Who’s coned their smooth bore?

[Kansas Kid]

Probably never going to do any of my rifles but been thinking of doing a .62 Smooth bore. Who’s done it and what are your thoughts?

 

[Runewolf1973]

Probably never going to do any of my rifles but been thinking of doing a .62 Smooth bore. Who’s done it and what are your thoughts?

I don't see why anyone would want so tight of a ball/patch combo on a smoothbore to begin with that this would even be a consideration. I guess some guys like em tight?

 

[Coot]

The barrel on my fowling piece is pretty thin at the muzzle and as a smooth bore, there is no rifling to engage. I see no reason to cone it and the thin-ness is a reason not to.

 

[Kansas Kid]

Well the barrel is pretty thick on the one I’m thinking of doing. And tight is right.

 

[Bob McBride]

Never thought about it. Might help. I crown them pretty good if they're square....

 

[ADK Bigfoot]

In my experience, there is no need to cone a smoothbore if loading is too tight, drop down a ball size; .612 to .600, .600 to .590/595. or adjust patch thickness. Or use wads and unpatched balls. lots of options to try before permanently altering the gun .

Ask Bigfoot

 

[Kansas Kid]

There’s always other things besides ball and patch.

 

[tenngun]

I found premade commercial wads often very tiny and hard to load. Tighter then I load a patched ball in any gun. I don’t know how long it’s been since I’ve used them. I would try playing with the load before playing with the barrel

 

[Alexander Efremenko]

I used to do it a bit, it just made loading a patched easier. I still have one that's coned. It always shot well, and I can stuff any ball and patch combo if need be.
Anymore, if I can't start it with my thumb, it's too tight. Smootbores are very forgiving.

 

[Brokennock]

Well the barrel is pretty thick on the one I’m thinking of doing. And tight is right.

Not always. When developing loads for my 20 gauge, .615 bore, smooth rifle a .600 ball with .010 patch didn't shoot as well as in my other 20 gauge, thicker patch didn't shoot any better and was near impossible to load after the 1st or second shot. A .595 ball shot okay but not great with a 0.18 patch, not good enough. Oddly, the loosest load I tried, a .595 ball with .010 patch, shot best. With looser shooting better I tried a powder/thin card/lubed wad/.600 ball/thin card load, success. On a whim I tried the same load with a .610 ball, best groups off a bench I'd seen, and back up to standards.

Point is, why go to the trouble of coning your smoothbore and possibly ruining your shot patterns, when developing a looser, but as accurate load is possible and more fun?

 

[Mark Herman]

Have to agree with most of the comments, especially Coot's.

 

[No Deer]

It is your gun, do what pleases you. My friend cones his smoothbores, thick and thin barrels, just because he wants to and has the tool to do it. He kind of chuckles when talking about it, because most people look at him in disbelief. It makes NO difference in HIS shot pattern or POI with roundball, and makes loading very easy regardless of ball/patch or shot/wad combo.

 

[Rich]

Look at the unmentionable guns. Ever seen a coned shotgun? No. Ever seen a coned rifle? Yes. No need to cone a smoothbore. If your having to hammer in a ball/patch, adjust them. Smoothbores are easy to load with a good combo of patch/ball.

 

[Kansas Kid]

Look at the unmentionable guns. Ever seen a coned shotgun? No. Ever seen a coned rifle? Yes. No need to cone a smoothbore. If your having to hammer in a ball/patch, adjust them. Smoothbores are easy to load with a good combo of patch/ball.

They don’t load from the front. Coned rifle is just another way of saying cleaning/loading rod wear.


So far we have only a couple of people with actual first hand experience.

 

[Artificer]

Look at the unmentionable guns. Ever seen a coned shotgun? No. Ever seen a coned rifle? Yes. No need to cone a smoothbore. If your having to hammer in a ball/patch, adjust them. Smoothbores are easy to load with a good combo of patch/ball.

Actually, unmentionable rifles are not coned. If they were coned like ML rifles, there is no doubt they lose accuracy.

Unmentionable and ML rifles ARE carefully crowned both on the face of the muzzle and the "bore" or the end of the rifling, but that is not "coning" as done on ML guns. Most Bore Crowning on either type of gun only goes a very little way into the bore, while coning goes pretty deep.

Gus

 

[hanshi]

I like and shoot pretty tight loads in my rifles and have to use a short starter. But in my smoothbore I do not want a prb that has to be started with a ss. I prefer to be able to thumb press into the muzzle and then go straight to the ramrod. Best results are with a .600" ball and .012" patch.

 

[Kansas Kid]

I use .595 in my .62’s and .015 patches. Would like to use .018 or .020 patch to carry a little more lube.

 

[SDSmlf]

You can change the angle on the face of the muzzle of muzzleloading shotgun with a file and walk the pattern around. Doubt you could do it that easily with a coned bore, though I have not attempted it (coned bore on a smooth bore).

As I understand coning a rifled barrel, you do not remove metal to the point of eliminating the rifling. There would be some left to still grip the patch as the patch and ball exit the bore. Wonder if coning a smoothbore would basically create something of a blunderbuss effect.? I’ve got one in 56 caliber that won’t put two consecutive patched balls within 5-6” of each other a 25 yards, but it is fun to shoot.

My gun, I would try real hard to find a patch and ball combo that I could thumb start and was accurate without coning. But that just my opinion.

 

[jbwilliams3]

I had a 28 gauge Carolina gun that was coned. The maker coned it, not me so I have no idea how it shot before. I can say confidently that it shot well enough that I doubt it shot any better before it was coned. I shot mostly bare balls out of it and it was a minute of deer gun 100% of the time off hand at 40 yards. If I wanted better than that, I'll shoot my rifle.

 

[Kansas Kid]

I’m still kicking it around. If I decide to do it I’ll make my own tool.