RB's, conical, or sabot?

[Mailman]

I have 2 Traditions, 1 buckskinner 50 cal with 1:20 twist and 1 deerhunter 50 cal with 1:48 twist. What works best in each of these?

 

[playfarmers]

My wife has the Deerhunter and uses 70g of 2f and a .490 round ball. The rifle also shot the Lee REAL bullets, and the Buffalo Bal-ets well. As for the fast twist, I would try some conicals first, because I will never use plastic in my rifle. Good luck.

 

[brain]

the 1:20 is pretty much intended for sabots.
the 1:48 can do rbs nicely, though will do conicals better.

 

[Runner]

495's over 70 grains of 3f wrapped in a commercial pre-lubed .015 patch. My flintlock Deerhunter shoots better than I can hold it loaded that way. I tend to use fairly tight loads in most of my guns. You definately need a starter with that one. The 385 Hornady Great Plains bullet should work well also if you want a conical that is easy to find most places.

 

[captaincaveman]

my 1:48 T/C Hawken likes 90gr 3f, .490 ball and a pre-lubed T/C pillow ticking patch. I haven't tried conicals in it but Dads .54 Renegade with 1:48 twist shoots maxi-balls and Hornady Great Plains bullets great. I don't know about sabots. Them things are sacreligious :nono:

Josh

 

[MikeFromON]

I tried PRBs in my .50 cal, 1:28" twist Mountain Rifle the other day and they shot suprisingly well, grouping much better than the Hornady PA Conicals I was shooting earlier. I started with chrages of 60 grains FFg then backed it off to 40 grains and there was almost no change in grouping. The PA Conicals are not much longer than a round ball but they do weigh 35% more. It occurs to me that in fast-twist barrels, the ratio of length to weight of a projectile is more important than either property on its own (i.e. if you are shooting heavy bullets, they should be substantially longer than lighter ones). PRBs work well because they are near-perfectly balanced objects, being spheres. That is why they don't need a lot of spin to stabilize them. The PA Conicals are very nose-heavy I think, because of their hollow base, semi-circular nose and short length. A proper conical (like a Maxi-ball or Minie) would be more stable when spun up fast because they are much longer and have a more tapered nose, so their mass is more evenly distributed along thier length. I will be trying some Minie balls and other longer, heavier conicals when I get my hands on some molds as that is why I bought a rifle with such a fast twist in the first place. One day I would love to make a mold that casts either very modern-looking Spitzer-type bullets or at least something with a proper ogive-shaped nose. Something with a boat-tail is not out of the question either.

 

[Sharp Shooter]

Try Maxiballs with the 1-20. It will shoot long conicals. For the 1-48 conicals or roundball. I would use roundballs.

 

[Mad Professor]

I don't think a bore size spitzer bullet would work well, I think there would be issues with proper sealing. That's why they make those &%$#tic things to house the CF type bullets .

If you could find a way to load a jacketed spitzer that might be interesting?

see:http://www.lrml.org/technical/ammunition/ammunition.htm

 

[MikeFromON]

Basically, I was thinking about a Minie ball with a much pointier ogive tip. I am surprised nobody is making something like this as the muzzle-loading world seems to have a great population of handcrafters and amateur machinists. I figured a boat-tail could be managed by putting over-bore grease grooves (like the REAL) or a lubricated paper collar halfway up the bullet's length, or perhaps just winding a regular paper patch around it somewhere.

 

[MikeFromON]

"Some have experienced difficulty in getting the sharp-or pointed-nose bullets to perform satisfactorily, especially in barrels with a rifling pitch slower than one turn in twenty inches."

A quote from[url] lrml.org[/url] .

 

[paulvallandigham]

Mike: Research done back in the 19th century showed that the Round nose bullet shape is the most accurate for the velocities that can be obtained by using Black Powder.

In fact, the nose of the .22 long rifle rimfire cartridge is the most accurate shape for lead projectiles.

That is probably the reason that all attempts to make a conical with a pointed nose have been dropped because there was not real improvement in accuracy. Certainly, a pointed lead bullet is not going to give you higher velocities, or retained velocities.

If you look at the military rounds adopted in the early 1890s, when smokeless powder was first introduced, all those bullets are round nosed. They had lead cores, and steel, then copper jackets. Most of the 6.5 mm cartridges were among the first to use smokeless powder. The Italian Carcano 6.5 mm round was the first military round to use the new powder. Velocities were at the then unheard of 2400 fps range, considerably flatter shooting than any of the lead projectiles in use before then in military rifles.

 

[Runner]

There is considerable experimenting in conicals going on, but most is directed at the 45 caliber. Instead of tip shape, longer bullets designed to self center while being loaded are used. They pick up the BC using length.

 

[MikeFromON]

I just finished doing a bit of reading on the subject of bullet shape and one source mentioned that tip shape has little effect unless your bullet goes supersonic, simply because the shock wave that makes such a tip necessary do not occur otherwise. The same source claims that at common black powder velocities, a boat-tail makes a world of difference as those aerodynamic effects (namely a vacuum forming behind the bullet in flight) occur at any velocity.

 

[paulvallandigham]

Runner: This has all been done, and tried several times over the years. The .45 boys would best pay attention the .45-70 BPR cartirdge fellows, and to the workings of Paul Matthews, who is considered the most knowledgeable source on that cartridge living today. Even the research buried long in the archives of the U.S. Army testing centers have been dug up and gone over to glean some lessons about choosing the correct bullet, length, weight, shape, etc.

Mr. Matthews writes in the Single Shot Exchange, as well as has a couple of books still in print on that cartridge. You can save a lot of time and frustration reading all the research others have done since 1873. The BPC guys are shooting round nose, 535 gr. bullets for long range shooting with their .45-70s, and .45-90s. A long match is pretty brutal with those loads, and that is why so many are playing around now with the .40 caliber cartridges, as you get better BC, in a lighter weight bullet, that shoots flatter, and may be blown less far by the winds. The recoil saved is also worth the effort, and the .40-65, and the .40-70 bottle neck cartridges are getting new life. I even saw where someone is shooting a sharpes with a .40-82 cartridge to make it an " express gun ". But, pointed bullets are not going to do it. The round nose bullets are the way to go for accuracy at long range.

Now, if someone goes down to the .38 caliber BP cartridges, and makes a really long bullet with a pointed nose, they might get it going fast enough to make used of that design. Wind drift has always been the killer on the smaller caliber bullets.

 

[MikeFromON]

According to the Greenhill formula, the 1:20 twist will stabilize a .50 cal bullet up to 1.875" long and the 1:48 twist will stabilize a .50 cal bullet up to 0.78125" long. My own .50 cal 1:28 twist will stabilize a bullet 1.34" long.

 

[Runner]

Actually, before the idiots destroyed it, the guys on HuntAmerica were posting really good results in the 450 to 550 range. Now I am not sure where to even find them anymore.

Many experiments have been run over the years. Even in pellets, the round nose design is the top accuracy pellet for long range. At close range, the wadcutters have a very slight edge. Add in any wind and roundnose pellets take over again. In my current slug gun, I shoot a target wadcutter because I am not going to shoot it past 125 or so at game anyway.
Most of the improvements in muzzleloading bullets these days are not in tip shape. They are in self centering driving bands that actually work like the REAL is supposd to, driving bands that actually scrape the fouling from shot to shot, and now in soft copper gas checks.
None of that changes the basic equation when it comes to muzzleloading hunting bullets. Designs have been in use for a century that will shoot better than any of us can hold off hand. The longer for better BC equation has not changed. The newer movement back to smaller bore guns doesn't change anything but the pounding you recieve from shooting long for caliber bullets.
Years back a gun writer made up a target box 10 foot deep. He drilled holes and used dowels to simulate brush. The idea at the time was the big slow bullets went thru small brush with less deflection than smaller fast bullets. His testing conclusively proved that the smaller bullets hit less of the brush and ended up on target more often than the big bullets do. The myth of the brush gun continues anyway.
Guys will continue to attempt to find the new magic bullet for muzzleloading also. The fact that is was all pretty much worked out years back doesn't even slow them down. Someone is always going to be trying to turn an open sighted traditional muzzleloader into a 300 yard death ray!

 

[arcticap]

These shoot very accurately out of our Deerhunter at 50 yards:

[url] http://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/fusionbb/showtopic.php?tid/200540/post/341262/hl[/url]//

 

[Mailman]

I had to slap myself for being stupid. I have a Buckskinner with a 21" barrel with a i:20 twist The other is a Whitetail [not deerhunter] with a 24" barrel with a 1:48 twist :surrender: Sorry if I wasted anyones time.