Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Muzzleloaders CVA Optima or TC Impact

Liking the Optima from what I've seen and heard. Any bugs in it I'm not aware of? Any reason to take the Impact instead. Just want something easy to clean, fairly accurate with reasonable trigger to use in MZ season for deer and small chance of black bear. Looking to stay $250ish.

Both are nice rifles. Someone will be along shortly to rag on CVA, but I have seen really good accuracy out of all their recent products. My brother has an Impact and it shoots great, but the bore is really tight. He has to use the easy load sabots to get the bullet down the bore.

Well, I went ahead and ordered a black/stainless V2 Optima with rings. Got it from:

http://www.sportsmansoutdoorsuperst...sman/black-powder-muzzleloaders-for-sale

They had been out of stock for a while and I saw yesterday they had some more in. Apparently I got the last one because they went right back out of stock on the listing after I ordered. Lowest price around. Listed for $241.84 shipped. They have some other muzzleloaders at killer prices too. Also have Blackhorn 209, Hornady SST 250gr and some Harvester sabots on the way from Midsouth Shooters Supply. Now all I have to do is get used to front stuffin before Nov 8.

Make sure you order the blackhorn209 breech plug. www.blackhorn209.com has the cooler one with the o rings and carbon cleaner tool kit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKaFzTmIcGk

My Optima with open sights at 100 yards.

Well you just got me into a lot of reading. Went to Blackhorn209.com and reviewed some stuff I had already looked at and also linked over to some of Russel Lynch's articles on the subjects of CVA/Blackhorn/Breechplugs/Primers etc. The bad news is I probably will get a rifle with a flat faced plug. Going to call CVA shortly to see if I can get some relief on that. The good news is apparently CVA saw the light and adopted the Blackhorn plug design from Western Powder. Kinda crazy the story Russel told about CVA turning it down to begin with. 3 different versions are on their website for various CVA and Encore rifles. The plug for the Optima/Wolf/Accura is for sale on Gunbroker CLICK HERE Learning a lot more about the intricacies of these dang single shot rifles than I intended to.

FYI to anyone else buying a CVA and using Blackhorn 209 you WILL need the 209 breech plug as bigblock suggested. That's even per CVA customer service. And the breech plug you get with your CVA WILL NOT be the one you need. Found out speaking with them their plan is to keep the flat faced plug designed for pellets as standard issue. Reason given is that pellets are what majority of shooters are using. The fix isn't all that expensive. I found them at https://www.midsouthshooterssupply.com/ for $23.17 plus shipping.

The local Dunham's had the BH209 plugs for under $20. I recommended the plug to a friend who has a Bergara barrel on his Encore.

Looking at the different plug designs it all makes sense which works for pellets and which for powder. With a long plug and flat face the spark has a long way to go before it hits the pellet. A lot further than from the head of a shotgun shell to the powder charge. Cupped face plugs with powder really look to me like the way to go, but then I'm an amateur at this. Picked up some blue pack Winchester 209 last night so with everything else on the way I should have everything I need. Except a buck.

I own/have owned inlines from Marlin, Knight, TC (2 of 'em)and now a stainless CVA Optima V2. I like the CVA best, even better than my TC Encore. It's lighter, has a better trigger, and is just as accurate as the Encore. I did get a BH209 breechplug for it, and ignition is great.

Just got an interesting note back from Ramshot Customer Service. Since their published data for BH209 only goes to 120 gr volume equivalent I asked if it could be extrapolated to 150 gr volume equivalent in guns designed for the 150 equivalent charge. Answer is "The maximum charge of Blackhorn we recommend is a 120voulme (84gr by weight) this charge is equal to 150gr or 3 pellets or Pyrodex." So 84 weighed grains equals 3 50gr equiv Pyrodex pellets or approximately so. I hope to be shooting the BH209 in an Optima V2 on Friday or Saturday. Eager to see what it'll do.

I used to shoot 777 pellets and 130 grains by volume (two 50 grain pellets and one 30 grain pellet) produces approximately the same velocity (2000 fps with a 250gr SST)) as 110 grains by volume of BH 209.

An interesting side note is the three pellets (130 grains by volume) of 777 weighs (actual measured weight) about the same as 110 grains (by volume) of BH209. Both weigh approximately 77.5 grains on my scale.

FWIW, 110 grains of BH209 (by volume) with a 250 gr SST seems to produce very good accuracy in many rifles ... from what I've read. This load works very well in my Omega.

Do you need to change the breech plug on the new TCImpacts ?

I bought a bunch of Harvester short sabots and the 250gr SSTs. Plan on going 75, 80 and 84 weighed grain loads at the range. Also found this ballistics "guesstimator" on the Hornady site. Figuring a 100 to 125 yard zero it looks like 175 or so should be doable with that bullet. If all goes well I'll shoot it out to 200 just to see where they fall.

http://www.hornady.com/ballistics-resource/ballistics-calculator

No, the Impact is supposed to work fine with BH209. You may want to verify your primer of choice fits. The Win209 can be a little tight in some T/Cs and some imported primers may not fit at all.

You won't be disappointed with the Optima.

I really doubt the accuracy would be good with 150gr of BH 209. Even if it was safe. The 150gr magnum load they recommend is for for black powder/Pyrodex.

The sweet spot for BH in CVA guns is usually 110gr.

you have to under stand that even 150gr T7 loose is an over load.

120 grains T7 is equal to 150gr goex 2f or pyrodex rs/select, its a hotter burning powder, just like blackhorn209.

So while you may think its ONLY 120 grains, its actual equal to 150 grains of the lesser powerful powders.

And therein lies the fallacy of calculating powder charge by "volume equivalent" or "weight by volume". Bunch of hocus-pocus. Look at the manufacturer's recommended WEIGHED charges and weigh your own.