slow twist with conicals

[silent sniper]

hello everyone I have some questions. I've been looking at getting a pecatonia river of track of the wolf 54 cal lancaster or bedford county flintlock. it will have a 1-70 twist green mountain 54 cal barrel. I want to be able to shoot PRB and conicals. Is there any way this is possiable ? I know that conicals need a fast twist but are there any conicals that would get acceptable hunting groups ? thanks sniper

 

[reddog]

Stick with your round ball, it will kill anything it hits! You will also have a LOT better chance of actually hitting something!

 

[roundball]

"...it will have a 1-70 twist green mountain 54 cal barrel. I want to be able to shoot PRB and conicals. Is there any way this is possiable?..."

I have no personal experience with this but I have seen a few posts where folks have claimed good accuracy in a slow twist using "ballets"...they are a little heavier than the caliber size RB if extra weight is what you're after...I think Hornady and Buffalo make some.

But just my opinion, I always thought they were a solution in search of a problem...a well placed round ball will get it done by itself

 

[Birddog6]

IMHO, you better go someplace & shoulder the Bedford & the Lancaster before ya choose, as the difference in shouldering them is like comparing an apple to a grapefruit. Both shoot the same thing but the comfort & feel of the two is ALLOT different........

:hmm:

 

[paulvallandigham]

If you will do any kind of comparison penetration testing with a .54 cal. round ball, you will find that it can kill just about anything that walks on this continent. There is NO NEED FOR A CONICAL in this caliber, or anything larger, unless you are hunting the Big Five in Africa. Then, you want to be using a .58 or .62 cal. rifle with conicals, rather than the smaller .54.

A .54 Round ball weighs between 225 and 230 grains. An Ounce of lead weighs 437.5 grains. You do the math. That .54 RB is a heavy piece of lead to be throwing at anything. If you actually are planning to hunt Black Bear, or Brown bear, then use a harder alloy lead in casting the balls, and you will get greater penetration yet!

That slow rate of twist will give you a very accurate rifle- at least as accurate as you can hold and shoot iron sights out to 100-135 yards. With between 80 and 120 grains of powder, you are going to have power at both ends of the gun enough to take any game, and few unwary shooters, too!

Why would you bother to be looking to shoot conicals when they are just not needed??? You sound like you are new to Black Powder guns, and you have been listening to too much of the nonsense espoused by certain folks with a commercial agenda to promote non-traditional guns, and substitute powders. Consider the sources of those criticism. Do your own tests. Make up your own mind. If you read the hunting topic on this forum over the next few months, you will find lots of large game taken with one shot from a .54 cal. rifle shooting pure lead round balls. Any claims you might have read about such projectiles bein ineffective, or incapable of killing game would greatly surprise thousands of Mountain men, and Long Hunters in our Country's history. :surrender: :thumbsup: :hatsoff:

 

[windwalker_au]

hello everyone I have some questions. I've been looking at getting a pecatonia river of track of the wolf 54 cal lancaster or bedford county flintlock. it will have a 1-70 twist green mountain 54 cal barrel. I want to be able to shoot PRB and conicals. Is there any way this is possiable ? I know that conicals need a fast twist but are there any conicals that would get acceptable hunting groups ? thanks sniper

the lee 300 grn real bullet will shoot in that twist with a felt wad under it.
bernie :thumbsup:

 

[cowpoke1955]

I've tried the 300 grain Lee REAL in my .54 GPR and never could get it to group. Have to agree with nost. With a .54 caliber ball, what more do you need?

 

[BrownBear]

I got "okay" accuracy from the 300 grain Lee REAL from my slow twist 54 cal Lyman. That is, it would group 3-4" at best at 50 yards. But at 100 yards the same load wouldn't stay on the target paper. It appeared that as velocity dropped off, the bullets really started to wander. My best load was 90 grains of 2f or Pyro RS with a lubed felt wad under the bullet. You could probably improve grouping at longer ranges if you really ran up the velocity, but at the expense of higher pressures and way more recoil. I finally gave up on it.

 

[rebel727]

If you want to shoot round balls and conicals get a 1:48 twist.

 

[Bob Gular]

I have used paper patched Lee minies with success in a Green Mountain 50 caliber. Without the paper they were all over the target, with the paper they they were inside of three inches. OTOH the 530 roundball has a fifty grain advantage over the 490, and unless you are taking long shots where a lot of downrange energy is required, will be "enough gun" for the job at hand.
Just a couple sparks from ths side of the fire.

 

[PreglerD]

Hello from Germany,

Try to use some maxiballs. I think they will work. Used them in my .45 GPR with the 1 in 60'' twist.But meanwhile I have a .50 Deerhunter and i only use PRB.

Regards

Kirrmeister

 

[tg]

I will deviate a bit from the content of the thread and ask you to take a close look at why you are getting into ML hunting/shooting, write down a list of reasons that you are attracted to the hobby, then see if modern accesories really fit into your overall goal or if you are steering toward the traditional ways, that will pretty much answer the question about the use of the conicals available today,and try to be honest about the comparison of todays connicals and those of the post 1840/late ML period. good luck and enjoy the journey, it will become as much or as little as you make it.

 

[Zonie]

With the 1:70 twist Green Mountain barrel you mentioned IMO it should stabilize a bullet if the bullet is short.
Now, that assumes that it will fully grab the rifling so it can develop the spin it needs to stabilize it.

The real problem as I see it is that in order to seal the bore when it is fired it must obturate or increase its diameter enough to seal the rifling grooves.
There is the problem.
If the barrel was designed to shoot bullets it would have fairly shallow rifling grooves.
The barrel you mentioned however has grooves that were designed for shooting a patched roundball.
These grooves are 10 to 12 thousandths deep unlike the 3-7 thousandths deep grooves designed for use with lead slugs.

That extra depth works very well for grabbing the cloth patch when shooting a patched roundball but they are so deep I seriously doubt that a naked bullet would ever seal well if it was shot in that barrel.

If the bullet doesn't seal, the hot gas from the powder will melt the lead and cause leading in the bore. Melted lead also does not grab rifling very well so the bullet will not spin like it should.

If you select that barrel, stick to the patched roundballs it was designed to use. :thumbsup:

 

[nw_hunter]

I think one things that makes this sport so much fun, is trying different loads, and projectiles in our muzzleloaders.

I tried shooting a 50 cal lyman shocker bullet in my 54 cal Hawken with a cloth patch, and was amazed at the groups I got at 50 yds.

You could try hollow based conicals to get that bullet to seal going down the tube.

If all fails! That's a good excuse to order a GM fast twist barrel.

 

[BrownBear]

I think one things that makes this sport so much fun, is trying different loads, and projectiles in our muzzleloaders.

I tried shooting a 50 cal lyman shocker bullet in my 54 cal Hawken with a cloth patch, and was amazed at the groups I got at 50 yds.

You could try hollow based conicals to get that bullet to seal going down the tube.

If all fails! That's a good excuse to order a GM fast twist barrel.

Absolutely! This is all about having fun. And experimenting is great fun.

 

[juancho]

That same question went thru my head too.That was when I only had a.45 with a 1:48 twist.My tests with that gun showed that is absolutly doable.Groups at 100 yds were 1.5 to 2 in with PRB or 285 grains bullets form winchester(cannot remember name or model, they came in 20 packs)
When I laid my hands on a .54 I realized how big those RB are and felt no need for anything else.

 

[pathfndr]

I shoot 370 gr maxi balls made from wheelweight in my 50 cal underhammer. 1 in 66 twist. It will link them at 50 yds. I do use wonder wads. It likes 90 grains of Pyrodex P for the maxi's. So yes a slow twist will shoot conicals.