Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Muzzleloaders Problems with T/C Hawken

Bought this gun used winter 07. During the spring and summer I had shot the rifle on several different occasions. Found real Quick that it would not shoot the patched round ball, after trying several different combos found that the patch would blow to small bits even with 50gr 777. Tried 90gr 777 and 50 Maxie ball shot great but very painfull to shoot unless padded between brass butt plate and sholder. Next tried 320gr Lee Real Bullets same great all touching groups @ 25yds. and less painfull . I cast a bunch of the 320 gr and didn't shoot any more till sight in during doe season. At first started a cloverleaf group @ 25yds, then one missed the box??? Just a flawed bullet thunk I, then another missed ON THE OTHER SIDE OF BOX??? this is about a 20 in. X 24in. box and sand bag rest!!!! After quite a bit more shooting found that now and then one would go in or very near the group, most though missed that big box high, low, left and right. Some of my buddys watching the procedings allowed that they would have allready wrapped the gun around a tree. I'm too stubborn to give up that easy though and I tried every 50 cal bullet anyone had on hand, Maxie Hunter, PA conical, Power Belts; all with simmalar results. I get to thinking, ( I know thats dangerous) what could have changed from my summer shooting results, and the results now maby cold barrel instead of a warm one? I now became a deer driver for the m/l season Later on I bought a bore light and sliding it down the barrel inch or so at a time had a good look at the rifeling, it looked pretty good to me eccept it seemed to be worn right at the crown. I know this can affect accuracy if bad enough??? Maybe if bullet is started every so slightly cockeyed the muzzel blast would cause an extreme flier??? Just me thinking out loud. Cain M/L in P-burg tells me they can cut and recrown the barrel for about $50.00. Next time I'm down there will let them look the barrel over and see what they think. I remember being told by somebody that the crown can be slowly worn away by the ramrod. Any body have any thoughts. In other words HELP.

Have you thoroughly cleaned it? ....maybe leaded up

Yes, very thorouhly. Made no difference.

Might try a thicker patch and a smaller ball. Also might try using real black powder. Most of our Modern BP substitutes are designed to ignight at higher tempuratures which inline rifles privide. This results in delayed ignitions in traditional style guns when using BP substitute. This means more time between when the trigger is pulled and when the bullet leaves the barrel making for more time for the sights to be pulled off target. Real BP will get you much faster and more consistent ignition times.

Also TC's have a 1-48 twist which is a hybrid twist designed to shoot both round balls and Conicals. But the conicals that it will handle best are short for caliber conicals. The Maxi hunter is one of those bullets designed for this kind of rifle. You might try some others. The Power Belts are designed for much faster twist rifles and it should be no suprise if they do not shoot well.

I'm no expert but these are just my suggestions. You can find a lot of great information from some real BP pros at www.muzzleloadingforum.com

I bought a T/C Hawken in 19 and 72. I shoot ONLY 2f black powder and the (I believe) 325 grain Maxi-ball that I cast from pure lead. (I use old water pipe, ot chimney flashing). I have killed more deer with that rifle than I have with any other rifle I own. I do not believe in using these modernistic powders in place of black powder. I believe there in lies your problem. The "kick" from my rifle has never bothered me as long as I pull the rifle tightly into my shoulder. I have also won several black powder shooting matches with the rifle. I clean it using BOILOING hot soapy water. The soap I use is Ivory bar soap shaved slices into the water. I rinse with clean boiling water and stand the barrel muzzle down till it dries. I use bore butter inside and out when the barrel is dry. Unless your barrel is totally rusted, I don't see why your results can't be similar.

Couple things
1) the 1 in 48 isn�t a hybrid in fact its been used by many old makers for a very long time .
Now its true that it�s a middle ground and not the most desirable for either patched round ball or conical . But if you work on you load you will find the sweet spot for both. The 1 in 48 will shoot bot PRB and conical acceptable l
T7 is also hotter then pyro which is also hotter then good BP
Reduce it for even at 90 grains your shooting the equivalent of over 100 grains of black .
2) you say your patches are burning up .
This is caused by
A) to thin of a patch . If it loads real easy but your patches are burnt up the you need a ticker patch and probably better lube.
B) sharp spots in your rifling that�s cutting the patch letting gas through and burning your patch
C) to thick of a patch ball combo . If your having a hard time loading you can be chewing up the patches just in loading ..

IMO your patch should be at least .015 . infact .018 is better . what are you using for a Lube.
if as you say the patches are burning up at 50 grains then most likly your patches are to thin or your distroying them on loading

As far as your conicals moving all over the board , are you cleaning between shots or at least every few shots ?
Fouling will raise the bore pressure .
Next time you go to the range you need to start working up a load for what your shooting .
Start at 50 grains and move up in 5 to 10 grain increments .
Shot 3 or 4 round and clean the bore , shoot 3 or 4 more and clean the bore .

Lastly before I had the barrel re crowned , I would send it back to TC .
They have the best warrantee on the books , its truly life time and is NOT just for the first owner but to anyone who owns the gun .
Now I would hold it against them if the tell you to bugger off because the barrel looks like its been through a rock crusher but if its just a problem from use , they are real good about fixing it .

I had a similar problem with a TC Hawken about 10 years ago. My standard load, for many years, was 90 grains of FFFg black behind a 370 grain Maxi-ball. With a Lyman receiver sight, the rifle would shoot about 2" at 100 yards. When my groups started to open, I examined the rifle carefully. The heavy recoil of my load had actually battered the hooked breech and tang. I put a .0015 piece of steel shim between the hooked breech and tang. The groups immediately closed up. I sent the rifle to TC. It was over twenty years old. TC replaced the tang and barrel free of charge. Two weeks ago, I sent the lock in because it was eating flints. I got a brand new lock (with much better frizzen and geometry) back from TC. Again the service was free. TC and leupold have the best warranty out there. Send them the rifle with a courteous letter explaining your problem. I betcha they will fix you up free of charge.

90.0 of FFF powder with a Hornady great plains or a maxi-ball was my Hawken rifles prefered load. I would wet patch after each shot.

Doc

MMM I may have came a cross sounding like 90 grains is to much .
If that�s what shoots the round the most accurate then that�s what you should use .
As a point I shoot 110 of 3F in my Carolina rifle when shooting a 435 grain 54 cal conical .
That is my Bull Elk load and I don�t use it even for cow elk or mule deer , which I hunt with round balls for . However for round balls , that charge is reduced to 80 grains of 3 F.
using 2F can produces even a diffrent pattern.

Now I shoot a lot , and go through some 25+ lbs a year of BP . However even then I don�t reduce my loads for target practice for the main reason I want to know and be extremely confident in my hunting loads

But back to your problem
the important thing is your load combination must be able to hold that charge .
If your eating patches , then its not . you need to find the reason why . The patches will tell you that even when all wadded up and burnt . So its best if your using a patched round ball to also learn to read your patches

The other thing as I alluded to my previous post pyro is hotter then BP , T7 is hotter still . So if your using T7 the standard is to reduce the load by 15-20 grains to come down into the pressures produced by BP .
So at 90 grains your probably shooting the equivalent of 105-110 grains of BP .
Most times I find that the heavier charges just are not needed to produce the best results . In fact to much powder can even be a hindrance in that the powder isn�t able to burn completely OR it creates irregular pressures resulting in inconsistent POI .

Now something else I have ran across concerning TC rifles . I have had a couple customers that we simply could not get their rifles to shoot round balls with any consistency even with good patches being recorded . The barrels for what ever reason simply wanted to throw cork screws .

As was suggested above by Stoneybroke . we wrote a nice letter put in a couple targets with information concerning Temp , wind , altitude, powder charge with type of powder , patch thickness and ball size as well as distance to target .

In both cases the rifles came back with a new barrel �same twist by the way , 1 in 48 �
And we found the problem solved .
The other thing to keep in mind is that what shoots a given round the best in doc's rifle , my rifle or anyone else�s rifle , may not achieve the same results from your rifle .
Each rifle is a little different in what they like, even among consecutive serial numbers .

There is a lot to muzzleloading some times folks get lucky and get what they want in consistency and accuracy on the first try . But most times they to find that with some adjustment to their loads that accuracy will get better

Ditto on TC customer service. I wore a barrel out on my TC Hawkin . It got so bad,the Maxi balls would just about drop the full length of the tube. They rebarreled it for nothing. About ayear later, it started acting up again and I sent it back. The peep sight ( A TC aftermarket ) had gone south and they replaced it with an original on the barrel open sight. Last year, my mule wrapped it around a tree and cracked the stcok.I don't think they will fix that though

Another item that might help your patches is to employ a lubed overpowder wad. This operates somewhat as a gas check. It sounds like you've got a problem that needs solving first. Just a thought.

You've got a bad tube or one that's terribly fouled. Send it to TC without delay because they will rebarrel it. I sent one back once, 1976, that had a broken clean-out screw (old ones had one in the bolster); it came back factory blued even though it was originally a cold blued kit model. You should also be very selective on powders. BP substitutes are not all suitable for cap locks.