A fellow I met at Church is active duty Air Force assigned to a nearby airbase. He drew a cow tag for the muzzleloading season which starts in about a month, and a couple weeks ago he bought a CVA Optima in .50 caliber. Last week we went to the range and I gave him some Lyman 370 grain Maxi-Balls to try. His first three shots were over 70 grains of Triple Seven FFG, and he shot a 1.5 inch group at 50 yards off the bench. Thinking 70 grains is a pretty light load, he bumped it up to 90 grains but the group spread out to about 3.5 inches.
We're going back to the range as soon as possible, but until then the question is whether a 370 grain Maxi-Ball on top of 70 grains of Triple Seven will deliver enough energy to provide a reliable and clean kill out to 100 or 125 yards. Obviously, with a well placed shot it would that load will work just fine. Given that in the field not everything works as planned, I think that load is marginal even though it is accurate. The problem is we don't have a lot of time to experiment with different loads.
I was tempted to give him a hard time about putting in for an elk tag when he didn't own and had never fired a muzzleloader, but I haven't said a word about it. He was assigned here several months ago after back to back tours in Afghanistan, so I'm just trying to help him get ready any way I can.
Any thoughts?