What Muzzleloading Stuff Did You Do Today?

[Jim K]

Went to the range today and practiced shooting out of my bag and offhand in preparation for a woodswalk coming up.

 

[SciAggie]

Pulled the ball and cleaned my .62 Jaeger today. Turning things over to the new .40. She’ll have to pull the load for a while. 1st world problems, eh?

 

[Tacitus]

Finished another shooting bag. Something a wee bit different this time. A belt bag instead of a shouldered bag. Bag is made of bison hide with deerskin binding and interior pocket, Irish linen stitching.

 

[rhart]

Can't hardly go wrong with a T/C Renegade... unless you paid too much. I have two of them; a .50 caliber flintlock and a .54 caplock. Both shoot quite well... better than I can actually.

Hard to tell what "too much" is now days. Watched a Hawken go for $700 on an internet sale a couple days ago and watched another one go for $425 at an online auction before that. There's a NOS flintlock TC Hawken kit that was recently reduced from $764 to $714 on another seller's site (remember all these come with 40 to 69 shipping charges and 3% to 4% credit card charges). There's a .54 Renegade with 21" barrel for $1195.95 online and a .50 and a .54 Renegade for $425 each. So I thought $300 wasn't too bad. (Internet went out so I had to finish by edit).

 

[Matt85]

Just sat down with the lead furnace and cast sixty-five 65 caliber balls to keep the musket and pistol fed.

It's moments like this that remind me why frontiersmen preferred to use the smallest caliber gun they could get away with. To make sixty-five of these round balls takes 3.7 pounds of lead!

 

[Bunk]

Tell me about it Matt. I get 14 to the pound with my percussion Sharps.
No wonder the old buffalo hunters salvaged the bullets from the carcass.
Mine is not a cheap gun to shoot, but great fun. About 15 rounds a week trying to get it zeroed in and am getting close. Three inched right windage and will be right in the middle.
stay safe
Bunk

 

[wganz]

cast about 30 pounds of Minie balls for next weekend's match.
got another 30ish pounds to go
I'll sort & count tomorrow.

 

[Gordoncourtney]

Hard to tell what "too much" is now days. Watched a Hawken go for $700 on an internet sale a couple days ago and watched another one go for $425 at an online auction before that. There's a NOS flintlock TC Hawken kit that was recently reduced from $764 to $714 on another seller's site (remember all these come with 40 to 69 shipping charges and 3% to 4% credit card charges). There's a .54 Renegade with 21" barrel for $1195.95 online and a .50 and a .54 Renegade for $425 each. So I thought $300 wasn't too bad. (Internet went out so I had to finish by edit).

Have a look at holts uk Norfolk March auction ml section Still thinking about the ml £1300 I recon .577 33” barrel 1850????

 

[Gordoncourtney]

Another one...
View attachment 199780

There a guy who paints simply like your horses in Swanage uk I copy a few fir practice simple but very effective. As I said earlier in a different phase mixing colours , wife don’t like them. But Richard Gerhard sells his at auction for £21m Better add one if wall hangers

 

[cal.43]

made a small handforged knife

 

[rhart]

Have a look at holts uk Norfolk March auction ml section Still thinking about the ml £1300 I recon .577 33” barrel 1850????

That's a nice looking old rifle!

 

[Mark E. Prickett]

I did a little rainy day artwork on my tomahawk handles, also poured some pewter on one for practice.

 

[buckleymarka56]

Yes replace the drum! It's not that hard to do. Track of the Wolf has what you need.

I took out the drum, took it to the gunsmith, had it measured, ordered 2 without holes , let the smith drill the holes.

 

[Dale Allen Raby]

T/C Hawken .45 at a water-filled gallon milk jug at 70 yards. Bullet was a .40 caliber 155 grain Hornady XTP inside a Harvester Crush-Fit .45 caliber unmentionable. Charge was a duplex load; 20 grains of Old Eynsford 3f topped off with 50 grains T7 2f. Velocity should have been about 1700 FPS. The impact point can be seen in the snow for the first attempt. With the barrel fouled, I got a much better result with the second shot... same load.

 

[Ed C.]

T/C Hawken .45 at a water-filled gallon milk jug at 70 yards. Bullet was a .40 caliber 155 grain Hornady XTP inside a Harvester Crush-Fit .45 caliber unmentionable. Charge was a duplex load; 20 grains of Old Eynsford 3f topped off with 50 grains T7 2f. Velocity should have been about 1700 FPS. The impact point can be seen in the snow for the first attempt. With the barrel fouled, I got a much better result with the second shot... same load.

Good shot! Had to laugh at your comment after the first shot...very well timed.

 

[rhart]

Cleaned out the barrel of my new (to me) TC .50 cal. Renegade with the new cleaning jag I purchased at Bass Pro Shop. I used 'Moose Milk' to begin with. At first I thought I'd done something wrong as the patches came out way cleaner than I expected so I upped the ratio of Ballistol to water and still wasn't getting dirty patches so I used straight Ballistol - still no dirty patches. Then I remembered I had some Butches Black Powder Bore Shine so I started using that and still no dirty patches! Bore looks good just looking down with a flashlight. I don't know, maybe it's just good... Getting ready to order some lead balls and conicals for it this morning.

 

[William Sublette]

Last month I got a new to me squirrel rifle that didn't work.

https://www.muzzleloadingforum.com/threads/help-with-a-36.157645/#post-2254966

There are parts of it that are well done, (butt plate) and parts that look like a first timer built it. ( the lock inlet).



I finally got a day off to go shoot it.

30gr of 3f, with a .015 patch, and a .360 ball is the best so far.


The barrel has a stamp that says:
GM100F.

I assume that means Green Mountain something.

 

[Dale Allen Raby]

Spent about fifteen minutes looking for the "rules" that some have mentioned. Supposedly they ban the discussion of "unmentionables". So far, I haven't found any rules. Anyone know where they are to be found? if I continue to post here, I don't wanna run afoul of "Da Roolz".... not even the stupid ones.

 

[Relic shooter]

Tried my original Rogers & Spencer with different loads and bullets.

Seems, 15 grain FFFFG Swiss powder (Nr. 1) , 20 grain grease and a .464 roundball are a good starting load for small groups at 25 m.
Flyers are the shooters fault.

The first shots with a clean barrel are not recorded. Seems that the barrel needs some black powder residue to shoot better.

189 20 grain 1,5 FG
190 15 grain FFFFG
191 5 20 grain the outer ones and 10 15 grain FFFFG

20 grain 1,5 FG (Nr. 4) may work too.

The .457 balls may suffice, the LEE conicals are to small as they are .452 or so.

I am running out of .464. balls as the ASP Rogers & Spencer does not need larger bullets tahn .457.

I've never tried 4F in any of my original Colt & Remington revolvers, just 3 & 2f.
The chambers & bore size on all .36 & .44 cal. are also larger than repros so require larger dia. balls/bullets.
The real accuracy game changer with original Civil War percussion revolvers is their progressive twist & deeper rifling.
Your correct in stating that revolver groups become much more consistent & tighter after the first
shot conditions the barrel.
Same is true with most original rifles & pistols I've competed & hunted with patched RB as they typically have deeper rifling.
Relic shooter

 

[Ed C.]

Took about 20 minutes to turn an old T shirt into about 150 cleaning patches.