Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Muzzleloaders CVA Palmsaver ramrod

I bought a new Optima V2 yesterday and it came with the Palmsaver ramrod. Pretty cool idea I thought until I look at how it's made and designed to use.

Basically the Palmsaver idea is nice but once you put the knob in the rod you take away your brass jag so if seating a bullet your going to booger up the threads on the opposite and of the rod or mess up the bullet point if using a plastic tip or lead tipped bullet unless you take the knob off, slip the other end of the rod into the know which is just a loose sloppy fit and chance boogering up the internal threads on the palmsaver.

Make sense?

Has anybody came up w an idea or system for loading that doesn't require you to remove the palm saver for seating which is what it's designed to help with??

Maybe a small enough brass seating for the end of the rod that goes down in the thimbles?

As long as this has been around you would think they would have a field ready rod that didn't require assembling/disassembling to use so as not to mess up the front of a bullet.

As it is right now I see this as more of a help on the range and kind of a pain for follow up shots in the field.

Also according to the manual you cannot use the palmsaver to seat the bullet if using less than 100 grains of powder unless using the extended jag. I was wanting to run 80-90 grains of powder as I don't need much range for the woods hunting I do 99% of the time.

Sounds like somebody needs to design a longer breech plug for those not wanting to use so much powder.

I have the same gun. I think you are limited to exactly what you mentioned unless you have a small brass fitting to be made for the non-Palmsaver side. I'm shooting XTPs and have not noticed any issues with the rod as designed.

That’s bizarre. We have 2 of those muzzleloaders and I’m sure it’s no problem to load 60 weighed grains of Blackhorn under a 200 gr Barnes.429 pistol bullet with a Harvester ribbed sabot. All I use is the factory rod with palm saver and a brass tip on the other end that matches the bullet profile. Of course if you’re carrying the rod under the barrel you cannot have the brass tip attached. That can be a pain and I’d love for the factory to remedy that. But I have seen no need for using an extended jag for stuffin a bullet. That’s the load used when my wife is at the trigger and it’s pretty much a .44 Mag single shot. Don’t know that it matters but both guns have the Blackhorn 209 breech plug.

Good to know. I hope to get it out this week or over the weekend for a little trigger time.

The cva rod with the palmsaver i have is a joke. So is the t handle power rod on my Thompson centers. I have replaced them all with the fiberglass cva universal rods you cut to fit. Nothing fancy just a plain ramrod that works

Probably what I will end up doing is build my own. Make it with what ends I want.

I do like the idea of the knob but can punch a hole in a starter and use the starter as a palmsaver.

Used to be able to find wooden palm savers I still have one floating around somewhere. The ramrods are fine as range rods they’re just not practical for hunting when a fast reload is required. I’ve had three or four instances where I shot a deer and was able to reload and drop another. The new range rods are too cumbersome for that

I use a small block of hardwood (3x 3/4 x3/4 ) with a 3/8 hole drilled part way through the center as a palm saver with a brass tip on the other end of the rod. I carry the wood block in my pocket, the rod on the gun.

By golly you just learned me something !

Hey 10gauge, just wanted to let you know how that low end load I told you my wife uses worked out. Like I said it’s 60gr weighed BH209, Harvester ribbed sabot, 200gr Barnes.429 HP. She shot an old grey faced 3’point we’ve seen a couple of times before. Didn’t weigh him whole because of time restraints but I’m confident he was 150lb-ish. He was after some does and Rhonda had to take a moving shot. Hit him near side thru the rear shoulder meat and exited rear of ribs opposite side. Big hole. She was above him about 30’ in a ladder stand for on a Ridge and he turned and ran uphill right at her. Hit the ground about 10 feet from the ladder and rolled back down to an access trail the 4 wheeler could travel. Good boy! Had a big honking buck do her wrong this morning. Hope I can finish that story later.