Supplies for your back up gun

[Blacksmith]

A lot of people have large supplies of ammunition for their go to guns in case the SHTF occurs. And many of those same people also own various black powder guns they shoot for pleasure, some are used during muzzle loader season to extend hunting opportunities. you may not think about it but these are your ultimate back up guns because black powder can be home made much easier than smokeless. These may be modern inlines or reproduction percussion cap or flint lock firearms.

Although you have plenty of ammo for your main gun do you have enough 209 primers, percussion caps, and flints to keep your BP guns working? It would also be nice to have a round ball or minie ball mold in each caliber just in case.

A lot of people have cases of military surplus ammo for one firearm and only a tin or two of percussion caps for another. Cover all your bases.

[starmac]

If push comes to shove I have enough to keep my muzzies loaded for the rest of my life, unless I play too much. lol
My wife recently picked me up a cap and ball pistol, so I need to pick up even more caps and powder. lol

[Dean D.]

Great points Blacksmith. One of the reasons I chose to go with flintlock ignition was the thought that finding percussion caps might be problematic to say the least. Making BP is pretty straight forward. I've been dabbling with flint knapping for a while now and hope to learn to knap gun flints. I've read how, my only hold up has been finding suitable raw flint to work into gun flints.

My first BP gun was a TOW .54 rifle kit. Upon further consideration I decided a smoothbore would be the ultimate "If you could only have one gun...." choice. Today UPS will be delivering a Pennsylvania Fowler kit from Flintlocks.com. Life is good.

[Nomadnailer]

I think a flintlock muzzleloader is the ultimate firearm with a large supply of black powder and lead

[Geezer in NH]

I can get a rock that will fire all day in my Flinter from my driveway. If God wanted you to use a cap lock he would have lined river bottoms with caps.

I have at least 10K percussion caps and have only 2 cap lock revolvers. I sold my last cap lock longun 10 years plus ago when I stopped competing in line shoots. I kept every cap that came in trades for years in my gun shop.

Flints have been my hunting guns for the last 20+ years.

[Garyshome]

I guess a flintlock vs an AR IS better than nothing, but not by a whole lot.

[Outpost75]

Great thread. I have found that my Ruger Vaquero .44-40, .44-Mag, .45 Colt and Ruger BlacKhawk .45 Convertible all intercharge cylinders as far as timing and indexing, etc. The forcing cones in the .44 barrels are large enough to accept standard pressure .45 Colt and .45 ACP loads from the appropriate cylinders and squeeze them through the .44 barrels without any signs of spitting or excess pressure.

Not recommended practice, but when SHTF any cylinder that fits will be used ith with any ammo that fits.....

[reloader28]

We always figure that if we need more or better guns there will be plenty laying around.

That said, I think a flintlock is an excellent SHTF gun.

[Blacksmith]

Don't turn your nose up at old technology because it worked for hundreds of years and would work again. The problem with modern firearms is what do you do when the ammo and or reloading supplies run out. Just think about the .22 shortage and primer shortage recently. Lots of people are having trouble finding their favorite reloading powder in many areas of the country. That AR or Glock is a fine weapon but with the wrong powder or odd bullets they can turn into a single shot "stove piper" with one pull of the trigger. Finding parts for new guns may become impossible while the old designs were originally made by hand by blacksmiths and gunsmiths and could be repaired by the same.

The old black powder cartridge guns and their reproductions shoot just fine with smokeless powders and modern components but can easily go back to black powder and cast bullets. You can even make a simple mold with hand tools that would be useable for casting bullets to be used with paper patching. Many original flint lock guns were converted to percussion caps. The conversion could be done in reverse to change Percussion to Rock Lock.

Best choice is have some of each just in case, and a bow and arrow in the back of the closet if you can't find sulfur.

[rancher1913]

I tend to keep multiple guns of the same caliber around so if one breaks I have an extra waiting in the wings. ordered some cap makers from this site but the stuff to go in them I need to work on. have several flintlocks that I love to shoot and have in the past made my own powder but it was a pain boiling chicken poop. all else fails I got several bows.

[jonp]

Very old thread but I will play.

I was talking to a guy at my former job a while back and the subject came up about shtf. We got to talking and when he asked me what I had I said something like "enough to take everything you have from you" and in an end of the world shtf scenario that is what it is about isnt it?

[rancher1913]

lots of people say that, just remember "there is a butcher for every bull". if you need to take by force to survive sooner or later you will fail.

[reloader28]

Saw a Pathfinder Outdoors show the other day and Dave Canterbury was using a smooth bore flintlock in 20 gauge. With the same charge of powder he could use shot or a 60 caliber ball from the same gun.
He just put in the powder and tamped a bit of sheeps wool over it until he found something to shoot, then put in either shot or a ball. Even showed him hunting a pig with it.

I just thought that was interesting after seeing this thread.

[rancher1913]

I have a double barrel in 20 guage but it uses caps, would love one with flints. fun as all get out to shoot and if you can stuff it down the barrel it will shoot it.

[Mackay Sagebrush]

I find it simpler to have multiple examples of the same gun.

In other words, I have a 1/2 dozen 9mm chambered Glocks, 1/2 dozen 1911 .45s, 1/2 dozen .223 rifles, a bunch of .22 rifles and handguns, etc, etc.


Example:



A case of 5,000 rounds of standard velocity .22 does not take up much room, and when shot through a suppressed gun, it is extremely quiet and effective. Plus with a suppressed .22, if things got ugly, I could acquire more arms and ammo from those who chose to be aggressors, or predatory in nature.









Plus due to the fact that standard 230 grain .45 ACP is subsonic, a .45 suppressor can be quite a practical tool.

[Hogtamer]

I own and shoot other weapons of course, but my main is a 12 ga shotgun. I am lethal to large game and small, near and far (100 yds). I have backups and backups to backups. Much primer, powder, shot, buck and slugs, wads, fillers, molds and hard lead. much of each loaded too. Not gonna run out. The only drawback to the 12 ga is bulky, heavy ammo.

[bisleyfan41]

Yep, after getting caught flat-footed (unprepared) during the last shortage, I took steps and have almost completed stashing away enough of everything I need to be fairly certain I'll NEVER run out of anything at my current usage rate. More than ample supply of lead, primers, mags, spare gun parts, cleaning supplies, and factory ammunition to last more than my lifetime. Not an eternal stash of powder yet, but plenty already here and adding more weekly. Not happening again and NOT relying on a flintlock to save my bacon.

[GhostHawk]

Well I had my fling with black powder long long ago and far away. Fun for those who like it, but for me, thanks but no thanks.

I have my supply's stacked wide and deep. Both loaded ammo, and components.

For an alternative I have many thousands of rounds of .22lr stashed.

Rather than black powder I prefer airguns for putting meat in the pot. No powder, High pressure air, caps needed. Pellets are also stacked wide and deep. Plus with an airgun I can make my own .22 caliber round balls. (sharpshooter mold)

These are more than accurate enough for squirrels and rabbits to 20 yards. And would put food in the pot as long as I have any lead at all. As for rifles, my latest is a Hatsan 135 QE Vortex that does 1000 fps and with 14.3 gr pellets runs around 28 fpe. More than enough. It will put 5 of those buckshot into one ragged hole at 20 feet. Have not tried farther yet. But I have no doubts it will do minute of squirrel out at least to 30 yards.

That is my plan. It requires no chemicals, no charcoal making, only needs a heat source and lead. With .22 caliber lead balls it is extremely thrifty on lead.

And with store bought pellets I can shoot all I want at around 1.2 cents per shot.

[Der Gebirgsjager]

Black powder guns are fun. Have a few myself. Have you ever noticed that there are lots of new black powder guns around, but not too many really old ones? Don't forget to clean them!

[BrassMagnet]

Well I had my fling with black powder long long ago and far away. Fun for those who like it, but for me, thanks but no thanks.

I have my supply's stacked wide and deep. Both loaded ammo, and components.

For an alternative I have many thousands of rounds of .22lr stashed.

Rather than black powder I prefer airguns for putting meat in the pot. No powder, High pressure air, caps needed. Pellets are also stacked wide and deep. Plus with an airgun I can make my own .22 caliber round balls. (sharpshooter mold)

These are more than accurate enough for squirrels and rabbits to 20 yards. And would put food in the pot as long as I have any lead at all. As for rifles, my latest is a Hatsan 135 QE Vortex that does 1000 fps and with 14.3 gr pellets runs around 28 fpe. More than enough. It will put 5 of those buckshot into one ragged hole at 20 feet. Have not tried farther yet. But I have no doubts it will do minute of squirrel out at least to 30 yards.

That is my plan. It requires no chemicals, no charcoal making, only needs a heat source and lead. With .22 caliber lead balls it is extremely thrifty on lead.

And with store bought pellets I can shoot all I want at around 1.2 cents per shot.

NOE now has moulds for pellets for air rifles and sizing dies to size them!