a .45 cal BP rifle 451 or 454 ball?

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drslav

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Tjis is going to sound completely ignorant. But I have opportunity to fire a BP Pedersoli Kentucky rifle in 45 cal. My question is basic. What do I need?
What powder do I use how much of it and what do I load it with? Buy a flask thing? What kind of ball or bullet do I use.? Any advice will be appreciated. I know nothing ...
Thank you all.
 
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Well flint or percussion ?

All of what you need can be found at track of the wolf they ship to canada.

To start i would reccomend:
-FFFG goex powder ( start at 45 grains and go up from there for a charge)
-Ball starter/ short starter
-.45 caliber balls (.440 dia)
-Possibles bag
-Adjustable powder measure
Couple extra flints/ or a tin of caps if its percussion
-Vent pick and pan brush if its flint
-Ball flask is helpful
-.45 caliber patches, lubed with spit or vegetable shortining mixed with beeswax (best thing to keep them in ive found is an empty chewing tobbaco tin)
-A tool set with ( ball puller, patch worm, cleaning brush, fouling scraper)
- knapping hammer to sharpen flints

Thats pretty basic and will serve you well, you can get more in depth as time goes on if you like

Where are you in ontario ? Im living in maniwaki 1 1/2 hours north of ottawa and shoot my black powder here regularly.

Cheers, McLean
 
Have a pocket knife handy as well, you can buy a product called spit patch or simular from thompson centre, traditions and such that may be better suited for someone new. Just be dang sure that ball is seated on the powder!!

CAUTION: Shooting Black powder is extremely addictive, the addiction rapidly advances usually proceeding with the first shot. Early signs include a big grin, fidgeting untill the next load is ready to go and giggling like a schoolgirl!!!
 
Yes forgot to mention a little knife. Ive recently started making my own cartridges for shooting and they really speed up loading.

For me it started when I went into my dads safe one day to get something and I saw a percussion lyman .45 cal hawken. I dug around in the shed and found his old bag and gear and went to the range. Guessed at how much powder and how it worked then boom! I was totally hooked, then came the percussion revolver two flint pistols 3 percussion ones and several rifles. Even have a matchlock now which im still trying to figure out.

Its alot of fun, Hell I even have a 1/2 scale confederate mountain howitzer. Costumes and all kinds of stuff.

Cheers, McLean
 
Thank you for the info. I am visiting mu aunt in edmonton. Her husband has that rifle and had no idea how to use it..in fact he was not sure whether is real!!!
he inherited it from his father. I know nothing about this stuff. Last time i visited i had no idea how nice of a rifle this was. So did some research on value and make...its never fired i think...



mrclean89 said:
Well flint or percussion ?

All of what you need can be found at track of the wolf they ship to canada.

To start i would reccomend:
-FFFG goex powder ( start at 45 grains and go up from there for a charge)
-Ball starter/ short starter
-.45 caliber balls (.440 dia)
-Possibles bag
-Adjustable powder measure
Couple extra flints/ or a tin of caps if its percussion
-Vent pick and pan brush if its flint
-Ball flask is helpful
-.45 caliber patches, lubed with spit or vegetable shortining mixed with beeswax (best thing to keep them in ive found is an empty chewing tobbaco tin)
-A tool set with ( ball puller, patch worm, cleaning brush, fouling scraper)
- knapping hammer to sharpen flints

Thats pretty basic and will serve you well, you can get more in depth as time goes on if you like

Where are you in ontario ? Im living in maniwaki 1 1/2 hours north of ottawa and shoot my black powder here regularly.

Cheers, McLean
Click to expand...
 
Post some pics and we can help you with that here too! Mooncoon will hopefully hime in and lend his expert knowledge to identify it.

Cheers, McLean
 
[youtube]3CEbBv4U71M[/youtube]

Don't forget to seat your ball on the powder without an air gap. Your ram rod will bounce off the load when seated - you'll learn to recognize the feeling. You might over compress, but that should theoretically give you a slower burn.
 
drslav said:
Tjis is going to sound completely ignorant. But I have opportunity to fire a BP Pedersoli Kentucky rifle in 45 cal. My question is basic. What do I need?
What powder do I use how much of it and what do I load it with? Buy a flask thing? What kind of ball or bullet do I use.? Any advice will be appreciated. I know nothing ...
Thank you all.
Click to expand...

I have the same rifle in .50. It is my current favorite and converts easily between percussion and flint, which is a nice option.

I agree with all the information above. :cool:
To get you started, I can even send a few spare .440" round ball and patches to your Edmonton address if you want.

Always happy to help a new BP shooter get started.

By the way, cleaning your BP gun after shooting it is essential. Be sure to read up on what you have to do to properly clean a pinned rifle like the Kentucky.

Happy shooting!
 
I have not gotten into bp shooting yet but its coming soon ,one thing I have read here from these guys is that if you don't know the rifle ,,make darn sure there is not already a charge and ball in there,it would be bad to put another charge and ball in on top of one already there.
 
it was soooo fun. went to cabellas and picked up some stuff to start. got 50 gr load. was good enough. we had a blast. cant wait to do it again.
thank you all for the help. I think i will buy one too. will post some pics..or vid
 
So it went well. but i am thinking that maybe the bullets we used went in the barrel a bit too easy. Also seems like they shot way too low. Any ideas? we used 50 gr of FFF pyrodex
In the meantime here is short vid and a foto with the gun of my cousin letting it go. She is a true country girl.

click on the first image for vid


IMG_1175.jpg
 
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I presume you're shooting patched round balls? If they virtually drop in there your patches would be too thin, or the balls you were shooting may be slightly undersized (which you can make up for with a thicker patch if you know in advance what you're shootin') - that would affect accuracy. Not all lead balls or patch material are equal size, you need to have a combo that fills the bore diameter of your rifle. If you are using pre-bought patches I think they'll usually tell you how thick they are - but I usually cut my own & use a micrometer to select the right material.

I make that all sound complicated it ain't! Keep shootin' :)
 
We did not shoot balls. Guy at cabellas said the .45cal bullets we picked up were ok for it, i am beginning to think maybe they are supposed to be ball and patch only. The barrel is rifled though. What do you think??
YES its very addictive...we had too much fun.
 
Depends on the rifling, if it is a 1:48" twist then slugs should be fine. I usually shoot patched balls though so someone with more Mini experience can chime in on that.

If it was a 1:48" then, assuming the slug was the correct bore dia then I'd suggest trying it out with different powder charges. That's part of the fun with BP...think of it as reloading experimentation without the hassle of loading cartridges.

What distance were you shooting at? I find 10 grains can make a pretty big difference here and there...50 gr on my .54 prints low at 100 yards but going to 70 raises the POI substantally (check max loads for your rifle of course!).
 
Thing about shooting muzzle loaders is that you're playing with all the variables each time you reload.

Twist rate is obviously a factor on deciding for bullet weight, and consequently conical or round ball owing to concical's ability to weigh more for a given bore diameter.

If your groups were consistantly tight but low, then either it's sighted for a different distance or charge. If they were low but all over the place, then it could be a number of things.


Also, to clear something up - many, if not the majority of traditional muzzle loaders pre... lets say 1850s shot round ball even though they were rifled. Minie balls came in sometime mid century, but round ball was still popular what with the older guns still being too valuable just to throw away in favour of a gun built for minie ball... and round ball shoots nicely for most shooters. The Cabela's guy in all likelyhood didn't have a clue and sold you whatever he sees inline muzzle loader guys shooting, or was priced at a premium :p
 
I think the fellow at Cabelas was thinking of modern inlines when he gave you his advice. While some traditional rifles can stabilize mini and maxi balls (both are elongate) almost all or all trail walk type competitions are shot with patched roundball. I would suspect your gun will shoot more or less to the point of aim with patched round ball. The mini ball was a military bullet and was invented by Captain Minie of the french army in the late 1830s or early 1840s.

The thickness of the patch is sort of a balance between ease of loading and adequately gripping the rifling. I currently use a patch that requires some resistance to push down but does not hurt my hand using the short starter. I buy my patching (100% cotton) from Fabric Land by the meter and I use a micrometer to select the thickness that I want. I would suspect you will end up using something around .015" thick with light compression. I tear a strip of cloth off of the large piece of material and keep it rolled up in a patch box (not the one on the gun) soaked in moose milk and cut my patches at the muzzle. I use a greasy lube for hunting but never for practice shooting.

I am not a great believer in the bouncing the rod method of seating the ball; I have a mark on my ramrod that comes flush with the muzzle when my standard load is seated. While on the subject I use a wooden ramrod and push the ball down with a series of short taps, keeping my hand about 6 or 8" above the muzzle. If I had my hand a couple of feet up and pushed hard and the rod broke, I would stand a high risk of driving it through my hand. I have had several rods break over the past 30 years, mostly because of poor grain but have never speared myself. I usually epoxy them back together and go on using them and usually go several years without breaking one.

cheers mooncoon
 
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