577 Snider and smokless at the range Tues
..............I believe I'd posted before (dunno if it was here) about trying 24.0grs of Unique under a Lee .600" RB cast of WW alloy? Anyway, here goes[smilie=l:
http://www.fototime.com/35572699B1D8361/standard.jpg
The Snider carbine. I have a Canadian friend (retired RCMP captain) who found out I had a 3 band Snider and asked if I'd like some Snider 'parts'. Naturally I said sure, so he sent the above carbine (in pieces) and it was lacking only the screw to hold the hammer on :-) It was a cutdown rifle and after the barrel was cut it'd never been re-crowned, so that bright ring up by the muzzle was where the steady rest was bearing when I recrowned it.
My experiments with BP had been less then steller as the best 50 yard group to date (using a .590", 315gr Minie') had been 5 rounds into about 5". I had an old American Rifleman article by a guy who'd done some work with smokless in the Snider, which had had it's original bbl replaced with one from a Zouave. Anyway that was the impetus. I put 24.0grs of Unique in a Jamison 577 Snider case and then thumbed in a .600" RB from a Lee mould over a 1/8" thick lube wad. I then drove out to where we used to live in the sticks and fired it.
http://www.fototime.com/81B27EA5C8B88C9/standard.jpg
I loaded up 25 of'em. After the powder had been decanted into each fired unsized case, I thumbed in a .080" thick cardwad (punched out of bar coasters). I used a 1/2" wooden dowel to push the wad down to a depth of .300" (half a OD of .600" RB). I then extruded out some 1/8" thick lube strips onto waxed paper strips. These were then pressed over each casemouth with the paper dragged off to leave the lube cookie. A RB was then set into place and gently pressed down a bit.
I had to make a short seater insert for the Lee seater die to push the short TB down JUST at the halfway point. The seater die isn't set up for a .600" OD boolit so if it isn't almost completely seated the crimp part of the die will grab the ball. With the ball close to the halfway point the die will crimp the casemouth. You can barely see it in the above photo.
http://www.fototime.com/62E487ABCAAA3DE/standard.jpg
It was off to the range Tuesday and this was the result at 50 yards. Those 5 rounds went into 1.75". Velocity was 1475 fps with an ES of 23 fps. At firing, recoil was plesant and it produced a satisfyingly sharp bark. The cardwad apparently pretty much disintegrated as there was only very tiny fragments floating off in the slight breeze. I'll have to try these in my 3 band one of these days. I didn't have a target at 200 yards but there was a head sized rock out there on the berm. I expended 7 round in it's direction. Three used to get the military rear sight adjusted. If the ladder was placed on the 200 yard step it was high. I may have hit it too, but if not it came darned close!
The rest of the rounds went downrange by me and several other shooters who were fascinated by the bitty carbine and the big fat cartridges. Some even took photos of it with their cell phones :-)
.................Buckshot
