulated the cheek height to fit me so I do not get the snot slapped outta my face. Now I know that the resale is ruined by this modified stock, but, I have no intention of ever getting rid of it ... I like this rifle this much.

I like this well built rifle a lot. Nice wood and all put together well with detail work in a solid sound peice of armament.

At first I was frustrated by the lack of accuracy with minne balls. The only minne that does well is the lee .575 extreme wide flat point. It shoots .570 PRB's very well tho. A .015 patch lubed with mink oil is easy to load and I have discovered two 1.5 Old E powder charges it likes, 70 grains and 105 grains. Both will stack em on top of each other if I do my part at 35 yards. Gotta stretch my yardage next but if they will not group at 35 ... stands to reason they will not get better at longer range.

I have read of the patent breech but find no such in my rifle , it is bore diameter back to the touch hole from the nipple bolster.

Next I have read of a 1 in 48 inch twist, but not so with mine. With a tight patch on my cleaning rod I marked it and pulled it back out and discovered a 1 in 60 or so twist.

All in all the more things I discover about this rifle, the more I think this must be an early model rifle. It is marked Pedersoli - cal 577 behind the CW00xxx number on the left breech area in very small print. The lock is stamped with the crown at the rear and TOWER with 1861 on top of it in the middle of the plate. With the exception of two number 25's along with small proof marks, that is the only markings on this rifle.

At any rate, thats my tale. Any hints or suggestions or maybe further knowledge concerning this wonderful rifle would be excellent.

I have wanted a Pedersoli 1861 musketoon for a long time, but along with their other Enfields, I’ve read many many people having lackluster performance in the accuracy department, even using bullets properly sized etc. Also there is 0 evidence the 1861 variant carbine with its adjustable ladder rear sight was ever imported or used in the U.S. Civil War. I wish they would offer one with a fixed rear sight to better approximate the ones on record being imported into the country during the war.

They look extremely neat and handy, though. Perhaps the crux of the issue is the lack of progressive depth rifling on these repros. At the end of the day these guns shouldn’t only be accurate with patched round bal, and they appear to be incredibly finicky to wring any kind of accuracy out of with Minie bullets. That’s a shame, as it’s really kept me away from them. If they happened to offer them with the correct progressive depth rifling in the future, I’d buy one in a heartbeat.

 

[Britsmoothy]

Not all pedersoli made guns use patent breaches, as you discovered.
Sounds good.
I had a PH made one in smoothbored!

 

[bigted]

Brit ... your PH ... did it come factory smoothy? Also, is it 58 smoothbore?

I have an old CVA Zouave that shoots terrible and have contemplated having it bored 20 gauge 62 cal smooth.

 

[BillinOregon]

Ted, this is the three-band rifle, correct? It is the two-bander that featured the 1:48 twist. A friend in Australia shoots his with properly sized Minié balls to 600 meters.

 

[bigted]

Bill, no both the ped and cva are two band rifles. They both have very slow twists inside. I have some ground to cover yet with the ped and finding a satisfactory accurate load/bullet in a minnie.

The older cva is just a heavy, wavy unaccurate bugger that I got on the cheap with a huge oversize bore. Gonna figure out what to do with it eventually.

 

[Britsmoothy]

Brit ... your PH ... did it come factory smoothy? Also, is it 58 smoothbore?

I have an old CVA Zouave that shoots terrible and have contemplated having it bored 20 gauge 62 cal smooth.

Yes bud, factory smooth bored.
Zoli made their zouaves in .58, 12&8g smoothbores by the way.

 

[Tobee]

I have wanted a Pedersoli 1861 musketoon for a long time, but along with their other Enfields, I’ve read many many people having lackluster performance in the accuracy department, even using bullets properly sized etc. Also there is 0 evidence the 1861 variant carbine with its adjustable ladder rear sight was ever imported or used in the U.S. Civil War. I wish they would offer one with a fixed rear sight to better approximate the ones on record being imported into the country during the war.

They look extremely neat and handy, though. Perhaps the crux of the issue is the lack of progressive depth rifling on these repros. At the end of the day these guns shouldn’t only be accurate with patched round bal, and they appear to be incredibly finicky to wring any kind of accuracy out of with Minie bullets. That’s a shame, as it’s really kept me away from them. If they happened to offer them with the correct progressive depth rifling in the future, I’d buy one in a heartbeat.

I've always wanted an enfield musketoon and so got a Pedersoli from Dixie a couple years ago. Wanted to shoot it "all day" without getting a jaw-ache. Long story, the gun wouldn't shoot Lee and Lyman mold minies as dropped. Found good (to me) accuracy when I expanded the front and rear driving bands of the Lyman wadcutter minie and then sized down to .582. Found 42-46 grains of 3F to be a fun/mild 50 yard load. Minie is a drag fit going down the bore.

I then got a Parker hale musketoon. Correct me if I'm wrong but that one does have progressive depth rifling. Only, the rifling is made using modern
machinery so maybe not correct?

I use the center pin from the Lyman wadcutter minie mold in their blue/gray minie mold to make a deeper cavity, thin walled minie. This is for the light loads I want to use in the musketoons. To center the group (move POA), I super glue a copper shim to the rear sight blade and make the appropriate notch. Guns still shoot high. Here are a couple pics. Typical groups. Tell me if I can do better. Kind of slowed down on experimenting.

 

[bigted]

Looks good Tobee. So these groups came from the Ped musketoon? Which number mold is the minnie you shot those groups with?

I need to cast some more of the Lee minnie bullets with the extreme flat wide nose. They may gain ground with experimenting with powder charges and lube.

I would like to get a minnie to work but if not ... I do know how to shoot the PRB's

 

[Tobee]

Thanks bigted. Yes, groups are from Pedersoli musketoon. Lyman # 575494. Minies were first sized to .581 then needed to size to .582. Could not shoot a group without sizing (upwards) the front driving band. My rifle is CWO2xxx and marked .577 (haha).

Your barrel mic to .577?

 

[bigted]

I figure it is at least .579. I went back to the range today and discovered a gem of a recipe.

Being unhappy with everybodys success with minies, i took my lyman .578's and Lee .578's as well as more of the 470 grain .578's.

On a crazy hunch, i tried filling the hollow base with crisco and lubed the grooves with SPG lube. MAN did this rifle come to.

For around 12 to 16 shots ... all touching at the 35 yard mark ... then flyers began ... dry patching with three clean patch's returned the accuracy and my good mood in one fell swoop.

Man am I pumped. First good accuracy with minies EVER. Who woulda thunk.

I guess filling the huge crater produces a hydraulic effect to the skirt. Gonna need to use something besides crisco though as i can see it getting runny and destroying some powder.

I just hope I can duplicate todays results.

 

[bigted]

Re read that last and just wanted to say that i read somewhere about filling the cavity. Never meant to sound like I think that I DISCOVERED it. I am a nube and following trails already plowed by others.

Thank you all for the many pearls I find here.

 

[RAEDWALD]

bigted. You say that the stock gives you an unpleasant blow. I wonder if you might want to review how you hold it? This same stock (i.e. the original) was used by literally millions of users over generations as made and as a Snider breech loader. Even still being used in Yemen in WW1 and manufactured in France, Belgium, Afghanistan (arsenal not 'khyber') and Nepal and sundry other copies, all with no change other than in the length of pull. I have used this stock often with full service charges with no issues. We are all built differently but it worked with burly Canadians and tiny Gurkhas and all shapes in between. (Apologies to tiny Canadians and large Gurkhas).

BTW are you familiar with the old 'Incredible String Band' song 'Big Ted'?

 

[TFoley]

Parker-hale - the REAL Parker-Hale, located at Golden Hillock Road, Birmingham, England - made a good few Musketoons and three-band muskets as smooth-bores, especially for the re-enactors. And yes, the UK has a sizeable WoNA following - enough to put on a very good copy of the Shiloh nastiness every now and then. See, here in UK you can have a smooth-bore gun on a shotgun certificate [SGC], providing that the barrel is 24" or longer. In fact, once you have your shotgun certificate, you could, if you wanted to, buy as many smooth-bore replicas as it takes to outfit the Army of the Potomac.

However, having one that is rifled is a whole different ballgame, as it is classed as a Section 1 [Rifled] firearm, 'zackly the same as ANY rifled, uh, rifle, or carbine. Having a couple of identical calibre firearms like this is no big deal - I have seven .22 rifles, and all of my centre-fire rifles are in two or even threes. But the point is that the process is a total RPITA from beginning to end, and ownership of a RIFLED version of a WoNA gun necessitates belonging to a club that shoots this kind of gun in the fust place - yet more expense.

So P-H took the decision to sell a number of smooth-bore guns, notably sold as wall-hangers, with the legal requirement to have a SGC if you ever wanted to actually shoot the thing.

Note also that the P-H Musketoon [I have an early one] not only had progressive depth rifling, but it was 1/48 and five-groove, too, which is why if you get one that shoots, by golly it really shoots, and out to 600 yards, too.

 

[bigted]

I must admit I do not know of your song. Interested tho.

There are not many that have my stature. My height is 6 foot 5 inch tall with long arms with a long neck. Not to say I could not learn new to me shooting positions, however there are stock dimensions that fit and a few that do not. 17.5 inch from the crook of my for arm to my trigger finger tip. 15 inch LOP is just about perfect for me.

I am eager tho to learn of your suggestion of shooting position.

 

[bigted]

Parker-hale - the REAL Parker-Hale, located at Golden Hillock Road, Birmingham, England - made a good few Musketoons and three-band muskets as smooth-bores, especially for the re-enactors. And yes, the UK has a sizeable WoNA following - enough to put on a very good copy of the Shiloh nastiness every now and then. See, here in UK you can have a smooth-bore gun on a shotgun certificate [SGC], providing that the barrel is 24" or longer. In fact, once you have your shotgun certificate, you could, if you wanted to, buy as many smooth-bore replicas as it takes to outfit the Army of the Potomac.

However, having one that is rifled is a whole different ballgame, as it is classed as a Section 1 [Rifled] firearm, 'zackly the same as ANY rifled, uh, rifle, or carbine. Having a couple of identical calibre firearms like this is no big deal - I have seven .22 rifles, and all of my centre-fire rifles are in two or even threes. But the point is that the process is a total RPITA from beginning to end, and ownership of a RIFLED version of a WoNA gun necessitates belonging to a club that shoots this kind of gun in the fust place - yet more expense.

So P-H took the decision to sell a number of smooth-bore guns, notably sold as wall-hangers, with the legal requirement to have a SGC if you ever wanted to actually shoot the thing.

Note also that the P-H Musketoon [I have an early one] not only had progressive depth rifling, but it was 1/48 and five-groove, too, which is why if you get one that shoots, by golly it really shoots, and out to 600 yards, too.

Those factory smooth bores are cool and new news to me. I have wanted to have my old bad bore CVA bored out to 62 from it's current bad 58 bore. I guess that this would not be too far off in historic basis afterall ... correct?

 

[satwel]

I am eager tho to learn of your suggestion of shooting position.

I have two Enfields, a P-H musketoon and a Euroarms Model 1858 Navy rifle. I had trouble shouldering them and aligning my eye with the sights. I couldn't figure out why Enfields were so popular. Then I read a forum post explaining that Enfields are designed differently than American rifles. The poster said Americans stand facing almost 90 degrees away from the target and we turn our heads to the left to sight whereas in England they shoot facing the target straight on. I tried standing directly towards the target with my Enfields and low and behold, the rifles fit much better and I could align the sights much easier. I still have to install a taller front sight on the 1858 two-bander, but the musketoon hits right at point of aim. I once put 10 shots into one big ragged hole at 50 yards offhand with the musketoon.

It's hard to explain but the next time you shoot your Enfield, try standing with your feet pointed directly at the target. I think you'll see they're much easier to hold.

 

[TFoley]

I must admit I do not know of your song. Interested tho.

There are not many that have my stature. My height is 6 foot 5 inch tall with long arms with a long neck. Not to say I could not learn new to me shooting positions, however there are stock dimensions that fit and a few that do not. 17.5 inch from the crook of my for arm to my trigger finger tip. 15 inch LOP is just about perfect for me.

The average Victorian-era soldier, both in the-then British Empire and in North America - just the kind of man who would have been at home with the three-band and two-band Enfield [or Springfield] rifled musket, was just five feet nine and one-half inches tall, and probably quite slim - say around 145 pounds. If you look at portrait photographs taken at around that time, you'll see what I mean.

Somebody of your size would have been a definitive bullet magnet on the battlefield.

 

[RAEDWALD]

I must admit I do not know of your song. Interested tho.

There are not many that have my stature. My height is 6 foot 5 inch tall with long arms with a long neck. Not to say I could not learn new to me shooting positions, however there are stock dimensions that fit and a few that do not. 17.5 inch from the crook of my for arm to my trigger finger tip. 15 inch LOP is just about perfect for me.
I am eager tho to learn of your suggestion of shooting position.

You must be like my son-in law at 6" 7". I took a look at my position and I see that the tip of my left foot is (towards the target) in line with the middle of the arch of my right foot.Not quite standing directly at the target but more that way. just tried the across the body US method. That does not work at all. My neck (me 6') could not bend down enough. I usually put a butt extender slip on. Not to soften the recoil (which I find no problem) but to extend the length of pull. I suspect that you need that extra length of pull and some change in the stance. FWIW I use a MAS49 slip on which was made for the French army as their length adjuster instead of making different length buts. Period soldiers were tiny folk compared to these days and the British Government went over to shorter butts for their later Enfield muzzle loaders/Sniders at (IIRC) 13" instead of 14" but LAC kept theirs at 14". Perhaps Pedersoli copied the shorter ones? Either way I think you would benefit from extra length.

Big Ted lyrics:
Big Ted's dead, he was a great old pig
He'd eat most anything, never wore a wig
Now he's gone like snow on the water, goodbye
He was getting old so the farmer said
"Sold him to the butcher just to make a little bread"
He's gone like snow on the water, don't cry
Ted may be a moo cow next time round
Giving sweet milk to the people in the town
He'll be whatever, he will choose on air or sea or ground
The sows are busy with the piglets fine
I'd put them in the forest now if they were mine
'Cause I know they like acorns and I don't like bacon
Boochy, boochy, boochy, boochy, boochy, boochy, boochy
Boochy, boochy, boochy, boochy, boochy, boochy, boochy
Squidly, squidly, squidly, squidly, squidly, squidly, squidly
Boochy, boochy,…

Put 'Incredible String Band - Big Ted - 1969 45rpm' into youtube to hear it.

 

[bigted]

Well I guess I have some experimenting to do stance wise next time out shooting. Thanks for the instruction.

Why yes I would have been a "bullet magnet". Specially now at 62 where my bones and joints are having a tougher time getting into positions ... well not so much getting into them ... but returning from them.

Stance wise, I do suspect that the American stance ( quartering away from the target ) provides an enemy with less of a target. Not especially useful during the CW as battles were fought in the Napoleonic system of lining up and exchanging bullets ( such a moronic way to do battle). I suspect our quartering away stems from our success in gorilla warfare we adopted during our war of independence. Or somewhere along those lines where being in hiding and doing surprise attacks worked so well. Something we must have forgotten along the way as when in the jungles we got our behinds handed to us by this exact system.

At any rate I intend trying this "British" stance to see if I can improve my comfort in shooting such straight combed weapons.