Home Forums Hunting & Shooting BPCR Puzzling about twists and alloys

Heard mention of stripping here and there, assumed it had something to do with alloy/twist/pressure equation... Then reading about slug guns(front stuffer long range target rail gun black powder things...I think). Anyhoo, they seem to be doing okay with their version of the Hindenbergs over black as far as the strippage thing goes...bouncing around in my head, too many unframed questions and no answers. Especially since they seem to be using shallow groove bores, or so I've been told. What kind of magic is this?

Y'all have any thoughts on the subject? Or knowledge?

HA! Lookie what I found....

http://www.muzzleblasts.com/vol4no2/articles/mbo42-4.html

This is a fascinating read...at least to me anyhoo.

Interesting read Dan...
I just shot a ML match yesterday (first one in about 8-10 months). Boy, you forget about how much FOOLING AROUND you have to go through shooting those things compared with BPCR and the cleaning is more of a pain! Targets at 150 yds. offhand that would be easy for a BPCR, become pretty tough with a patched round ball! ML pistol accuracy always amazes me though.
So Dan, did you ever figure out if you are going to come West to se the elephant? The Quigley, that is? ......Dennis

Dennis, I'm still wranglin' with Mrs. Dan, but looking to late spring -07 at the moment. Thinking it might not be insufferably hot in the desert then, and heading north after doing the NM/AZ tour...working north-ish after that part...CO, WY, MT, ID etc. Mebbe May-July for the whole shebang. No pun intended. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

On the subject...that fella covered a fair % of my questions in that article. Yeah, they are trouble I guess, but they don't waste time cleaning brass. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> Surprised at how shallow the grooves are on the subject gun, and how they finagle bullet size and shape to achieve their ends. The compression thing too, that wasn't something I'd considered significant in MLs...dunno why. Friend of mine started yakking about rock lock slug rifles the other day, sent that link to me. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" /> Well, at least he's kept the story about the match lock version to himself. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/tongue.gif" alt="" />

I don't know about that particular article. I don't have time right now to give it a fair read, but a number of muzzleloading folks, myself included, use .45-18" twist Badger barrels to make slug guns. Mine is on an underhammer and works very well with the same bullets and wads that I use in my cartridge rifles. I highly recommend them for deer hunting or whatever.

I use paper patches and pure lead or very soft alloy in mine.

Pedersoli's Gibbs rifle is another side hammer rifle with a similar barrel. It has an excellent reputation out to 1000 yds.

Brent

Brent, when you have the time I would appreciate your take on the article, and whether or not your experience mirrors that of the author. His words make a lot of sense to me....wishing he'd been a bit more effusive with discussion on the two alloy bullets.

Dan,
It is an interesting and well composed article. It aligns well with what I know about such guns, but these are 25-30# rifles that are made to shoot bench rest matches at 300-500 yds using 30x scopes. I have watched Ed Stutz shoot this sort of match. He would be one of the 10 people that the author refers to. I believe Ed was a national champ at one time.

Anyway, the .0035" groove depth is about what my Badger barrel measures on my muzzleloader. The stuff about 2 alloy bullets has been discussed for cartridge guns but has not been tried to the best of my knowledge. These bullets use a pure lead base (to obdurate fully) and a hard alloy nose (to avoid slumping).

Remembering that I have never shot one of these bench slug guns, I would say that they are easier to dial in to the same degree of accuracy than a cartridge rifle because they have fewer variables to mess with (brass, crimping, seating depth etc.) than cartridge rifles. But they are capable of fantastic accuracy, so much of the fooling is for a level of accuracy that we do not typically achieve with cartridge rifles.

Good article.

Brent

Thanks, appreciate the feedback. Would you know if the two alloy bullets are cast in two parts...as one, or maybe cast/swaged in two parts then swaged?

Generally, it is cast as two parts and swaged together. There is a mortice and tenon sort of fitting. Everyone that does this uses home-built gear so far as I know. Pretty cool bullets too.

I should add, that these bench slug rifles all use rifled false muzzles and bullet starters of various types.

There is another type of slug rifle however, and that one uses the same 550+ gr .45 bullets, usually paper patched of course, but shot out of convential weight side hammer rifles. The Pedersoli Gibbs is the best current production example. These are used in mid and long range matches to 100 yds. They do not incorporate a false muzzle however. And, so far as I have heard, they all use one-piece bullets in these guns and no scopes. Shooting is done from cross sticks with a slightly different sort of hold being required (left hand under the rifle forearm I believe).

These are the guns that are in Ned Roberts book, The Caplock Muzzleloading Rifle . In more recent times, Bill Roberts was probably the best known expert and shooter of this sort of rifle. Since he passed about a year ago, his son, Al, has been leading the way.

Brent

Thank you sir! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/cool.gif" alt="" />

Dan,
There were a couple of front stuffers (Gibbs I believe) shooting on the British team in Africa- did reasonably well. ...Dennis

Ah, the Retrosaurus lives on! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />