Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Birth of a deer camp

Cool cars for sure gotta share some pics of FIL's 68 dodge corranet(sp) .

Ok wife says she want's a new front stuffer I'm thinking CVA Optima Nitride . What ya'll thunk ?

Go T/C. I have personally had bad luck with CVA and have known of others that have too. But, some people love theirs.

I got a cheapie model TC Venture maybe? It's a blued/plastic stock and the thing shoots lights out!!

The T/C Impact is a good gun for the money. Real simple, fail proof design.

That's the one I got. Thanks Troutrisher. Not a Venture, that's the rifle I think.

Anyway, if I was going to buy another, I'd get the same thing. I literally took it out of the box, loaded 100gr of powder, a bullet, and shot it at 50 yards. It hit 1" high, and windage was perfect, even with my bad eyes on the open sights. I couldn't believe it so I shot two more. Dang near the same spot.

Bumped it back to 75 yards and it was dead on. I never touched the sights at all!

PA still has a "flintlocks only" season that starts the day after Christmas (as long as Christmas doesn't fall on a Saturday), because Sunday hunting is still pretty much limited to coyotes, foxes and crows here.

You can use any sort of front stuffer in the October doe season, but the post Christmas season is flinters only.

Bought a cheapo Traditions flinter for a backup last year, think it was a bit less than $300? Getting hard to even find a flintlock here, almost have to go to a shop that specializes in them now and spend lots of money. Bass Pro doesn't even sell then anymore, bought the last one Dick's had in stock.

Blued/synthetic stock, short barrel, fiber optic sights. Comes w/sabots and 44 caliber XTP hollow point bullets. Works out well for me, since I shoot the same 200gr XTPs in my M629 Smitty. Accurate enough for me and it has an adjustable trigger.

Come ta think of it, that was two years ago, not last year.

I've run a CVA Hawkins percussion gun for 30 years. No trouble with it whatsoever, and it's very accurate. My son runs a CVA Buckhorn and is still working up loads for it, but it seems to work just fine for an entry level in line.

Muzzle loaders---I started off with a CVA Kentucky in 1980. Hunted it successfully for a couple of years. Traded it for a TC White Mountain .50 caliber carbine which I hunted successfully for about 15 years. Now I have a TC New Englander .54 caliber with synthetic stock and that is the last one I ever will possess unless it gives up the ghost somehow. Thompson Contender muzzle loaders are great.

On another note I went to a gun show yesterday and bought on a whim a New England Firearms 12 gauge slug gun. This is a break top single barrel with rifled barrel and iron sights. Pretty neat. Will get to the gun club ,hopefully tomorrow, and see what the accuracy is.

Stan in SC

Someday I'd like to get one of the carbine flintlocks like the ones Cabelas sells. I like those a lot.

Tom, when you say "flintlocks" do you mean an actual flintlock or is that an all inclusive way of saying muzzle loaders?
Most muzzle loaders used today are percussion cap and are not true flintlocks.
I have fired a few flintlocks but never owned nor hunted with one.

Stan in SC

T.C. used to market a flinter called the Pennsylvania hunter. I don't know if it's still in their lineup or not, but it was more or less specifically designed to comply with Pa.'s strict Primitive weapons rules. If you want to up the challenge factor a bit, pick up a flintlock and hunt with it. They're fun and frustrating all at the same time.

If I lived in PA I would own a flintlock for sure. January deer hunting sounds better than drilling holes in ice trying to catch a 12" fish.

Stan,

I do believe you're correct that it's a percussion and not an actual Flintlock.

They have the longer barrels and the carbine version. That's the one I like the most. It fits me nicely and carries really nice. I've fired a few actual Flintlocks when we used to have that as part of our Hunters Safety crew. We brought in a black powder club and they had all kinds of stuff.

You guys should have seen the crowd stir that '77 Highboy caused when it rolled into town for the car show that me and my family attended.

Nate comes rollin down the street and the crowd was like "whoahhh look at that truck!"

I don't think he even had it backed into his show spot yet and there was 20 people all around it.

It really is that bad ass!

I've been running a 'el cheapo black/blue CVA Optima for the last few years. No problems so far. Knock on Wood


I see now the Optima's are mostly black/stainless

I use a pre space gun version of the TC encore on .50

Stainless with walnut stocks.

I really like it. My only complaint is an effect that they call the crud ring, or something such. A crust ring above the powder line in the bore that makes it difficult/impossible to properly seat repeat shots without cleaning. I get 3 shots max and I have to run a wet patch to bust that crust.

I deal with it by just not seeing any deer to shoot at. This way its no problem at all.

Dave, I had the same problem using genuine black powder. Then a buddy gave me a pound of Pyrodex. Does better than Black powder and at the range I can get six or eight shots before cleaning.

I went to the gun club today to shoot the new NEF slug gun.Very very consistently accurate using iron sights at fifty yards.I was using Remington 3" Sluggers advertised at 1560 FPS.
Yes, accurate but jeez does it have recoil. I shoot my 45/70 a lot and am not recoil shy but this one could make me so if shot much.

Gophergunner,we have a T/C Pennsylvania Hunter for sale at the shop where I work part time.Nice muzzle loader.

Stan in SC

Ive seen pics of your TC and I have its clone I have had the same problem with the crud ring . I've switched to Jim Shockeys Gold and its much better now . I'll prolly take her to OKC sometime soon and let her pick one she's pretty small so the shorter the better . That's why I'm leaning to the CVA Optima also several around here and every one says they are very accurate .

Thinking about this crud ring more - I've always kept a block of wood around to put on the ram rod to keep it from poking though my hand when sighting in - see I'm not as smart as Dave. I just put my weight into it !

I believe deer are actually afraid of my muzzle loader. I've NEVER seen a deer while hunting with one. None, ever! Even if I hunt in metro areas that are full to the bushes with them.