Remington Balls

[Gote Rider]

A friend gave me some remington premier golden lead round balls for my 50.cal. They are .490 I would like to know if any of you used these on deer and how did they perform. I have been muzzle loading hunting over 20yrs and never hunted with a round ball. I have killed tons of deer with the maxi-balls but I want to try the these round balls to see how they will do. What do you think about them?

 

[44-henry]

I have seen the Remington brand round balls before, but never shot any of them. Without knowing any better, I have to think it is a marketing ploy more than anything else. Really it is tough to improve on a basic pure lead roundball for hunting deer size game. If you keep your shots in the hundred yard mark the roundball really is about all you could ask for in performance.

 

[roundball]

Lead round balls have been killing deer for a few centuries and are extremely effective;

And Remington's are fine...they simply offers theirs with a copper wash over them...I think a marketing gimmick intended to reduce a comsumer's direct contact with lead, etc.

 

[BrownBear]

My hunting pard just shot a bunch at our last range session. The ones he has are brass colored rather than copper. He shot them alongside Hornady swaged, then intermixed them. Good shooting going on, but you couldn't tell the Remington or Hornady targets apart side by side, much less when he was mixing the two.

Later on when we were recovering our balls from our R2B2's, the only way you could tell them apart was a bit of the brass color showing on the back of the balls. If the color was gone there was no other way to tell them apart.

 

[thewho66]

Ive been shooting them at my club matchs for about 3 years and they work great for target shooting. As for deer I would agree that they would work like any other lead round ball. Im on my last batch now as I got them real cheap a wally world on clearance.

 

[Gote Rider]

I forgot to add that I also got some lubed patches with the balls.I have read where some people use different thickness patches with round balls. I do not know what the thickness is of the ones I have? The guns I will be trying the balls in has a 1 in 32 and 1 in 48 twist. Which one of these would the balls shoot the best out of?

 

[paulvallandigham]

Both barrels have a fast twist for a .50 caliber gun, and are therefore intended to shoot conicals. They will shoot PRB, but may be " fussy " about the amount of powder used.

As to patch thickness, we can't guess. Neither can you. Patch thickness of a correct size is necessary for best accuracy with all RBs. You are going to have to use a micrometer, or caliper to measure the lead balls( don't trust someone saying they are .490"), the bore and groove diameters of your barrel, and then the thickness of the patches. Lube is also important. Different lubes can change group sizes in different barrels.

Part of the fun of this sport is discovering what works in a particular gun. We can give you guidance when you tell us dimension in thousandths( .001") of an inch, but you ( and we) need that critical information about the barrel and your balls and patches to help narrow down the choices for you to try. Dial Calipers can be bought on line for about $20.00. If you already own a micrometer, you can get old fashioned INSIDE calipers at your hardware store for less than $10.00. You take the measurement of these calipers with your micrometer. A micrometer, new, is going to cost you at least $60.00, and the better ones will cost twice that amount. You want a micrometer with the click adjustment for .0001". You don't need a digital micrometer- just another place to store dead batteries!, IMHO. Check the suppliers here for calipers and micrometers. Then do a little comparison price shopping locally."A Rose is a Rose, is a Rose..." The bard says, and that applies to calipers, too. :thumbsup:

 

[roundball]

"...the ones he has are brass colored rather than copper..."

Yes, brass colored, not copper colored :wink: .

Here's a ballistics chart supplied by Remington if it's of any interest to any one:
http://www.sportsmansguide.com/resource/remington_charts/bpballistics.HTM

 

[roundball]

I forgot to add that I also got some lubed patches with the balls.I have read where some people use different thickness patches with round balls. I do not know what the thickness is of the ones I have? The guns I will be trying the balls in has a 1 in 32 and 1 in 48 twist. Which one of these would the balls shoot the best out of?

I've never shot them out of a 1:32 twist, but PRBs out of a 1:48" twist are excellent. It seems to me that all calibers have a pretty nominal bore measurement and as a starting point/baseline, in the .50cal for example, my experience is that a .490" ball and .015" patch seems to always work and give good accuracy. And I later learned that a tighter PRB combo with a .018" pillow ticking patch tightened group sizes slightly more.

One comment about the Remington gold colored balls...I stumbled across a half price close out sale of a couple dozen boxes of Remington .570" balls and bought them all for my .58cal. When I took a box to the range, I had to use a piece of 2x4 laying around to start them...when I got home I mic'ed them and found their diameters all measured in the .575"-.577" range although the boxes were all labeled .570"...don't know if it was just a one time manufacturing / packaging slip up or if Remington golden balls might run larger than marked, so if you can, you might want to sample check the diameters of the .490's you're getting ready to use...if they're a little oversize, then maybe an .018" patch would be too tight.

 

[BrownBear]

My pard was using the red pillow ticking rather than the blue. My impression is that it felt thinner than the blue, but I have never measured it. He was getting a few failed patches in spite of great accuracy, so the discussion was aiming toward thicker patches. If there was a size difference between the Hornady and Remington, he didn't remark on any difference in seating effort. Looked pretty standard from where I was standing.

I have shot a fair number of RBs through faster twists- not extensively, but enough to form impressions. You'll have difficulty distinguishing between fast and slow at or below 50-60 grain loads, out to 50 yards at least- as far as I've shot them. Above that there's a slight loss of accuracy, but we're talking 2-3" groups compared to 1-2" groups. Certainly no difference in terms of deer accuracy, but if you shoot deer further than that, I'd sure be testing hot loads at your hunting distances.

 

[david50]

first deer i ever killed with my old .50 GPR was loaded with a Remington gold ball in front of 75gr's of ffg, worked like a charm, dropped right were he stood at 75yds.

 

[Blizzard of '93]

never tryed the Rems but they can't be much if any advantage over pure lead RB's. out of my .50 1-48 twist with PRB more than about 70gr 3F groups begin to open up.