It is pleasantly peaceful here in this forum, praise be unto the gun gods!

General layout follows:

12 bore SxS W.&C. Scott and Son manufactured in 1895, Both barrels (Damascus) are F.C. with a bore diameter at the muzzle of .695". I have absolutely no idea when the gun was last fired, it came into my hands about 5 years ago at a gun show. About 15 minutes ago I put a couple of primed cases in the pipes just to see if the old cannon would pop the caps. OH YEAH! Very nice condition, all things considered. Left bore is pristine, right side has a very minor amount of light pitting on the right side of the about 10" from the breech. It looks more like dust specs than pitting it is so light.

Magtech brass gifted from a member here on the 'Fire along with a quantity of nitro and fiber wads. Another gift also arrived, a quantity of ancient but very well preserved...Remington/UMC production. Over shot wads arrived 2 days ago. Because the brass is thin walled all wads are 11 ga. wads. The brass ID Is ~.765" at the case mouth, length just a hair less than 2.5". Once loaded the over shot wad will receive a small ring of Duco cement on the perimeter as is the custom with loading shells of this nature.

All of the brass I received had been fired in the past, with smokeless powder as best I could determine. They were tumble cleaned and present as essentially new brass. I do not know how old the brass was, but the primer pocket geometry was not totally consistent so I ordered a pocket uniforming tool from Midsouth and cleaned them up a little. The use large pistol primers. The most obvious discrepancy however was that primer flash holes were not of uniform size, nor were they all centered. I do not think it will interfere with the project. I did not realize until looking into the history of brass shells that they were in common use up until the beginning of WWII.

Loads to be tested:

All will start with 3 dram equivalent loads and 1 to 1-1/8th ounce of shot or ball. CCI 300 primers and Swiss 1.5 FG powder. Why 1.5? It's what I have. Load data comes from the Lyman Blackpowder Load Manual. All charges are by volume, not weight.

#9 shot; 1 oz, 82 grains of powder. A friend wishes to toss some clays for this load. laugh
#4 buckshot, 1-1/8th oz (24 pellets) 82 grains of powder
.690" roundball, weight of approximately 490 gr., 82 grains of powder

I will use a single layer of thin paper as a shot sleeve in the first two loads and a .010" cloth patch around the ball in the last load.

Stand by, lots of smoke soon to be released.

[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]

I am..........disturbed.

Concerning the difference between man and the jackass: some observers hold that there isn't any. But this wrongs the jackass. -Twain