Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Muzzleloaders Got my Stainless 209x50 Encore up and running

Shoots better than I expected. I used Shockey's Gold 3F (80 grains by volume) the 240 grain Speer Uni-core JSP and Federal 209 magnum primers to sight in. The scope is a Konus 1-4x24 M30. The scope turned out to be a good piece of glass and adjustments were on the money other than the clicks were more like 3/8ths of an inch than 1/4 of an inch. I plan on hunting Michigan this year with it and would like to know if any of the current crop of powders is better for cold weather. The Shockey's Gold seems pretty good to me, easy to clean and accurate with the load listed. Thinking about trying the IMR White Hots pellets.

Mine was a very moody PITA until I went to blackhorn 209 and it turned it into a pretty useful tool after that. 100gr by volume under a .429 240gr Speer deepcurl in a harvester sabot gave whitetails a pretty hard road to go down especially for timber hunting. Clean up on blackhorn is a breeze compared to others and can shoot 5-6 times without swabbing the barrel if one wishes to do so. Comes with a price though but worth it if you have to shoot black powder or substitute. 209 magnum primers will certainly put things in your favor when it gets colder. Mine let me down one too many times and it got replaced with a hot rod smokeless gun but that’s a story for a different day. I think mine just had bad mojo if one believes in superstitions...

Seems different Encore barrels really like different powders. I use Shockey Gold pellets and have no problems (2x pellets), can shoot 3-4 times without swabbing.

My buddy’s Encore cannot seat a second shot without swabbing with ANY powder. The crud ring leaves him about 3/4” above the powder after one shot.

That was the problem I faced with triple 7 either in pellets or loose and 1/4” of seating depth meant 8-9” difference in poi. Really hard to gain a lot of faith in that when a “fast” 2nd shot is in order. Bad enough crud ring that the patch/jag would hang up and I was faced with taking the breech plug out and knocking the rod the rest of the way through. Man that thing was a bear. But I’ve spoken to individuals that love theirs and never had such issues.

As far as a crud ring and cleaning the Shocley's gold 3F goes, cleanup is very easy, I used rubbing alcohol and it took three wet patches each followed by a dry patch to make the inside of the barrel spotless. Of course as usual the threads at the front end were a bit more of a pain to clean but absolutely nothing like Pyrodex RS. As for shooting twice without swabbing this was also not a problem, second shot just a bit harder to get all the way down. While I was shooting after each shot I would run a wet patch of rubbing alcohol down the barrel, scrub a bit at the chamber end and then run a dry patch. Triple Seven will never pollute the barrel of any muzzleloader I own. I will take pyrodex every time if I have to over Triple Seven. Since Gander Mountain moved away I have no dealer nearby to get the APP powders from so when my pound of 'Gold is gone I will try the White Hot pellets as they seem to be available at a lot of places.

“Pollute”...I like that terminology. I’m bound to a can of it (3f)that I bought to feed a sidelock gun with musket caps since the clean up is still a little better than the RS. But I’ll never feed it to an in-line ever again if I can help it. I never used the white hots personally though.

I'm not an inline guy.. .but have 1. I ran BH209 and I'm completely impressed. In my setup, it's very clean. I didn't realize it but I am at a top end charge. I assumed 150 by volume was max. Off the top of my head, 120 is. I weighed my charges and converted it. I'm right around their max.

Also converted to a large rifle primer plug and shoot CCI large rifle mags. I'd assume that helps. Fire a 209 and swap the barrel l...pretty dirty on its own.


The performance and cleanliness is awesome IMO

I at one time owned a CVA apex and TC encore endeavor and used BH209 exclusively. I never ever had one iota of a problem with them in all temperature from 70's down to 20's . Federal 209A primers in both. Barnes TMZ 250 grains with factory blue sabot , there was no need to futz around with loads, they shot lights out in both rifles.

I was using Winchester standard 209’s and best I can figure I had primed my cleaned the night before gun with a primer that had been in my rubber t/c primer holder from the year before. Was a pretty blustery cold day but only in the 20s at lowest and had a bigger deer than I cared to mess up on come in at around 2pm and the gun hung fired. Was actually about to break the gun open to reprime it when the gun went off. Only bad experience I had with bh209 but it was probably more primer than powder after thinking on it further.

Bh209 and a 300 gr NBT shoots tiny groups on my encore

Bh209 will have to drop in price before I fool with it. Is there any real negative in using regular black powder? Other than the cleanup that is. I would definitely use an o ring under the primer.

Mine likes bh209 with 300gr thor bullets.

Rick, you're right...BH209 isn't cheap. Then I realized it wasnt even a pound jar!!! The performance is pretty in-matched as far as velocity goes...as far as I've looked...which admittedly isn't much. Lol. For all the more I will ever shoot it, I decided to live with it. The bullets I shoot aren't cheap either. But it's purely a hunting gun and I was after maximum performance.



Guthooked, that's exactly what I shoot. Those Thors do an amazing job....especially when pushed hard. The damage to my Ohio buck this season was unbelievable as far as a muzzleloader goes. They did do nearly as well from a fast twist flintlock I built...but I wasn't able to get the velocity from real BP.

Burned 24 rounds loaded with Pyrodex RS under the same sabot and bullet. Went up to 120 grains and got excellent accuracy. Little dirtier between shots and took a little bit longer to clean up but the solution I used this time, 50/50 windshield washer fluid and rubbing alcohol cleaned up pretty quick with five wetted patches and five dry patches. I did do more between shots than I did with the Shockey's Gold. For deer I just don't see the need for more than 100 grains of powder. Looking forward to this coming fall, hunting Oklahoma, Michigan and Texas, all with this rifle.

Going to shoot some Goex 3F black next time.

To add I really don't see a big issue with swabbing between shots hunting. You need to be able to clean after you shoot anyway so why not have patches ready to use.

great! I love my Encore, too, but I did not have luck with Jim's powder a couple of years ago, and stuck with FFg.

Well I took the barrel to a local gunsmith to get two more holes tapped. WTH he wanted $45. a hole! Well I could tell he was struggling so I OK'd it but they better be perfect. I want to use the EABCO 6 hole mount so I can get the scope a bit more forward and I am planning on shooting max charges under the 300 gr. Nosler BT Muzzy bullet to possibly get 200 yard capability. I have shot a few already and they do buck some. It still seems that powder availability is weak, fresh propellant locally seems to be the White hots, Tripple 7 and Pyrodex pellets. Have not seen any #11 caps for my TC Hawkin and am down to 12 or so. I have 200 plus musket caps and my order nipples for them just because I can't find any #11 caps.

I got a new stainless barrel last year, and 100G volume of BH209 with a powerbelt shot the best. I tried various sabots with marginal success. I bought a bunch of Federal borelocks, and they did not shoot well. I heard borelocks need a stiff load, but I prefer 100 grains and under. Deer around here are shot at 75 yards and under 99% of the time. Anyway, with my limited testing I was really surprised at how picky the barrel was.

Guess I got lucky, so far with three different bullets and 3 different powders mine has shot everything well. So far the sabots I like best are the Harvestor green ribbed sabots. The ones that came on the 300 gr, Nosler Ballistic Tips are good also. You are right about not needing really powerful loads for most deer hunting.

I love my Encore. Everyone speaks so highly of BH209, I've been meaning to try it, but never have. Personally, I try to keep it simple. It's two 50/50 Triple 7 pellets with a 295gr Power Belt on top. If I'm at the range, I can shoot it about 7 times before I can't ram it home anymore. When I'm hunting, I go out with a clean barrel, so when I shoot something, I can get the next one seated while in a tree stand. If I shoot the second one later on, I can still get #3 pushed down. Then I'll clean it when I get home and I'm ready to hunt again.

Well I got my barrel back. Hmmm he didn't have a 6-48 tap to match the screws that came with the Eabco 6 hole base so he tapped the two new holes 6-40! He did provide good screws to match but then again they take a flat head screw driver and not an allen wrench. However he mounted the base solid as can be. I put my 1-4x25 scope back on needing to change the position of the rear ring a bit. All is good, I guess. Load workup to start as soon as my Multi Purpose Black 3F gets here.