Zeroing process?

[Flatlander35]

Good evening,

So I was able to cast up a few hundred minie balls and hopefully within a week I will get out to the range and fire my "new" musket for the first time. I have a few questions. Is it advisable to fire a fouling shot before the first string of five shots? I figure, I'll start my charges low and increase by .5 grains each time to see what groups the tightest in my rifle. After each string of five, do most people run a few patches of Ballistiol or other cleaner/water through the bore to wipe it out? If so, I assume another fouling shot before the next string of fire?

I'm probably overthinking things, as with my Zouave I can put 80 shots through it before it actually needing to clean the bore but want to be thorough and I don't have enough experience with these to know the best way to do things.

Thanks in advance.

[hawkeye2]

Fire a fouling shot if it makes you feel comfortable, some guns need one , some don't. You'll probably find out if you need one before you've fired many groups. I noticed you said .5 grain increase per group, you'll die of old age if you do that long before you find the ideal load, hope you added a decimal point where it wasn't wanted. I usually go with 5 grain increments and when I find my group opening up again I go back to the next to last and increase slowly. If the group diminishes as I approach 45 grains and then begins to open up after 50 grains then I go back and try charges between those two limits till I get what I'm looking for. Remember the only thing that should change between 5 shot groups is the weight of powder and absolutely nothing else. I start each 5 shot group with a clean bore.

[Hal]

I do similar, but usually in 2 grain increments, then 1 grain increments the second time around, going above and below the best group from the first batch. I normally load 5 rounds of 5 different charges, mainly because I use those plastic cartridge boxes that hold 25 rounds. I seldom go to .5 grain increments on black powder, but you could if you wanted. I do not fire fouling shots and I do clean between each 5 round string. I say "clean". I don't clean like I would before putting it away, but I put a couple of wet patches down the bore. If it's getting clean after the second one, I'll run a dry one to get the moisture out and move on. I find that with Swiss powder and only 5 shots, this is usually sufficient. If the second one is still black, I use a third or fourth until I see it cleaning up, then a dry one, but this is seldom needed.

[John Bly]

Shoot your first shot on paper and then you'll know what your musket does on a cold clean bore. This is important. How many times do you miss your 1st target than start hitting? Shoot until your musket needs cleaning. I shoot an entire skirmish without cleaning mine until the end. I used to clean after every event but found that many times I missed the first shot on the next relay. Now if I miss I know it is my fault. You'll know when to clean when a bullet hits a tight spot about 5"-6" down from the muzzle when loading.

Use 5 grain increments to find the 1st sweet spot then go 2 grains over and under to refine the sweet spot. Then 1 grain increments for the final load. Good luck to you.

[Maillemaker]

I don't fire a fouling shot.

When doing load workups I make up groups of 5 shots of each charge weight. I increase charge weights by 5 grains between groups.

When doing load workups, I clean the bore in between every charge group (5 shots), so that each group starts out with the same bore condition.

In competition, I usually clean in between relays.

I know some people do not clean between relays.

Steve

[Kevin Tinny]

Hello, Flatlander:

There are many Threads here that include helpful, proven detail.

Here are some tips, please:
The OD of your minie should be enough to prevent gas cutting and tipped target holes. If any tipping, step-up OD in .001" increments. Check for tipping at all distances and slightly beyond the longest.
There are many good lubes that allow shooting a full event of 50 plus rounds with cleaning only afterwards.
Use PURE lead, not mystery metal.
Weigh your Minie's, and use those within a spread of 2 grains. Watch the weight tolerance of your scale. Cheap digital ones can have a couple grains tolerance with heavy Minie's. Weigh the same one three times to see the spread.
Confirm your final accuracy load on separate trips to the range.
Beware of wiggly benches and bad holding that can mask an otherwise good load. Most prefer a CONSISTENT, moderate to firm hold against the rifle.
A heavy trigger pull can be a distraction.
Please keep us posted on your progress.
Smiles.
Kevin Tinny

[Muley Gil]

You aren't actually zeroing your musket, you're trying to find the most accurate load. Once you find that load, then you adjust the sights so that the most accurate load hits where you aim it.

[PoorJack]

You didn't mention the size of the bore of your musket. Without knowing that for sure and sizing the minies accordingly, you're wasting time and powder unless you're in that happy spot where the mold drops at the perfect size.

Maybe I'm the odd man out here, but I use a 3gr increment. With a 5gr increment, it's possible to miss a node entirely while 3 will show a node right away and you can dial in from there. Once you've gotten the charge right, then there are other variables to work with to fine tune even further.

[Maillemaker]

Here is an example of a load workup with 2-grain increments I did:

https://i.imgur.com/3yJBMBKl.jpg

This may indicate how a gun might have more than one "sweet spot". Ideally you should duplicate the test multiple times to confirm it.

[SLevitsky]

I usually do not fire a fouling shot. I start with 46 grains usually loading up 10 rounds and do a 2 grain increment with 48 and 50 grains respectively. I will bench the gun to find the best possible group. Once you find a group,no matter where it may be(you can sight in the gun later). Say 48 grains was your best group, I then load up 47 and 49 grains to find that sweet spot. Shooting 10 rounds instead of 5 will give you a better idea of how a bullet will group. Just my humble opinion.

[John Westenberger]

My load development process is this (Start to finish)

-Use pin gauges to check rough bore diameter. Slug bore for breechloaders.
-Talk to teammates and see if anyone has a similar gun, and load what they use. Borrow projectiles or molds/sizers if possible (Sometimes the process stops here. My Smith drove tacks with loads I borrowed from a teammate. I just replicated those with Swiss 2f instead of Goex 3f)
-Load up 5 shot groups in 2 gr. increments. Use lube that is known to work. I like Len's lube for everything.
-Load up 1 extra group, I usually do the lowest load to save powder, to foul the bore up and get a little warmed up myself. A clean bore, for whatever reason, seemed to be either dead on to where I was aiming, or a flier. Probably inexperience and me holding the gun weird the first few shots.
-BRUSH in between groups. I don't run any patches at a skirmish. Just brush. Knock the big stuff out and keep the bore dirty, but not fouled.
-Take any group that shows promise, load that again, as well as load 1 grain either direction. Try those. Same process with the fouling group. I've had guns that

I did all this when moving my Zouave from a known Goex load to Schuetzen (After the Goex shutdown), and now I'm getting ready to do it for my new to me Trenton. Will probably use the 7lbs of Goex 2f I have left and try Swiss 1.5 and 2. I can usually get a decent group within two trips to the range, and get it totally dialed in another one or two.

I don't usually weigh projectiles. If they look good, they are usually good. I figure they're all close enough that if a group has a flier, it was either me, or the projectile. I don't factor fliers in group size. I've weighed them before, and it was more hassle than it was worth. When shooting 400 odd grains of lead, 5-10 grains of difference isn't going to throw a shot that far at 50 yards. Your results may vary.

[marv762]

the one thing i do that i haven't seen anyone else mention is a weigh my bullets. so if you shoot a group of 5 they are all the same. have seen people say i have flyers or 2 groups. that will just take that issue away from the start.

also go with 1 grain increases. been doing this long enough that i just start at 46 and go up from there. Marv jr.

[Maillemaker]

I weigh my bullets.

There was a reprint of a Dave Francis article in a recent Skirmish Line where he suggested discarding anything outside of +/- .5 grains. I find this extreme and this would result in very few acceptable bullets if I did this.

I now enter a run of bullets into a spreadsheet and compute 1 standard deviation. (this is where 95% of a sample falls under a bell curve). Typically, this is about +/- 2 grains.

I used to go +/- .5% of average but 1 standard deviation is generally a tighter tolerance.

I don't bother weighing revolver bullets and I don't bother weighing the Moose Wilkinson as it drops so consistently there is no point.

Steve

[PoorJack]

When I'm doing load development for a particular bullet, I do weigh every bullet and use only those at +-.5gr. When making skirmish ammo, I open that up to +-1gr. It's entirely possible to get that level of consistency in casting but you have to be willing to work at it.

[Maillemaker]

Are you ladle casting or bottom pour?

[PoorJack]

Steve-

I have a 20# bottom pour pot from Lee. I have a mechanical thermometer that goes up to 1200f. Wide open, the pot won't do more than about 875F. I have also drilled out the spout on the bottom for a faster flow. One other thing I've noticed is the weight starts to vary as the pot gets under half full so I stop and add lead at about the half way point.

[Maillemaker]

Thanks for the info. I also have a Lee 4-20 pot. I have also drilled out my spout to increase the flow rate. I have an RCBS thermometer. I run about 900F in the pot as any lower and I get wrinkly round balls in my Lee aluminum molds. They shed heat very fast.

I always pre-heat my molds by letting them rest on the surface of the melt. So they throw good drops from the first drop.

I'm going to do another run tonight as careful as I can, and report the results. I'm then going to do a run ladle-cast and compare.

The only mold I have that drops within tenths of a grain is my Moose Wilkinson mold.

Steve

[Maillemaker]

I did another casting session tonight. Bottom pour using an Accurate mold of the Larry Flees Sharps design. I cast as consistently as I could.

I cast 73 bullets. 3 had obvious defects so I discarded them right away.

Here is a graph of the results:

https://i.imgur.com/z1W8S0Yl.png

Here you can see the average, plus ways of computing a minimum and maximum acceptable weight:

https://i.imgur.com/ATgOScDl.png

I chose to go with +/- one standard deviation. This was a spread of 1.8 grains. About 68% of objects should fall within one standard deviation.

The standard deviation is .9, which is less than 1, which means the data is well clustered around the average bullet weight (which one would hope they would be).

So out of 69 bullets, 15 were rejected as over or under weight.


Here are the weights:


499.6



500


500.1


500.2


500.2


500.5


500.8


500.9


501


501.1


501.1


501.1


501.1


501.1


501.1


501.1


501.11


501.2


501.2


501.2


501.2


501.2


501.3


501.3


501.3


501.4


501.4


501.5


501.5


501.5


501.5


501.6


501.6


501.6


501.6


501.6


501.7


501.7


501.7


501.7


501.7


501.8


501.8


501.8


501.9


501.9


501.9


502


502


502


502


502


502.1


502.2


502.3


502.3


502.3


502.4


502.4


502.6


502.7



502.8


502.9


502.9


503


503.5


503.5


503.5


505.1

[PoorJack]

Steve-

Where in the pour series did the rejects occur? From my experience, they should occur at the end as the pot drains. Like I said, I keep my 20# pot at least half full.

[Maillemaker]

I made sure to quit when I got to half a pot.

Not possible to tell when the bad ones happened. I found them as outliers while weighing.

One had flash - the mold must not have been shut all the way. It was overweight.

Another had bubbles/voids around the base of the bullet and was underweight.

Another had a void in its nose and was underweight.

When you look at the graph ordered by weight, you can tell that there is a definite down-turn on the left and up-turn at the right.

I suspect these are cold and hot bullets.

[Kevin Tinny]

Hello:

When testing cast bullet weights, I use a digital scale. All have weight tolerances, AND ALL HAVE "LOAD CELLS" THAT CAN GO GOOFY. Cheap digital scales are more likely to have significant weight tolerance ranges.

I weigh a bullet five times to find the scale tolerance range. Weighing a group of bullets in order once, recording weights and then repeating this three times will reveal amusing scale variations.

I cast and place bullets in casting order. Then weigh in that order to find where the uniformity within desired range starts. I add metal in 1# amounts so pot stays at least 3/4'full for temperature consistency and use a dipper, not bottom feed. Read the casting tips on Brooks Molds website.

After a lot of overdoing this, I found that my musket-minie testing at 100 shows +/- 2 gr to be ok. Smiles.
Kevin Tinny

[Maillemaker]

I started off over a decade ago with one of those cheap $25 Frankford Arsenal digital scales. It seemed to work OK for about a year but would not consistently return to zero. At the time I was loading modern ammunition and so was concerned that the reported weight was off similarly, which could be dangerous.

I invested in an RCBS 1500 Chargemaster scale. It worked for some years until the digital display went wacky. I replaced it about a year ago with the new RCBS Chargemaster 1500 Lite.

It is extremely repeatable and I feel it is a quality scale.

I use it to dispense black powder charges also, even though they say "not for black powder".

Steve

[Flatlander35]

Wow, enough information to keep me busy all summer. I tried loads from two different bullets, each sized to .575, starting at 40 grains of 2F, bumping up to 65 grains, swabbing after each group of 5, then confirming the two tightest groups a second time before doing some plinking and calling it a day. Took a solid four hours going up in five grain increments. The most consistent load was 60 grains with the 510 grain Lyman Ideal mold. The trigger on my rifle is very light, almost too much. I found though, the limiting factor for me is the sights. That tiny front sight and just awful half-u, shallow notch rear sight makes it almost impossible for me to maintain a consistent sight picture. I can ring steel at 100 all day, but need to use the 300 yard setting to hit at 200 with some regularity, but not enough to really be happy. I'm thinking of ordering one of the taller front sights to have it brazed on and a few of the rear sight blanks to drill out and make peeps so I can at least have some repeatability. Is there a recommended smith who does these right? There are some local smiths but I would much prefer sending this out to somebody who does it on a regular basis. Thanks again to all who contributed, as above I will be combing through all of this throughout the summer and will see where I get.

[Maillemaker]

I'm thinking of ordering one of the taller front sights to have it brazed on and a few of the rear sight blanks to drill out and make peeps so I can at least have some repeatability. Is there a recommended smith who does these right?

I'd recommend a dovetailed front sight. This lets you adjust for windage plus you can then file the site to suit.

[Rick R]

Regarding that fouling shot, I used to have those 1st shot issues with a 2 band Parker Hale Enfield. I shot a target with 5 "first shots" cleaning between each one to see what I needed to do to make that first shot count. I learned that by giving that 1st round a little extra thump with the ramrod I'd get that one to group as well as subsequent shots. I also used to shoot that bad boy without cleaning between events so it only mattered for 1 stinking shot all day.

[Harry Gaul]

A member on the last team would have a special round just for that first shot with a clean barrel. He felt that an extra 5 grains of black powder in addition to his regular load would give him the extra "pop" that was needed to be accurate. After that first shot the barrel would be fouled, and his "regular load" is what he used to finish the relay. He hit more than he missed.

Harry in Pa.
Forney's Battalion
03626v