Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Muzzleloaders Felt wads under conicals

All,

I load TC conicals directly on top of a load of loose powder in a TC .54 cal Renegage. Accuracy is OK but not great. Three shot groups range between 3/4" to 3" at 50 yds. On average, groups are around 2". I swab out the bore with a wet patch and several dry patches between shots. Has anyone found improvement in accuracy by using a tight fitting, lubed felt wad between the power and the conical?

What powder charge are yo uusing? My understanding is that the overpowder wad is to prevent gas blowby. Not sure of the necesssity or benefits of using one with a conical.

yes it can improve accuracy greatly. I even use them for round balls in one of the rifles.

GB,

The most consistent load I have found for my TC .54 cal Renegade is 110 gm eq of loose T7 under a 365 gr TC Maxiball.

I bought a bag of 20 ga felt wads on close out and thought I would saturate a bunch of them with beeswax and and try them out in the ML. I am curious as to what others have found since I know I am reinventing the wheel on this.

BB455,

In those rifles that you found great improvement, were they well used barrels?

Curious if over-powder wads help most with rifles with less than perfect bullet/bore fit.

all of the barrels were in great shape. They've had a good # of rounds through them. Its just the wad helps protect and seal off the gases. Kind of like what the plastic skirt on a powerbelt does.

Once I called TC about this very thing.The tech there told me the wads make absolutely no difernce.

I tried my TC 50 cal Hawkin with and without,with no differnce. I tried my in line Black Diamond. Same thing.The tech told me the inlines usually take a better tolerenced bullet like the Power Belt to shoot well.

TC finally rebarrled my Hawkin.

The best thing I did to improve accruacy waso to put a peep sight on the Hawkin.Those factory sights they put on suck

Several years back I was playing with a T/C Black Mt. Mag, a side hammer gun with the QLA muzzel.
I tried 370 grain TC maxi balls and 460 No Excuses in front of 100 to 120 grains of loose Pyrodex. Both showed poor accuracy at 100 yds, 4" to 6" groups with a peep.

When I tried some of the .50 lubed wads the groups shrunk in half, I'm a beliver.

they can make a big difference. that Winchester Apex i had needed the wad with maxiballs.

Wads:

I shoot Hornady 410s with a MMP SUB-BASE, I also shoot a 370 Grain Maxi with
a card wad under the bullet!

My groups went from 3-4" at 100yds down to 1 1/2 and smaller just by using
the sub-base and the card wad under the bullets. My loads are 90FFF to
115FF, out of my 50.


Some of the WAD links that I have found

http://www.buffaloarms.com/browse.cfm/2,246.html
http://www.sagebrushproducts.com/ShootingProducts.htm
http://www.circlefly.com/
http://www.trackofthewolf.com/categories/tableList.aspx?catID=2&subID=37&styleID=118

Some of the more expensive " Veggie" wads are made from:

Vegetable fiber gasket material engineered to resist high heat & compression
and water resistant.

Or you can make your own with some heavy card stock and a Gasket [Arch]
punch.

Hope some of this helps!
BS

Thanks to all for the answers to the original post.

A follow up question: Do you reduce the load of powder when using a over powder wad? If so, by how much?

You could also try the base cut off a 28ga shot gun wad under the conicals. I heard of this on another forum a few years ago and decided to give it a try. It worked very well with the NOEXCUSES conicals in my 50 cal Encore over 777 loose powder. I also tried some felt wads but the shot gun wads worked the best. Hope this helps, Karry

KLM300,

Cool idea. 28ga = .56 cal which would make it just about right for a .54 cal.

carbon12, miss read your original post. I thought you said 50cal. The 28ga wads might be a little undersized for a 54 to make a good seal. After reading your last post i measured some of the wads i have, they measure .501 at the top of the base and .510 at the bottom of the skirt. I also measured a 20ga wad and came up with .595 which maybe to much. Sorry for the confusion. Karry

KLM,

Thank you for the dimensional info on the 28 ga wads. I won't have to discover that they are undersized for the .54 bore for myself.

The beeswax lubed 20 ga felt wads are easily thumbed into the .54 bore. Whether or not they are a help to accuracy is still pending. I have not shot them enough to statistically determine one way or the other.

I shoot no excuses heavy 54s, I don't recall the weight for sure, but 400 plus pushing 500? Green mountain barrel as the TC tubes just have not been that accurate for me.
I started with BP, real... circa a case from 1964 of Dupont, 2F. Musket caps. Getting on the order of 2-3 inch groups as I tested it at 100 yards. Dropped an overpowder felt pre lubed 54 wad on top of the powder and groups went straight to 1-1.5 inches at 100 yards. I've seen the difference, and while I think it helps top end loads, I don't think they are needed for average loads. FWIW, I am running 90 grains of 2F and things are really good, easy to hold on an elk target out to 200 and have all shots go into the vital area of the target. Gravy enough for head shots at 100 if one wanted to.

Jeff

Rost495,

Thanks for the heads up on 'No Excuses'. Looking over his web site, I see that his slugs are less costly than the TCs I buy at the local Cabela's. I will test the No Excuses in my ML when my inventory of TC conicals gets low.

NEs are heavy weights at 535 gr. What twist is your .54 bore?

No Excuses mentions that he has found that over powder wads are of little or is no help to accuracy. But he also says the wads do not hurt accuracy. That is pretty much what I have found with my limited testing. Reinforces the often mentioned notion that each rifle is unique and responds differently to different loading methods.

I have ordered a box of the NE 50/460's also to give a try. I had good luck w/ the Hornady FPB's but wanted to try these.

I like the accuracy I get with 95 grains by volume of Pyrodex Select with a Wonder Wad and a 490 grain conical in my Knight MK85 .45 Caliber rifle.

The easiest way to know if it works for you is to try it.
I am a skeptic and tried several conical bullets and loads with and without lubed felt wads. For me and my loads a lubed felt wad gave better accuracy and the rifle bore didn't hold as much dry crispy powder residue, making the reload faster and easier.
I am comvinced it works. Cushion the load, lube the bore!
So i tried unthinkable herasy with my Lyman Great Plains, .010 lubed patch,.490 ball,with and without a lubed felt wad.Geewhiz it shoots much better and as expected ,reloads better with a lubed felt wad.
I don't shoot any frontstuffer without a lubed felt wad anymore.
Don't believe me , try it yourself