Minie ball molds

[Abert Rim]

Howdy fellers. I lucked out and drew a "one elk" muzzleloader tag for this fall here in Oregon, and have ordered the latest version of the Euroarms two-band 1858 Enfield. The goofy twist is now 1:66 in these babies, whereas they used to make it properly with a 1:48. Nonetheless, I think I'll be able to work up an accurate and powerful conical load for it that will blow through an elk's shoulders at any sportsmanlike distance.
I realize I must wait until the rifle arrives to make sure that it is .577/.589, but does anyone have any current favorites in hollow-base minie molds that will stand the gaff skirt-wise with hunting charges?
I'm not interested in that East Coast skirmish stuff where they shoot 400-grain jobbies over 40 grains at clay pigeons at 50 yards.
I'm thinking the Lyman 577611 will take the heat, but don't know if it will cast to a size that will be optimum in the Euroarms barrel.
Any thoughts?
P.S. Buckshot, old friend, I still have a few of those lovely Pritchetts you sent me a couple of years ago, and will give the a try.

[shooter575]

Saw your post on the N-SSA bb today also. All the minnes will take a C/W standard charge of 60-65. Once you go past that some will fail by blowing a skirt.What load do you want to use? This will decide what minnes may work.Slug your bore post the info and I may have somthing that will work.I have wayyyy to many minne moulds.
Also a stout charge with a plain based bullet may upset enough to take rifleing for your needs also.I know some that have had good luck with a REAL.

[BruceB]

Abert Rim, NICE to see you here. Where ya been?

I had some limited experience shooting caribou with a two-band Navy Arms Zouave of early production (about '64) and one of those gorgeously-built Parker-Hale Musketoons out of the 1970s.

In the Zouave I found it easy to blow a Minie skirt, (NO, carpetman...)and one could hear it fluttering away downrange. The Musketoon seemed a bit more tolerant. I did get some improvement by alloying the pure lead a bit...I seem to remember that 1/4 linotype toughened-up the bases enough for the 575213 to withstand 1100fps, and it still expanded well, judging from the EXIT holes. I had some ambitious loads in that Zouave...some would blow the hammer back to full cock! No fears about plugged nipples with THOSE suckers. I figured one that only brought the hammer back to half-cock had a "safety margin". What can I say...we were all young and immortal, once upon a time.

The longest shot I took on caribou was just under 100 yards, and I clearly saw the bullet go bouncing off down the snow-covered lake after exiting. I actually thought I'd missed, until the critter fell over.

You put 500-plus grains of lead in an elk's vital parts and you'll have backstraps for supper! Good Luck.

[Abert Rim]

Jim, Bruce, thank you for your kind replies. I know that the Lyman old style minies can't take much more than the standard service charges or skirts shuttlecock on the way out the bore. I am thinking more of that 577611, as the skirts are close to an eight inch thick and the old Lyman handbook showed a high-speed phot of this minie ahead of 150 grains with skirts unruffled. I don't plan to use that much out of the Enfield, but certainly would work from 90 on up to 125 grains of FFg or 1.5 Swiss for a hunting load. This is the load I used on my Walter Mitty days when I had a Kodiak .58 double -- 120 grains FFg under some of Buckshot's Pritchetts. Recoil was not a factor. Now the .72 Kodiak with 150 grains and the 1100 grain wadcutter -- that got my attention. But of course we can't use double rifles during the ML season here in Oregon, and I no longer own a Kodiak anyway ...
I have heard some folks speak highly of the RCBS Hodgdon moulds, with adustable base plug and available in incremental diamters.

[drinks]

AR;
I have a Lee .58 modern min'ie, the .575-470M, it casts .578 for me in ww's and weighs 435gr.
The skirt is quite thick.
I use it in 20ga as a slug in a plastic shot cup/wad.
Seems to be pretty accurate, 3" at 50 yds with no rifling, really does a job on water jugs and wet newspaper, more than 16" penetration at 1400fps.
Lee also has a .575 and a .578 in traditional min'ie designs, but the .50 I have has fairly thin skirts.
I shoot it with 75gr 777 ,1300fps.

[Buckshot]

...............AR, glad to see ya back again. I think of the common Minie' moulds available to just go out and buy, there are 3 really good suitable ones. One might benefit from a bit of cavity pin work to be good for heavy charges. These would be the Raphine 580gr Pritchit, the Lyman 530gr 575611 (both of which you've mentioned) and finally the Lyman 575213 Parker-Hale at 566grs.

The later mentioned P-H has a shallow cavity but the skirts are a bit thin. Other then that, it carries good weight. It wouldn't be a big deal to turn the cavity pin down a bit to give a thicker skirt. The Pritchit also has somewhat thin skirts, come to think of it. Speaking of mods:

http://www.fototime.com/C75E453AEFB1E35/standard.jpghttp://www.fototime.com/18DDAFC8EBB2F64/standard.jpg
On the left, per the caption a 575611 increased to 624grs by dropping the corepin in the mould blocks. On the right, these are 2 targets fired at 50 yards using the charges shown and the velocities obtained. These were with the modified 575611 at 624 grs.

In all these instances I used my Parker-Hale barreled (2nd gen) P58 2 band Enfield, progressive depth, 48" twist, CCI musket caps. Lube was applied in the base cavity only and was Wonder lube.

http://www.fototime.com/6BF0D8313CD43F3/standard.jpg
Here's another instance of the Lyman 575611 (un-modified) at work. That charge of Elephant 2Fg would have delivered about the same velocity as the 70grs of Swiss 2Fg.

When I ordered my 2 Band from Navy Arms they sent me a 3 groove 66" twist by mistake. However I didn't even notice that until I'd been shooting it for part of a day!!!! :-). However I learned something of value. I had cast up a bunch of Minie' boolits of alloy harder then pure lead. I didn't have any, and the softest lead I had was some old machinery footing stuff. Nor at the time did I have a hardness tester. It was harder then pure, but not as hard as WW.

I don't recall the charge I started with, but imagine it was about 40grs of 2Fg. It wasn't real shiny there at first and I began increasing charges. Again I don't remember but most likely 5.0gr increases. This would have been GOEX too btw, as it was before Swiss or Elephant were around. A 60gr charge sticks in my mind, and probably that is where things began to gel so far as accuracy was concerned.

That same day I discovered it was a 3 vs 5 groove bbl. Navy Arms was real nice about it and sent the correct rifle the next day. I don't know if the 3 groove had progressive depth grooves or not. When I got the 5 groove, 48" twist, using those same Minie' boolits and charges didn't do for diddley squat.

I think that this harder alloy wasn't upsetting well enough in the much narrower 5 grooves that are .013" deep in the breech. The 3 groove barrel with it's much wider grooves (even if proggressive and .013" deep) was easier for the skirt to upset into. That's the only reason I can think of that would explain why it would handle the harder slugs and the 5 groove wouldn't. That could very well be a positive in your case of hunting Moose. The harder slug might just be a bit better boolit in that respect.

http://www.fototime.com/5A94DEA526A1BFB/standard.jpg
Speaking of the 580gr Pritchitt, I made a swage die to alter it somewhat. The two 'as cast' Minie's are on the right. The swaged examples are on the left. The swaged cavity is shorter with a flat of .200" at it's base. The skirt is thicker, and then has a step to become twice as thick .125" up into the cavity.

Finally you can form a hollow point if you want one, buy putting spacers under the ejector pin to cause it to ride higher in the swage die. These were actually supposed to be for the Snider I want to make, so are .593" in diameter. Since my "Roun-Toit" for building the Snider action hasn't surfaced yet, I made a couple push through sizers. One at .575" for a Zouave carbine I cobbled up (below)
http://www.fototime.com/3989E3011A110BF/standard.jpg

The other was of .580" for the P58, 2 Band. Even though there is almost .020" sizing going on for the .575" bore, it's easy as most of it takes place over the base cavity. I haven't gotten around to shooting any of them yet.

..............Buckshot

[Abert Rim]

Rick, thanks for your detailed reply. Sounds like the 577611 can be accurate in a 1:66 barrel. The lady at Euroarms swears the current 1858 is 1:66 with five grooves, but every sutler I have checked with says three grooves. We shall see.
I think the 577611 out of your "dropped-pin" mould fired in your "canoe Zouave" would be some very nasty moose medicine. When you goin' hunting?
Bill