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ian45662
01-11-2009, 12:00 PM
How do you guys make up your smooth bore loads?

Greg Ogdan, 11444
01-12-2009, 10:33 AM
For me, .678 hard lead ball, rolled between two hoof rasps, liquid alox lube over 50 grains of FFFg Goex. I shoot a Potsdam.

pastore
01-12-2009, 02:23 PM
.678 ball, knurled, liquid Alox,45gr FFF Schutzen. Armi Sport Macon conversion

Phil Spaugy, 3475V
01-12-2009, 03:08 PM
.678 ball, hard lead, sprue down, dipped thrice in beeswax / peanut oil lube. 70 grains, 2F.

Fire and Fall Back.

Philo

Jim Brady Knap's Battery
01-12-2009, 03:37 PM
How's this? .688 soft ball, 80 grs Goex 2F, beeswax/crisco/olive oil lube, sprue down in tube for a thrice dipping, sprue up, lube down up in bore.

Jim Brady
2249V
Knap's Battery

Jim Strang
01-12-2009, 04:40 PM
.678 Lyman, any lead, sprue-to-muzzle, 80g 2f Goex, aluminum-foil wrapped "cartridge," 50/50 beeswax/crisco, thrice-dipt.

ian45662
01-12-2009, 09:32 PM
how do you make a foil cartridge? When you guys talk about lube are you just dipping the ball in the lube and loading it like that with nothing else?

shilohzowie
01-13-2009, 09:20 AM
Heres' what I do; Musket on ground,pick up rocks,chuck rocks side-armed. Green

pastore
01-13-2009, 09:25 AM
When you guys talk about lube are you just dipping the ball in the lube and loading it like that with nothing else?

With liquid alox you coat the balls with the lube and let them dry overnight.

Jim Strang
01-13-2009, 04:03 PM
Ian: I have a series of step-by-step pics I'll email you separately. Shilohzowie, sometimes that's a more successful approach! Green

David Disher 12143
01-15-2009, 12:12 PM
.678 ball, shake the daylights out of 25 or 30 in a coffee can, liquid alox, 62grains of 3F, and about 10 minutes of prayer to ask God to let them fly straight. Original 1816 Waters, Hoyt Barrel.


Popeye
110th OVI
12143

PS. the prayer is optional, but essential.

R Filbert
02-03-2009, 10:13 AM
Seems like .678s are popular? Mine is a .690 diped in 50/50 bees wax and lanolin. As for the balls- I remove the sprue completly with a file or small brass hammer then chuck em in a vibatory tumbler for about 20 min.Works very well- can't even find sprue mark- Look like Hornadys rite out of the box! I shoot an origianal macon type 1 and a hughs & philips- the hughs requiers a .678 with .50grns fff goex doe's very well at 25 & 50yrds.

Jim_Burgess_2078V
02-03-2009, 12:58 PM
To be different, I shoot a .672 ball (a previously acquired Lyman mold)with 75 grains FFg. To take up the extra windage in the bore the ball is wrapped in aluminum foil. When I first started shooting my Armi-Sport M1842, my cartridges were made much like original paper-wrapped cartridges, just substituting the foil for the paper. That got too labor-intensive so now I use plastic tubes for the powder topped off with foil wrapped balls and enough extra foil to serve as wadding over the balls when loaded. Several drops of melted Crisco go on each musket ball before it is sealed in the foil. Lube inside the foil keeps my cartridge box from getting greasy. I've never felt that Liquid Alox offers much to keep fouling soft as it is designed to prevent leading with modern cast bullets. Probably due to the smaller diameter balls, I can shoot both 25 and 50 yard individual targets OR an entire team match without having to clean/brush the bore. In the interest of full disclosure, I am now ranked among the sharpshooters in smoothbore competition, have never won any smoothbore medals, but shoot it at the Nationals just for the fun of it.
Jim Burgess, 15th Conn. Vol. Inf.

Tim Lyne
02-05-2009, 06:32 AM
An observation: Try to keep your mould at a consistant temperature, elsewise you may get varying ball dimensions. My experience has been that smoothbore accuracy relies pretty heavily on consistancy in ball size. If your sprue puddle takes more than 15 minutes to solidify, and you find that you can cast by the glow of your mould, it's a safe bet your mould is overheated and that ball is going to need some persuasion to reach the breech....

My load: .690 ball in a .695 bore, sprue up in tube (which means sprue down in bore), 80gr. of 3F, sufficient lube to keep my hair slicked back and the fouling soft.

That's pretty much it for the physical, nuts and bolts aspects of smoooth tube loads. Here are a couple of helpful metaphysical tips:
1. The smoothbore Gods are fickle. They will happily give you eight 10's in a row, then humble you with one at 3:00 in the five ring followed by an overcompensated zero at 9:00.
2. Brady and I believe that the Gods are appeased, at least in part, by foul language. Therefore make foul language as important a part of your training regieme as your shooting. (Apparently many others have found this to be true as well. I have often been impressed with the amount and variety of praise offered to the smoothbore Gods on the shooting line.)
3. If the intensity and quality of your praise proves fruitful, it's important to remain humble in victory. Practice humility with phrases like, "Yeah, a 99-5X is okay I guess", "Awww shucks" and "T'weren't nawthin'"

Tim Lyne
Knap's Batt.
#2952V

hp gregory, 9128
02-05-2009, 08:00 AM
i have tired about every kind of smoothy i could get my hands on. they all seem to shoot pretty good at 25 yds with 45 grains of 3f swiss and a proper size ball rolled on files and dipped in allox. i think the allox acts more as a seal than a lube. the key to this load is the fact that swiss burns so clean there is very little fouling. while most do pretty good at 25 the hard part is geting one to do well at 50 yds.
i have found that smoothbores like to get your hopes up by doing very well at 50yds on a given day then dash those hopes the very next trip out. even though you used the same ammo and shot under the same conditions. the dam things are just plain evil.
since i have reached my wits end trying to get a smoothbore to shoot well at 50 i have decided to take things to the next level. i contacted an old witchy woman that lives way back in the mountains in a cave. she promised me that she had the perfect lube that would make any smoothbore shoot like a musket. she claims she makes it out of chicken blood, ground up frog warts and big foot poop. she promised me that my smoothbore problems are over. man i can hardly wait to give it a try.

hp gregory

David Disher 12143
02-05-2009, 08:23 AM
That sounds a lot like somebody's recipe for the breading on those yummy jalepeno poppers....maybe we are onto something here.

ddisher
110th OVI
12143

Phil Spaugy, 3475V
02-08-2009, 02:39 PM
HP,

I agree with your observation that percussion smoothbores can be a bit finicky or even evil, but being a bit of an adventuresome sort, I shot my M1816 flinter smoothbore in one of our Sunday morning smoothbore matches today. Suffice to say that by adding the flint ignition to the mix, why it takes the smoothbore challenge to a whole new level. Sort of like "Extreme Smoothbore"

Heck 2 times I reached into my cap box, and damn near dropped the cap into the priming pan.

All that said it was great fun, and I even won a box of crackers and some mustard !!!

See you soon,

Phil

Greg Ogdan, 11444
02-09-2009, 08:34 AM
Tim, The problem isn't with the Smoothie, it's just that you, HP, and all the really good shooters think you can take credit for those 10's. If you were a crappy shooter like me, you would realize that those 10's are just the Smoothie Gods sucking you in so you will buy more powder and lead. Of course, all of us pay homage to the Gods with the foul language, it's just that some of us don't really to expect to get results. Just get your expectations in line and remember this: At the end of the day, there is alcohol and good friendship!

Tim Lyne
02-13-2009, 06:32 AM
Well said Greg.

No matter what the outcome, a day spent shooting is STILL better than a good day at work....or getting poked in the eye with a sharp stick.

And you're right about the Alcohol and friends thing; Just like some of our spouses, some ugly targets I've shot have always looked much better (and scored higher!) at 2:00 a.m. when surrounded by friends, music and empty Iron City beer cans.

Tim Lyne
Knap's Batt.
#2952V

Walt Magee
02-13-2009, 06:42 AM
More powder! 70 Grains of fff works great. If you are recoil sensitive go back to shooting a 22