Think outside the box

[dave951]

A group of us have been working in Scout camps to bring a quality black powder experience to the kids during the summer. This summer, we've been at 2 camps so far and have seen about 40+ kids overall. Part of the stuff we bring with us are Civil War muskets and minies. Being N-SSA competitors, this is a natural extension and we're very familiar with them.

But not every kid can shoulder a musket so what to for that situation. Have a good 50cal minie of course! The ones I've seen from Lee aren't up to the drill and I'm not a fan of Lee minie molds. After some research, I found a .473 Enfield pistol bullet design that looked promising and after some discussions with Steve Brooks on the mold and design, Steve cut a mold that dropped at .495 with pure lead and featured an adjustable base plug to vary the weight. The mold is a work of art and face it, a quality mold isn't going to be inexpensive.

So here's a pic of the bullet and a cartridge. Making the cartridge is easy. Put powder in the tube, plug with minie inserted nose first, dip lube base in beeswax/lard. Simple.



But how does it shoot? Well in my seriously rough CVA (my sewerpipe on a stick), I did a torture test. I fired 15 shots with no wiping or other attention to the bore and then then fired 6 shots offhand at 50yd for a group. As we say in the South, I'm thinking that dawg will hunt.

[Nobade]

Nice! That's perfect for the kids and sure works in your rifle for your own use!

[choctaw/creek]

Scouting was where I first got infected with black powder over 50 years ago. It's good to know that there are people like yourself that are going the extra distance to help kids learn a new/old way of thinking.