Taking up BPCR shooting (just what I need, another project)

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Easyrider

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Hi, all.
I recently made a deal on a used Shiloh Sharpes 45/90, and am looking to become more knowledgeable about loading for it. I don't yet have the rifle in my possession, but it is on the way. I have a lot of experience with black powder shooting (mostly muzzle loader), reloading, bullet casting, paper patching, and a lot of related stuff. My research online, though, indicates that BPCR requires an extended skill set, and I am looking for reliable sources of knowledge. I am considering purchasing one or more of Paul Matthews books on the subject. I bought his book, Paper Jacket, a couple of years ago, and while it was pretty good, and fairly comprehensive, I found that he managed to jam 20 pages worth of actual information into 120 pages of book. Has anyone here read any of his BPCR books? Does anyone know of any other authors on the subject? Websites? I have spent a lot of hours on the various forums, and have learned quite a bit, but as with all forums, some contributors are more knowledgeable than others, and it can be a challenge to sort the fly #### from the pepper. Also, one or two of the US forums tend to be really nasty, lots of flaming. Quite tiresome. It makes one appreciate the friendly knowledgeable folks here on CGN! :d
Glen
 
Mike Venturino's book: "Shooting Buffalo Rifles of the Old West" might be a worthwhile read. Venturino has quite a bit of BPCR experience. In the book, he does a pretty good job of explaining the basics of black powder cartridge shooting and setup. Plus some of the finer points as well. The book is entertaining and informative, covering a wide variety of firearms and cartridges. Including the 45-90. You may find it useful. Alongside "The Paper Jacket", which you already have, Paul Matthews also published: "Loading the Black Powder Rifle Cartridge". And: "Shooting the Black Powder Cartridge Rifle". Matthews does go into more detail on the subject of building load columns than Venturino. Though Matthews mostly concentrates on 45-70 cartridge and rifles, this information should be useful to you when developing your own loads for the 45-90, as well.
 
http:/ /www.wahsatchdesperadoes.com/Intro_to_BPCR_Loading.pdf

Do some Googling around. There's a lot of info out there.
Don't get too caught up in the really fine details right off. The variables can be daunting when you get into it. Multiple wads, lube cookies, paper in the primer pockets, case and bullet indexing. .... Just start with a compressed load of ffg and a big soft grease groove slug 2 thou over bore diameter. Then start tweaking one thing at a time if it's not grouping like you expected.
Can sure get addictive if you let it.
 
I have those two Paul Matthews books mentioned, plus Mike Venturino and Steve Garbes book "Black powder cartridge reloading primer". All have lot's of good info, although Paul's might be a bit dated now.
I believe there is more knowledge now about all the variables than there were back in the 1800's.
I read everything I could get my hands on for 6 months before I got my Shiloh, then got all the reloading gear together. Still took quite some time before I had a good load worked up.
But like VV says, it doesn't have to be complicated, it all depends on what you want out of the cartridge. Some are content with a 3" 100 yard group for hunting, and others shoot targets at 500 yards or more and need better than that.
 
stevejones: Just did a quick scan of the books mentioned. Didn't find anything on the percussion Sharps. Have no first hand experience with the percussion version of these rifles, so can't offer any useful information. Vagrantviking covers it pretty well....best thing to do when starting out is to follow the KISS principle, when developing loads for your rifle. Easyrider: Don't know if your 45-90 rifle comes with sights. If not, may I suggest you check out Montana Vintage Arms. This company produces top quality sights for the Sharps and other vintage rifles. I have used MVA sights extensively and recommend them unreservedly. Kelly also produces excellent sights. There are a few others I can't remember off the top of my head, but these two are among the best. I wouldn't get too twisted up right yet about that, either. Plenty of time later on, once you've become more familiar with the rifle.
 
I ran across a crusty old timer at the range one day that was shooting BPCR. He was also set up with paper patched bullets and empty but cleaned and primed cases and was loading the powder charges for each string of shots. Being there with my new, to me, vintage rolling block I set up beside him so I could chat and learn more.

Along the way he hit the sweet spot for the day when he added an additional 3gns to the charge used for the previous set. My buddy suggested that it's a pretty small change but I chimed in with how I suspected it's more about the variation in charge compression working better for that day with that temperature. The crusty old guy responded with a knowing grin.

I have no idea if this temperature to compression factor is given in the books mentioned. But it was an eye opener to me on just how many skills are needed by the successful BPCR shooter. Do smokeless ammo bench and class F shooters have different ammo for different temperatures?
 
I just checked Amazon.ca, and Venturino's book "Shooting Buffalo Rifles of the Old West" appears to be unavailable.

Alex McK, would you recommend one of Matthew's books over the other?

My objective with this project is long range target (up to 1000 yards), and possibly silhouettes out to 500 meters. I prefer paper patched bullets to grease groove, so that's where I will start. I have been shooting PP out of my Pedersoli Gibbs for a while now, and like it a lot, in spite of the need for cleaning between shots.

The rifle does not have a rear sight. I am considering an MVA long range soule sight, but have also talked to Lee Shaver about his long range soule. Lee's sight is $385 US, and includes a Hadley eye cup. MVA's is $485, and doesn't include the Hadley, which is another $95. All in, including currency exchange, the MVA is $253 Can more than the Shaver. Does anyone have an opinion whether the extra money is well spent? I have seen and used an MVA and there is no doubt that they are deluxe, especially when equipped with a "Montana Magnun" eye cup. I have never seen one of Lee Shaver's sights in person, but Lee is a very well regarded shooter in international long range muzzle loading competition, as well as a custom builder of very fine muzzle loading rifles.
 
I have had two of the deluxe Shaver sights. One of them loosened up after a few years, but it was an ok sight. My only real issue with it is that the windage marks on the staff seemed to be painted on. I find the MVA sights to be easier to manage if you want to know exactly how much windage you have on the sight at any time. Their windage marks are very precisely engraved on the staff.

If you don't mind the extra money you'll be very happy with the MVA. I would not get an original Sharps style though, but a Soule instead. The Hadley eye disc is definitely a good thing. When I first started shooting these rifles I used to keep the rear sight cranked open all the way and didn't see the point of it. Now I select the aperture size depending on lighting and it makes a difference.

Chris.
 
Oh, buffalo arms has Venturinos book in stock. He and Steve Garbe also wrote a smaller book, think called the black powder cartridge primer, or something like that. It'll not bad either. I'm not a huge fan of Paul Mathews books, but I bough them anyway as they are cheap and I'll read anything on the subject that I can find.

Some of the best information on reloading for BPCR rifles was written by Bob Glodt in a series of articles in the Black Powder Cartridge News. You might still be able to get the back issues. I know that some are still available.

The PDF document posted earlier is quite good. Better than a lot of the books you'll find.

The Internet is good, but lots of people have weird ideas. :). I mostly try to figure out what the top shooters are doing, although not many of them are Internet people. On the Shiloh site there are a few guys to really pay attention to such as Michael Rix, Zack Taylor, Vbull ( who has set a lot of records ).

The American Creedmoor Cup just finished in Arizona. The equipment lists are posted on the Arizona Sharpshooters web site. That would be a good think to check out. Most of the guys at the top were shooting .45-90's and some load data is available there.

If you are interested in shooting paper patched bullets in that rifle I would talk to Kurt on the Historic Shooting forums. He does a lot of bullet recovery and has a lot of interesting things to say. Paper patching is a lot of fun, and once you get the hang of it you'll find it pretty easy to come up with an accurate load. An excellent book to get you started is Loading and Shooting Paper Patched bullets by Randolph Wright.

Chris.
 
Easyrider: I purchased my copy of Venturino's: " Shooting Buffalo Rifles....etc." from one of this forum's fine sponsors: Wolverine Supplies. Either Matthews' book will stand alone; there is enough shared information between the two. Where they differ is in approach: Where one book concentrates on the mechanics of proper cartridge load development, including bullet selection, powder, wads, etc.....the other speaks more on the art of shooting, the black powder cartridge rifle, itself. My feel is that when used with one another, the reader is offered a nicely balanced overview of the entire sport. As mentioned in another post....the information does seem a bit dated. But....is still valid. I'm surprised I hadn't included Lee Shaver's excellent sights in my list. Call it "oldtimers". I know several shooters who swear by these sights. Have used them in the past myself, and really liked them. A great value for the money. When it comes to choosing one brand of sight over the other, all of the top brands are pretty much equal, when it comes to quality. My view is that, choosing one over the other really comes down to personal preference. In my case, I liked MVA sights. They offer superb precision in sight adjustability and consistency. Perhaps it was the confidence using those sights gave me that made the difference. Dunno....They are pricey though, but worth every dollar. Honestly....given a choice between the two, I would just as likely go with the Shaver's and not look back. Plus save a few bucks along the way. One thing I do like about current versions of the MVA "Buffalo" Soule sights, for example, is the greater adjustability for windage. At extreme range, or where wind is an issue, this feature does have merit. By the way, whichever way you go, a Hadley cup is a good addition. The apertures act very much like the iris in a camera lense. You can quickly switch from a smaller to wider aperture to "focus" the sight picture more reliably, depending on iight conditions.
I too have a preference for patched bullets. Accurate Molds makes some good ones. One bullet mold worth considering is Lyman's .450" "Whitworth" bullet . Can't remember the part number right off hand, but can look it up. Cast from wheelweight lead, my mold drops a bullet averaging 465 grains. Likely not the best choice for the 1:18 rifling pitch found in many Sharps' rifles, but still pretty good. Patched up to .459" or thereabouts, seems to work well.
Judging from what you've mentioned, it appears that you already have a sound background, when it comes to shooting black powder firearms. I doubt that making the transition to blackpowder cartridge rifles is going to be too difficult. A lot of the loading technique, bullet and lube selection and so on, does cross over from one to the other discipline. Don't know whether you shoot Pyrodex (RS, Select, etc.), rather than genuine black powder. But, this stuff is definitely worth considering in load development. I found that in some cases, it's lower density compared to black powder made it easier to "build" a good cartridge. Plus, performance, especially RS when compared to Ffg, was about on par. Worth looking into, in any case.
Hope some of this windy dissertation was useful.....
 
All I shoot now out of my Shiloh is paper patch at bore diameter, with black powder. The best thing about paper patch in my opinion, is no leading. Cleans up with a few wet patches, then oil. No brushing required. I tried 6 different grease groove bullets before this, and everyone leaded the bore badly. Took hours to scrub out. I tried every trick in the book too, different bullet diameters, alloys, seating depths, wads, lubes, case lengths, nothing prevented the leading. Now, life is wonderful again.
 
Ryan: You may already have a preference for bore cleaning solvent. But, one I've used for quite some time, is ordinary isopropyl alcohol. Started using this in muzzleloaders, and stuck with it. One or two wet patches followed by a couple dry and the bore comes up nice and clean. Works equally well in breechloaders. Dirt cheap, too.
 
Alex McK said:
Ryan: You may already have a preference for bore cleaning solvent. But, one I've used for quite some time, is ordinary isopropyl alcohol. Started using this in muzzleloaders, and stuck with it. One or two wet patches followed by a couple dry and the bore comes up nice and clean. Works equally well in breechloaders. Dirt cheap, too.
Click to expand...

Have not tried that, but I wipe between shots with a 50/50 blend of rv anti-freeze and water, works great, and cheap too.
 
Hi Glen, congrats on the new to you Sharps.
Two guys from our group that shoot with us at Selkirk both use paper patch. One shoots an orig action sharps with a modern barrel in 45/90. These guys shoot a lot of black powder .They would be willing to help a new guy get into the sport , come out to the first BPCR shoot listed on the selkirkgameandfish web site . I shoot 45/70 with a regular grease groove bullet. We all shoot 2f goes at our shoots,and most of the guys that I know only use black powder.

Pm me and I can give you a contact ph # for some help.
 
In a pinch, paraffin wax can be used to make chamber casts. Not as durable as cerrosafe, but will work. Obviously, care has to be taken when removing the cast. The chamber area, plus a few inches down the bore (enough to measure chamber throat, rifling leade, lands and grooves) need to be included. You will need to apply a very thin coat of release agent, first. One of the easiest to use is PAM cooking spray. Won't react to the heat like ordinary oil, etc. A word of advice(based on experience)....only go this route if you have no other alternative. It might take several tries to get it right. Plus, the paraffin cast is relatively soft, so great care must be taken when handling it. Cerrosafe should be readily available. I believe any of the forum's sponsors who also offer gunsmithing services, should be helpful.
 
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