paper patched slick for Enfield

[Nobade]

Now that I have my little Enfield carbine shooting tolerably well with normal minie' bullets, I want to try it with paperpatched slicks. I see that BACO has .570" cup base swaged bullets available, but at the price they charge I am well on the way to getting my own mould. Is anybody here aware of anyone making a mould like that? Anyone ever try shooting their musket with bullets like this? I figure it should be a lot more accurate at longer ranges compared to grooved minies.

-Nobade

[johnson1942]

buy a mini ball mould for your gun. now measure the top of the lands diam. for two wraps and tucking the end into the base cavity with number 9 paper get a pushthrough reduceing die 8 thousands smaller then the top of the lands diam. if you want to do one wrap of freezer paper and tuck the ends into the cavity go 5 thousands under the top of the lands diam. i use doughty enterprises to build my push through reduceing dies. he charges 32 dollars each and that includes shipping. on one of my guns i use the two layer wrap paperpatch system. on another one i switched to the chase single wrap system of paperpatching with freezer wrap paper. it made that gun shoot really well. its not rocket science and is really reliably fun. try it. their is a guy on you tube who shoots a paperpatched civil war gun at a target at leaste 600 yards out and hits it. its not a big target either. he uses a combination on aluminum foil and paper and the bullet is very accurate.

[Nobade]

Yes, paper patched minies do work reasonably well. But the grooves collapse on the shot and the hollow base doesn't allow terribly stout loads. What I am trying to do is indeed make something that will fly better at longer range, as well as being able to be loaded heavier for a little more speed out of my short little rifle. Plus it's fun to play with new things.

-Nobade

[johnson1942]

i took a mini bullet mould and reshaped the base so the hollow cavity had a thicker lip and wasnt so deep. did it on my tennessee turning lathe, a 3/8 drill motor and a file. the bullet stood up to pressure a lot better after that. i think if you get the right bullet you could really shoot paperpatch really good as you want in that gun.

[fouronesix]

It'll be interesting if a modified Minié with a shallow base cavity will stabilize. By reducing the cavity size of a regular Minié (including other cup base conicals), the center of gravity shifts rearward. May depend on the Enfield's twist.

[johnson1942]

you got me their, i only have experience with the green hill formula, ive never read about the ballance of a bullet?

[johnson1942]

you got me their, i only have experience with the green hill formula, ive never read about the ballance of a bullet?

[Maven]

Yes, paper patched minies do work reasonably well. But the grooves collapse on the shot and the hollow base doesn't allow terribly stout loads. What I am trying to do is indeed make something that will fly better at longer range, as well as being able to be loaded heavier for a little more speed out of my short little rifle. Plus it's fun to play with new things. -Nobade

Would casting those PP'd Minie balls from a slightly harder alloy or even WW's prevent this or only add to your woes?

[fouronesix]

you got me their, i only have experience with the green hill formula, ive never read about the ballance of a bullet?

I don't think the Greenhill formula applies very well to a hollow-based Minié fired out of a musket with a twist of 70"+. Kind of the same applies to a hollow-based shotgun slug fired out of a smoothbore shotgun. It may depend on the twist of the Enfield carbine though.

[johnson1942]

i see your point. didnt pacific rifle co. sell a bullet for big bores that looked just like the pellets that go in a air pellet gun? it was like a roundball with a v shaped hollow cup on the back. i bet those would work in a miniball gun.

[fouronesix]

it was like a roundball with a v shaped hollow cup on the back. i bet those would work in a miniball gun.

Yes, hadn't thought of that in a long time. Somewhere back in my very fuzzy memory I recall that bullet or a similar one.

I came to the realization a long time ago that there are two primary ways conical profile bullets are stabilized in flight. Either gyroscopically or aerodynamically. Most of the solid base conicals are stabilized gyroscopically, while most of the hollow-based shotgun slugs, hollow-based Miniés and some of the hollow-based pellet or dart designs are stabilized aerodynamically. Critical to aerodynamic stabilization is having the center of gravity of the bullet in front of the center of pressure.

[johnson1942]

some one from cast bullets pointed out to a while back the fins on a special shotgun slug that stabilized the slug. i then watched on the military channel the smooth bore tank cannons and the extreem accracy they obtain. fins on a ballanced bullet in a smooth bore barrel could be very accrate. wish i had the know how to make a mould like that.

[fouronesix]

I've watched some pretty interesting high speed videos of R&D testing done at both White Sands and Yuma showing what you describe. Many of the aerodynamically stabilized projectiles are also imparted with at least a little bit of spin giving the flight path a somewhat tight spiral shape.

[Nobade]

Yes, a minie' fired out of a normal 1:72 twist musket behaves this way. It flies much like a badminton shuttlecock, with just a little bit of spin to help it along its way. My rifle has a 1:48 twist, and using Greenhill predicts that a bullet a hair over 1 inch long should stabilize properly. Bullets will need to be cast of pure or nearly pure lead to properly seal the very deep progressive rifling this rifle has at the breech end.

-Nobade

[fouronesix]

The beauty of the larger calibers like the 58! It really pushes the minimum twist down the Greenhill scale. 48" oughta shoot well, even with thickening the skirt or shallowing the cavity. Lots of angular momentum :)

What comes to mind for paper patching and for better downrange ballistics would be a modified Pritchett design with thicker skirt and shallower cavity.... just thinking out loud.

[fgd135]

I shoot Pritchett style paper wrapped minies in my PH 1861 musketoon. I use a Burton minie, a Lyman 575213, sized down to .568", then wrapped twice with 16# 25% vellum, giving me a .576" projectile diameter. With 55 grains of Goex 3fg, accuracy at 50 yds is pretty good. I lube these bullets by dipping the paper patch in a very thin layer of melted beeswax after patching.

It certainly would be worth a try shooting those .570 480 gr. Buffalo Arms bullets but you might need to use very thin paper, like 9#, to fit your bore.