I have a .45cal Hawken that I want to start shooting. I have experience with .69 cal round balls in a smooth bore, but none with a rifled bore. I bought a .445 mould and and cast some balls using range scrap I use fore my .69 cal round balls. The range scrap I recover as a fair amount of hard lead in it from handgun shooters shooting unjacketed Boolits that tend to use hard lead.
Anyway it has worked fine for smooth bore, but I am starting to wonder if I need pure lead for rifled barrels. I was under the impression that pure lead was only important for mini balls and the wad would take up the space in the rifling otherwise.
Does the lead of the ball have to deform to the rifling even when using a patch?
I see lots of videos of people hammering in patched balls. Is that what you really need to do? I’m not crazy about doing it, because I shoot a lot of antique guns don’t like the idea of beating on them.
I have a .445 cal mold and am prepared to buy a .440 if needed.
All advice appreciated on where to go from here.
Thanks