I normally leave it a little while after shooting and have a good look down before reloading. If I start weighing my powder then I will be loading it through vials anyway, we dont have the risk of bounce back as the back is sand.
I normally leave it a little while after shooting and have a good look down before reloading. If I start weighing my powder then I will be loading it through vials anyway, we dont have the risk of bounce back as the back is sand.
A very informative post.
I have an 1858 two band Rifle in .58 and intend to use triple 7 and or Pyrodex.
What size and type of vial /test tube should I get......E Bay ?
Thanks Graham
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The op is also forgetting that when a finger is over the end of the flask spout, it's not flat, the skin of that finger will be inside the spout, depending how hard you press your finger on to the end of the spout, it can reduce the total by 1 grain.
"Men occasionally stumble on the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened" Winston Churchill
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Hmmmmmmmm. Are you shooting a Minié bullet? Or a patched ball? Bearing in mind that a RIFLED Enfield was designed from the off as a Minié bullet shooter.
I've never tried a sub in mine, but you'd have to start by measuring the volume of the service charge of 2.5 drams - 68.5gr of FFg - and go from there.
Any standard phial from around 75mm in length will hold any charge that you are likely to be putting in your Enfield.
tac
[QUOTE=tacfoley;7164317]Hmmmmmmmm. Are you shooting a Minié bullet? Or a patched ball? Bearing in mind that a RIFLED Enfield was designed from the off as a Minié bullet shooter.
I've never tried a sub in mine, but you'd have to start by measuring the volume of the service charge of 2.5 drams - 68.5gr of FFg - and go from there.
Any standard phial from around 75mm in length will hold any charge that you are likely to be putting in your Enfield.
tac[/QUOTE
Thanks a Lee cast Minie in a 1997 Euroarms P58. Mint condition .Can get Triple 7 or Pyrodex .Actually managed to get one box of RWS caps from Valley Arms with a 60 mile round trip. They only had one.
Awaiting a Melting Pot from Kranks in far away Leeds as I have a bullet mould and ladle.
Phials are next.
Designer of BASC Logo
I'd recommend a load of 50gr of Pyrodex RS to start. Triple 7 might blow the skirt off the bullet, leaving you with a difficult clean-out, to say the least.
Remember, and I keep saying it on the other thread - ALL the subs are MORE VIGOROUS in action than BP. What goes whump in a BP load is going go seriously THUMP in a subs load - all the more reason to start low, especially with the Minié bullet.
The Lyman mould is the more usual for the P-H and its copies, because the skirt is somewhat thinner than the almost-solid-based Lee. In any event, the bullet should be around 1 - 2 thou smaller than the muzzle - to allow you to 'thumb' it into the rifling with very little effort. Lubing the Minié is a whole story by itself - Borebutter, if you like the locker-room smell is very popular, if costy here in UK. Others, like me, make a mix of beeswax and Neats foot oil 75/25 and dip the bullet in it. This is fine for warm UK for most of the year. I have also used E45 - an emulsion skin cream from Boots the Chemist - it simply washes away with all the fouling going along with it.
I opine that you would be well-advised to get into real BP for large calibre shooting like the .58cal Minié - it really is NEVER overly successful trying to get consistent results with BP because Pyrodex doesn't mind a little compression, but T7 does not like it at all. More to the point, Pyrodex subs are meant for BIG loads in BIG hunting guns. The AVERAGE subs load in a .54cal percussion rifle is around 100gr of RS, for hunting, y'see. One gentleman of my acquaintance - not a subs man - loads his .54cal Hawken with a mighty 150gr of FFg under a 240gr sabotted bullet for hogs. He looks rather like Kenneth Williams, if you remember him - makes you wonder where all that recoil goes.
You'll no doubt be advised to do other things than this by others. What you take on board is up to you. I shoot BP here and in the USA and Canada, and have a deal of experience in the matter, as well as being one of the earliest posters on the well-known US BP sites www.muzzleloading.com. If I don't know the answer, then I know about 45000 other folks who do.
tac
PS - take a tint and hip and invest in a Co2 ball blower - sooner or later you WILL need to remove a ball or bullet that went down the barrel BEFORE the powder. Remember, there are two kinds of BP shooters - those, like me, who admit to doing it, and liars.
Last edited by tacfoley; 09-01-2017 at 04:04 PM.
@manxteddy - don't bother buying any vials/phials - I have a gazillion of 'em in my loading shed. I'll bring them when we meet up.
Best
tac
email...... stephenbarrow@ntlworld.com