snider.577

Snider load

That's interesting. I finally getting my shots (mostly) in the black when I stopped using cotton wool & switched to corn meal as a filler. With the same bullets (FB pure lead), I moved from scoring in the 60's to the 80's.

Peter (Burlington, Ontario)

stevejones said:
I had been trying to coerce my snider to shoot well with minnies for about a year until I accidentally cast some out of wheel weights. The result was like night and day. My current pet load is 65 grains of 2F with a thin gasket material wad. Then it is topped with cream of wheat. I can keep all the shots in the black with this load at 100.

Cheers. Steve.
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but who sells it?

Can you tell us who sells it in Canada?

Cheers. Steve.

Dantforth said:
In any three band Snider the round ball cast at .590" - .600" will work the best. These slow twist rifles were not designed to shoot conical bullets. I have a .590" conical bullet which will shoot well but not as well as round balls. A very short conical, given the diameter of the Snider and the 1:72" twist rate, may shoot better than the longer conicals. Mooncoon, what is the twist rate of the Snider double? Have you slugged the bore...what is the diameter? I am close to Maitland On. so I will have to find out who it is there making the cast bullets. By the way, the two band Snider is a "short rifle" and not termed a carbine.....picky, I know! I have three conical moulds so if I can be of any assistance please advise. Dave
PS - Hillbilly, it is 24 guage brass you want. Magtech makes it and they are about $25.00 per box of 25.....full brass which needs to be trimmed before use.
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filers

biggles said:
That's interesting. I finally getting my shots (mostly) in the black when I stopped using cotton wool & switched to corn meal as a filler. With the same bullets (FB pure lead), I moved from scoring in the 60's to the 80's.

Peter (Burlington, Ontario)
Click to expand...

I think that the cream of wheat(or corn meal) is doing a couple of things. First, its coarse texture scours the rifling each time you fire, thus removing fouling from that very shallow enfield rifling. Try this in a muzzle loader. Put about 30 grains of either filler on top of your powder charge and then ram your ball on top. After firing you will notice that the next time you load the ball slides down very easily. The next advantage is that the filler seals gases from passing the projectile. You can observe this with your muzzle loader at the same time. Your groups will shrink noticably.
As an afterthought, the minnie I'm using is a short one that resembles a semi-wadcutter. It's a Lyman mold and is a 577.

Cheers. Steve.
 
corn meal

Thanks Steve....unfortunately (or not) I don't have a muzzle loader, I just shoot BP Cartridge, Snider & Martini Henry, at the moment anyway. I will remember for the future
Peter (Burlington, Ontario)

stevejones said:
I think that the cream of wheat(or corn meal) is doing a couple of things. First, its coarse texture scours the rifling each time you fire, thus removing fouling from that very shallow enfield rifling. Try this in a muzzle loader. Put about 30 grains of either filler on top of your powder charge and then ram your ball on top. After firing you will notice that the next time you load the ball slides down very easily. The next advantage is that the filler seals gases from passing the projectile. You can observe this with your muzzle loader at the same time. Your groups will shrink noticably.
As an afterthought, the minnie I'm using is a short one that resembles a semi-wadcutter. It's a Lyman mold and is a 577.

Cheers. Steve.
Click to expand...
 
Mooncoon, try filling the base of the conicals completely with lube and then shoot them. I have had some luck with this and have had it explained to me that the lube acts in a hydraulic manner, forcing the sides of the conical into the rifling. Recovering the bullets proved that the lube was still intact. I have learned something here and intend to experiment with the corn meal filler. Thanks to everybody for that! Dave
 
IMG_1427.jpg


.604 RB and the SWC (Snider With Courage) on the right.

RB is .604 dia and weighs 325
SWC is .594 dia and weighs 450.

Both shoot about the same, into about 3-4" at 50 metres. Lots of smoke and fun. Both of these moulds I think I got from the British Militaria Forum.
 
Lyman mold#

I just checked and the mold I have been using is a Lyman #542622AW and below is 748. They cast 577 diameter. The suggestion made to fill the base with lube is something I do as well. I melt my lube in a double boiler and immerse the minnie's in the lube. I then remove them from the lube ( no fingers its hot...) base first and place them upside down so after its cooled the lube has filled the base. I have always used a lube that had to be melted as it serves two purposes: first, when it cools it holds the bullet in the case and second, it stays on the minnie. I believe the combination of these things may be the trick. That base has to expand to grab that shallow Enfield rifling.
Oh by the way, I know the Snider action was an American but did the US use them? As far as I know, Sniders were a British (and Commonwealth) item.

Cheers. Steve.
 
I tried a new combination today and think I am beginning to have some success. I decided to use the deep cavity that I was shooting before but this time filled it with lube and upped the powder charge to 70 grains of 2F. I used a plunger to compress the powder a moderate amount then dumped in corn meal as a filler and finally seated the mini ball on top of that.
The first two shots (1 left and 1 right) were about 4" apart both horizontally and vertically then the rest of the shots grouped about 4" wide by 1" high all shots at 25 yards. More or less the left barrel grouped right and the right barrel grouped left so I am really talking about 2 groups of 2-3" wide by 1" high

I recovered one slug from the snow and it appears to have more or less filled the bore for most of its length and no distortion to speak of of the skirt. It appears to have expanded about .002 or .003" and the base rim of the skirt is quite dimpled from the corn meal filler but I don't think in a way to cause inaccuracy.

My next maneuver will be to increase the powder charge to 80 grains and hopefully end the cross firing. Those results should indicate where to go with the powder. My suspicion is that some of the shotgun wad filler that I used in the previous loads remained imbedded in the slugs and perhaps to a variable amount causing inaccuracy. I did not compress my previous loads and I am sure that lead to the previous vertical dispersion. Interestingly non of the soft grease filler to the cavity of the mini ball, remained when I picked up the slug. I am hoping to find the remaining 7 slugs in 3 or 4 days when the snow melts down

cheers mooncoon
 
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