School me on Sniders

Tinman204

Tinman204

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Hey guys and gals!

My wife and I really enjoy shooting and reloading together. Afew months back we had the privilege of meeting some fellow gun nuts for coffee and got to handle and learn about antiques. We both really liked the sniders we got to see and it really never occured to me to get into antiques.

Since then we've been talking about getting into black powder shooting as yet another shooting related hobby. We shoot mainly ww1 vintage milsurps and we want to go pre 1898 for our next gun. We really want a Snider, and plan to add one to our collection be a regular shooter.

That being said, I've done some reading, used the search function here and watched some YouTube videos about reloading for a .577 snider.

What more should I know? Ive checked out IMA's website and have knowticed the Nepal sniders for sale on there in both cleaned up and untouched condition. I'm pretty handy and can fix just about anything so an untouched gun may be an option. Then there's the 3 bands, 2 bands and of course the cavalry carbines. I personally like long guns like my Turk Mauser and Ross so I really would like a 3 band. But I've read that the shorter guns have different rifling which generally makes them better shooters?

Also because they aren't super common I'm not sure what a fair price would be for each model in good shooter grade condition? I'd even consider a Sporter for my first one just to get my feet wet.

So do any of you guys shoot your sniders fairly regularily?

Also which models are good shooters, safer (mk3? With the latch on the chamber?)

Anyhow without rambling on any pictures or info would be great! I really want to buy a snider but I'm still not sure which one?
 
I think that I would stick with a british snider rather than one of the nepalese one. My limited experience with the nepalese guns is that the bores are not particularly uniform. Over and above that, in my experience, sniders are one of the most difficult guns to get to shoot well. I am not sure why but at least for me, I still can't get mine to shoot well. If you want to stick with pre 1898 military guns, I would go with a martini in 450 - 577. While they also have their challenges, the challenges are much less than for a snider

cheers mooncoon
 
yes the martini henrys are the way to go but you will end up wanting a snider all over again i got a cadet carbine for a new to sniders guy id stay away from the nepal guns like mooncoon said the bores are not always uniform and the chambers are almost always out of round

thing about both is the bore diameter british martinis tend to like .468"-.470" bullets in the 480gr range (the bullet being the same shape as the original) british sniders tend to like bullets in the .585"-.600" and different weights/lengths depending on twist rate 3 groove is around 1 in 78" twist and 5 groove is around 1 in 48

i know nothing about the nepal sniders(made in nepal) other then what ive said above the nepal made "martinis" the gahendra and the francotte are different the francotte is 100% always a wall hanger and the gahendra is hit and miss but if you do get a good one its not something you can take out and shoot alot they are weaker

IMA has plenty of british made martinis mostly mk2's and mk4's
 
mooncoon said:
I think that I would stick with a british snider rather than one of the nepalese one. My limited experience with the nepalese guns is that the bores are not particularly uniform. Over and above that, in my experience, sniders are one of the most difficult guns to get to shoot well. I am not sure why but at least for me, I still can't get mine to shoot well. If you want to stick with pre 1898 military guns, I would go with a martini in 450 - 577. While they also have their challenges, the challenges are much less than for a snider

cheers mooncoon
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I don't mind a challenge! My Turk Mauser was in a crawlspace for like 10 years and probably wasnt fired or cleaned for 40 years. The rifling was almost undetecable from all of the fouling. Spent over a month nightly cleaning and polishing the bore, and working on the stock in between cleaning sessions. The stock needed some bedding and had a good crack in it. The gun shot 16" "groups" @ 20 yards if you can even call them that when I got it. Now it's a 3 moa gun at 100 and although it's not even close to being my most accurate gun it's one of my favorites to shoot.

I guess I like a challenge and am prepared to put my time in. Sniders are different and if being defferent was easy everyone would have a snider! I'm always a guy who likes a challenge. Just want as much info as possible to make sure I end up with a good example to start off with.
 
Sniders - muzzle loading or breechloading conversions? Those are the only two I know. As a Canadian, you ought to start with something from this part of the world first before buying an Asian gun through a US dealer. There are good Canadian Sniders out there, and they appear on the Exchange periodically.
 
maple_leaf_eh said:
Sniders - muzzle loading or breechloading conversions? Those are the only two I know. As a Canadian, you ought to start with something from this part of the world first before buying an Asian gun through a US dealer. There are good Canadian Sniders out there, and they appear on the Exchange periodically.
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mk 1 and mk 2 sniders use the lock and barrel from p1853 enfield muskets mk 3 snider are made from the ground up as new guns with steel barrels

there is no canadian made sniders just snider that canada used
 
Sniders

Sniders are great guns to learn on as far as BP cartridge guns go. Due to the fact that the brass is almost a straight wall case they are much easier to learn to reload than the Martini Henry is. The first rifle I ever bought (4 years ago) was a "DC" marked LAC 1863 Snider Mk.II**. I had never shot or reloaded anything before that, & I learned how to on it.

Having said that I belong to a club with a thriving black powder section & quite a few people helped me out with time & their experiences. I shoot my Snider most weeks & estimate that I have put some 3000+ rounds through it by now. Unfortunately since I had never shot anything before I had no idea when I started if the lousy results were me or the load I was using. I have tried FG, FFG anywhere from 50 grains to 75 grains, round balls, 3 different minies, paper patching & a short slug; carded wool filler, cotton wool filler, corn meal filler & Cream of Wheat filler. After all this time & experimenting I can now manage to keep almost all shots in the black at 50 yards. My first targets looked more like a shotgun blast with very big shot :).

One of the problems with the Nepal Sniders is that some have out of round chambers which can cause difficulties in extraction....they were Nepalese made unlike the Martini's from the cache which were British made. This does not include the Gaehendra & Francotte which again were Nepalese made & doubtful in some aspects as far as shooting now.

I also now shoot Martini's & while they are great to shoot & own (I now have 7) they are not so easy to learn on as far as reloading is concerned, because the bottle neck case means you are more limited in the choice of fillers. Granular fillers which are easiest to measure & load can (reputedly) slug up & cause problems at the cartridge neck. Cotton wool was the military filler for the Martini.

My recommendation would be to get a British made Snider at a local gun show, learn to reload & shoot & then move on or incorporate a Martini Henry as you become more familiar with it all. "The British Militaria Forum" is a great place to go for some knowledge, however, most members are American & they are more familiar with the Nepalese Snider & it's peculiar problems than the British guns.

Be careful with Youtube. One guy was advocating loading the Snider with 85 grains of BP. Since the military load was 70 grains that recommendation seemed a bit foolhardy to me, if not downright dangerous. You can also use the correct size Shotgun hulls in the Snider (24 guage if memory serves), & I saw another video using a smaller case & wrapping it with masking tape to bulk it up....again not a good idea.

So Sniders are great guns & have many years of Canadian use & history behind them. Martini Henry's are great guns with less Canadian history but much more British army history. Sniders are easier to reload for & will use less powder & kick less. So there you go. If you PM me I will give you the links to some pictures of each (my first of each) & I also posted a bunch of picture I took at IMA's warehouse's from when I was there in Oct. 2011. An amazing place.

Cheers,
Peter (in Burlington, Ontario)
 
I have been shooting Sniders since 1998, and have several of them. They shoot best with the big Rapine Trashcan wadcutter Minie, but I think that mould is no longer made. The Lee Minie shoots not too badly, but seems to work better in the faster twist short rifles.

FG has always given me the best accuracy in Sniders. With the Rapine bullet hitting the 200m. gong was a sure thing every shot. Fill the hollow base of the bullet with lube, and accuracy will be maintained for as long as your supply of ammo lasts. I had about 75 cases at one point, and could shoot them all without cleaning and still hit 1 litre milk cartons at 100m.

Avoid magnum primers, they wash out the throat. Avoid smokeless, as smokeless loads are not only lame, they eventually open up your headspace.

Buy a Canadian issue Mk. II** with a good bore. Do not buy a Mk.III sight unseen, as many of them have wobbly breech blocks. The Short Rifles are the best shooters, they handle easier and the faster rifling twist is nice. Avoid IMA, there are more GOOD Sniders in Canada than anywhere else in the world. Try the EE or one of the outfits in Canada like P&S who carry a good selection.

My first shots with the Snider went everywhere, only one hit the target at 25 YARDS! :p I found eventually that 72-73gr. of FG with the Rapine or Lee bullet provided good accuracy, and I used a bit of Cream of Wheat as filler over the powder. Avoid corn meal, as it has a lot of sugar in it, which turns to sugar crystals in the bore. Use 50/50 mix of beeswax and Crisco as lube, with a bit of corn oil added in Winter. Fill the hollow base with the lube.

Clean up is easy, take out the screw that retains the breech block axis pin, and remove the pin, spring, and block. Run a wet patch down the bore, up and down a few times, dry, then clean with Hoppes #9. I usually clean at the range before coming home. Otherwise the house smells like bad eggs if you clean indoors!

If you want any more info, PM me, and I can answer any questions.
 
One more thing, the "safety breech" on the Snider Mk. III is neither here nor there, it originally came about due to the use of the Boxer cartridge. The cartridge would sometimes blow out at the base and the gas could get under the block and blow it open. The iron rim of the case would hit the soldier on the head. The Mk.II** had a hollow hammer nose to hold the block closed, then the Mk.III came out with the positive latch. I think the idea was to make the action feel "safer" by having the latch to push on. In reality many Mk.III's got loose in service. You sometimes find Sniders like my long rifle, with the entire Mk.III action replaced with that of a II**.

The Snider breech block needs a LITTLE bit of play in order to function properly. When the gun discharges, the block comes back as far as this play allows. The pin plunger arrangement on the II* and II** keeps the block in alignment as this happens. On the Mk. III the locking plunger has too much wobble, and the strain is taken by the extractor tube at the SIDE of the block. Eventually, the block can become loose on the hinge. The Mk.III also has less metal in the important area behind the breech block.

You probably should not pay more than $1000 for a really good Snider, and half that for a good shooter grade one.
 
minie bullets dont tend to work too well too long for the slow twist guns and to small to fit well

stand by load of today a pure lead .600 round ball a grease cookie under it and then the powder charge this is in a brass or plastic 24ga hull

the breech does stay shut with the mk3 more then the early pattern guns this can be seen when a 28ga hull is used insted of a 24ga the cadet carbine did not like the idea much but my firends mk3 did not even move split cases sometimes do the samething
 
I would not even consider using 28ga. shells in the Snider, bad idea. Even the 24ga. brass shells... I had a few of those converted for the Martini Henry and they lasted for two full power loads. Get some good lathe turned brass cases, and they will last your lifetime. Out of my original batch, bought from Norm Walden, I condemned exactly 1 case due to a crack in the case mouth. I have reloaded those case well over 100 times each in 15 years, in fact, I stopped keeping track after 80 reloads and that was some time around 2002-03. There is no problem at all with minies in the Snider, the key is finding the right one. Length is irrelevant as the balance in hollow base bullets is farther toward the nose, like a Foster slug.

The key is finding a bullet with a DEEP hollow base, as for being undersize, that is what the hollow base is for. Shoot into a sand backstop and dig out your bullets, then check to be sure they are expanding into the rifling. All the ones I have tried were engraved perfectly, even those cast from wheelweight metal. If you load a squib load, the bullets won't expand into the rifling at all.
 
BUSHMAN79 said:
I would not even consider using 28ga. shells in the Snider, bad idea. Even the 24ga. brass shells... I had a few of those converted for the Martini Henry and they lasted for two full power loads. Get some good lathe turned brass cases, and they will last your lifetime. Out of my original batch, bought from Norm Walden, I condemned exactly 1 case due to a crack in the case mouth. I have reloaded those case well over 100 times each in 15 years, in fact, I stopped keeping track after 80 reloads and that was some time around 2002-03. There is no problem at all with minies in the Snider, the key is finding the right one. Length is irrelevant as the balance in hollow base bullets is farther toward the nose, like a Foster slug.

The key is finding a bullet with a DEEP hollow base, as for being undersize, that is what the hollow base is for. Shoot into a sand backstop and dig out your bullets, then check to be sure they are expanding into the rifling. All the ones I have tried were engraved perfectly, even those cast from wheelweight metal. If you load a squib load, the bullets won't expand into the rifling at all.
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brass shotshells have lasted quite a while in my in my snider i use nothing but soild head cases in the martini only thing that should be used in the martini
 
Original KYNOCH drawn-brass Snider cases had a wrapped-paper-with-shellac liner in the casings. These liners were .030" thick and extended from the very bottom of the casing, to the base of the "shoulder" and took up the inside space which formerly was occupied by all the folderol of the Boxer casing. With these cases, a charge of Black and a simple waxed-paper wad over the powder was sufficient to hold things together.

A BIG problem with all Sniders is the PROJECTILE. There were 9 Marks of Service ammunition in a very few years because they were attempting to get better accuracy and they didn't know what they were doing. We can see the problems today, easily: they were trying to use MUZZELOADER SOLUTIONS for BREECHLOADER PROBLEMS.

BREECHLOADERS depend on filling the bore with an oversized bullet. That's how they get accuracy. If you do the same with a Snider, you will get good accuracy with very little additional work. Pure lead slug, wax wad under it and the slug about 008" oversize from the BORE and she should be good to go.

A REALLY good Snider can set you back a grand, yes. I sold one for that, almost 20 years ago, but it was UNFIRED..... and that DOES make a difference! A good Shooter grade rifle will cost dramatically less and a Bubba will cost less yet. Janice and I do not have a lot of money; she gets Disability and I am on OAP. You saw her "new" Snider..... well, new to her, anyway! She paid $225 plus shipping on that one; it was a good price but not excessively so. She will have her Snider at the range in July, so it is likely that she MIGHT let you have a shot or 6 with it (I'm in charge of making the ammo for it and I have about 90 casings and 1060 primers). Hers is a Mark II** and it does have Canadian markings, even though the wood is chopped.

There are lots of Bubbas around and you are handy with tools. You might think on getting a Bubba and rebuilding it. That will make it YOURS and NOBODY else's, ever!

I will make a few inquiries and PM you.
 
Sniders are hardly rare in Canada. Ones in as-issued condition are for sale regularly. Prices have increased from the $25-$30 of my salad days.
Sported ones are more common. I have a few real beaters and some extra parts picked up cheap. Have two shooters, the bores and actions are respectable. One is a II** with full length barrel and stock cut in front of the band. The other is an as issued II**. Good bores, actions. The sported one must have been used for huntng, the front sight is painted dayglow.
Have been working up composite cases. 4130 machined steel tube bases, with an annealed belted magnum case run through it. Fireforming is proceeding well. Amazing how the brass will expand to fit the chamber. Looks as if it takes two fireforming loads to blow things out fully. Doing it this way just for the sake of doing it. Going to take one of the salvaged detached barrels and ream it smooth to make a shotgun.
 
tiriaq said:
Sniders are hardly rare in Canada. Ones in as-issued condition are for sale regularly. Prices have increased from the $25-$30 of my salad days.
Sported ones are more common. I have a few real beaters and some extra parts picked up cheap. Have two shooters, the bores and actions are respectable. One is a II** with full length barrel and stock cut in front of the band. The other is an as issued II**. Good bores, actions. The sported one must have been used for huntng, the front sight is painted dayglow.
Have been working up composite cases. 4130 machined steel tube bases, with an annealed belted magnum case run through it. Fireforming is proceeding well. Amazing how the brass will expand to fit the chamber. Looks as if it takes two fireforming loads to blow things out fully. Doing it this way just for the sake of doing it. Going to take one of the salvaged detached barrels and ream it smooth to make a shotgun.
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glad to see the idea is working for you i on the other hand am still looking for a guy with a lathe local that will work for cheap

im thinking this may be a way from not using as much filler in the MH with smokeless
 
Don't know that I would want to pay commercial hourly rate to have the bases turned on a manual lathe. At a standard hourly rate, even with a bit of practice, it takes time.
Chuck up tubing; face; run in chambering reamer (only cuts the first 1/2" or so); check w/headspace gauge, adjust as necessary; set rim thickness, turn down base diameter, w/slight taper; part off. When a batch is done, reverse them, countersink a taper for brass expansion. Neck splitting when fireforming isn't a major problem, and even then the steel head can be salvaged and the brass replaced.
Case volume is reduced, I guess this would be an advantage with a M-H.
 
tiriaq said:
Don't know that I would want to pay commercial hourly rate to have the bases turned on a manual lathe. At a standard hourly rate, even with a bit of practice, it takes time.
Chuck up tubing; face; run in chambering reamer (only cuts the first 1/2" or so); check w/headspace gauge, adjust as necessary; set rim thickness, turn down base diameter, w/slight taper; part off. When a batch is done, reverse them, countersink a taper for brass expansion. Neck splitting when fireforming isn't a major problem, and even then the steel head can be salvaged and the brass replaced.
Case volume is reduced, I guess this would be an advantage with a M-H.
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yeah i may get powder compression with BP and less cotton wool with smokeless. good thing about the tough alloy that is 4130 and using it for this i doubt they will wear out fast its more of a investment then anything but i can't do anything till i get some primers

soory for the hijack OP
 
smellie said:
A REALLY good Snider can set you back a grand, yes. I sold one for that, almost 20 years ago, but it was UNFIRED..... and that DOES make a difference! A good Shooter grade rifle will cost dramatically less and a Bubba will cost less yet. Janice and I do not have a lot of money; she gets Disability and I am on OAP. You saw her "new" Snider..... well, new to her, anyway! She paid $225 plus shipping on that one; it was a good price but not excessively so. She will have her Snider at the range in July, so it is likely that she MIGHT let you have a shot or 6 with it (I'm in charge of making the ammo for it and I have about 90 casings and 1060 primers). Hers is a Mark II** and it does have Canadian markings, even though the wood is chopped.

There are lots of Bubbas around and you are handy with tools. You might think on getting a Bubba and rebuilding it. That will make it YOURS and NOBODY else's, ever!

I will make a few inquiries and PM you.
Click to expand...

Got your Pm. I also am far from rich, as you know Lauren suffers from nerve damage and is unable to work at this time. A grand is a little steep for me at this time but even if I can start with a bubba'd rifle it would be a chance to load and play with something of the black powder variety.

I'm so excited for July but there is much testing and tuning to be done before then. Hope to have a good load worked up for my Turk Mauser I'm close but I know it could be better. I will make her shoot before July simply because I want you guys be able to shoot the hell out of it!! I got the Ross dialed in so that makes a load for the AG Parker top priority! So much work so little time!

Back to sniders!

Think I would start with 24g shot hulls from Grafs loaded with .600 round balls which from info I've gotten on other forums seem to shoot well in most but not all sniders. There's a really good video series on youtube about loading and shooting the .577 snider. It's under "Murphy's muskets", in one video he shows a load with 24 g shot hulls cut to 2" and the loaded with 70 GR of FFG topped with no filler but the .600 round ba is seated in to the point that it crushes the powder. He the fills the end of the cartridge with lube and completely covers the round ball. Not sure if this is a safe way to do it but he shoots them after and gets good accuracy. I have a very good friend in Winnipeg whom is a good machinist and a millwright by trade and he said he'd be willing to take a crack at making cases for me. That being said I'd still have to get .577 snider dies and a single stage press that would take the larger base dies.

Anyhow, the gun show is this weekend maybe I'll find a suitable bubba snider there. It's my birthday on Friday so maybe luck will be with me this weekend and I'll find a birthday present for myself.
 
antiqueguy said:
yeah i may get powder compression with BP and less cotton wool with smokeless. good thing about the tough alloy that is 4130 and using it for this i doubt they will wear out fast its more of a investment then anything but i can't do anything till i get some primers

soory for the hijack OP
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No hijack in my books. You guys are throwing around info which WILL come in handy to me one day. I copy and paste this stuff and file it. It becomes like shop manual for the caliber I'm interested in loading. Saves a lot of time when I run into problems!!!

Post away!!!
 
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