.58 Minies With Flat Bases

[Good Cheer]

Anyone here abouts shooting .58 minies molded with flat bases?
Patched or lubed?

If so, what rifling are you using?

[swamp]

I shoot a P/H Musketoon. All my minies have had the base plug modified so the hollow is only 1/8 inch deep. Cast of soft lead they work fine for me.
swamp

[Good Cheer]

Hey swamp.
Is that leaving the edge thickness on the skirt the same?

[Rimfire]

Moose molds makes a flat base Wilkinson "minie" that is popular with the N-SSA shooters.
http://moosemoulds.wix.com/mm2013#!wilkinson/c1msz

[curator]

GoodCheer,

I once made some modified base pins for my two Lyman minie' bullet moulds to see if I could improve performance/accuracy. After a lot of experimenting with over-powder wads and various fillers, I came to the conclusion the only thing that I got was more recoil and reduced accuracy. An exception is the Lee 58-440 R.E.A.L. bullet that shoots very accurately in both my 3-groove and 5-groove rifled muskets. I do load a 24 gauge card wad under the bullet which is lubed generously with 50/50 bee's wax-lard. I cast mine from pure lead with 1/2% tin added to get sharper fill-out. Not too difficult to load with a short starter and a good thump with the heel of your hand. Once started, they slide easily down the barrel. Accuracy is way better than any minie' slug, especially past 75 yards. Accuracy is just as good using FFFg Goex or Triple Seven FFg. 70 grains (measure) seems to be the sweet spot with either propellant, at least in my guns.

[swamp]

Hey swamp.
Is that leaving the edge thickness on the skirt the same?


It is a little thicker. I got tired of wrinkles in the skirt.
swamp

[Good Cheer]

Back to the original question a moment...
I've changed around plugs and minie designs. I've paper wrapped hollow bases and plain bases.
And the available plethora of .58 minie molds has me wondering about using them as plain based muzzleloading bullets. The 48" twist is good for a little over an inch of bullet length, and that's about as much as you are going to run into with .58 minies. So, thought I'd ask to see if anyone is.

[newrib]

Hello Good Cheer, I have made and shot a few flat base minies, in effort to find a accurate target load for my Parker-Hale 1858 and 1861s. The Lyman 575213 with my homemade P-H style base plug did shoot fine with 60 grains of fffg in all my P-H 5 groove rifles, however recoil was excessive. I eventually bought a RCBS 578 Hodgdon which does shoot great out of my Zoli Zouave and kinda ok out of the P-H rifles (5inch, 5 round, rested, 100 yard groups). Not being satisfied with that, two different base plugs were made for the RCBS 578 Hodgdon a base plug which created a flat base bullet and a base plug which created a shallow Parker-Hale style hollow base. The solid base Hodgdon bullets shot ok at best (4inch, 5 round, rested, 50 yard groups) using my standard 43 grain fffg charge, these bullets weigh about 440 grains so recoil is a little heavyer. The RCBS Hodgdon with the P-H style shallow base is my favorite bullet for my Parker-Hale rifles. That bullet does shoot 3 to 3.5, 5 to 10 shot rested groups at 100 yards on most days with 43 grains fffg (Olde Eynsford) and using a bullet lube made from 45% beeswax, 45% olive oil and 10% lanolin, I have shot more than 40 rounds without cleaning with the same accuracy. Your mileage may vary. Good Luck!

[Good Cheer]

Thank you all for the info.

[mooman76]

Am I missing something? Isn't what we are calling a flat based minie actually a maxi?

[longbow]

I was thinking the same thing.

Also, why? What's wrong with a Minie? If skirt problems are an issue the 577611 should solve that. I went that way many years ago and was pretty happy with the results and no blown skirts even with heavy loads.

Just curious as to why you want a solid instead of HB.

Longbow

[Good Cheer]

Am I missing something? Isn't what we are calling a flat based minie actually a maxi?

Yep, pretty much except a minie most generally isn't going to have the contact length for bore alignment as good as the maxis.



longbow,
As to why, like why bother, I asked to inquire whether folks had tried it out to see how well they could make it work. 'Pears so that some have. I've looked up one day and found I'm kinda turning into a .58 herder.


The old 575602 design and the 57730 might be a little better on bore alignment than 575213 and 577611.
http://i791.photobucket.com/albums/yy192/SNARGLEFLERK/58%20MINIE%20BLOCKS%20CHART%203_zpsgfwbmgrm.jpg (http://s791.photobucket.com/user/SNARGLEFLERK/media/58%20MINIE%20BLOCKS%20CHART%203_zpsgfwbmgrm.jpg.ht ml)

[Buckshot]

http://www.fototime.com/0744963E3A064B6/standard.jpg

This NEI design may not meet the description of a Minie', but they ARE flat based, and load from the muzzle. Five rounds fired at 50 yards from my P-H P58 Naval pattern Enfield (5 groove, 48" twist). Weight is 500 grs. Lube in the groove only.

.............Buckshot

[johnson1942]

now that is accuracy

[longbow]

So just longer bearing surface is the goal?

[Good Cheer]

Well, nope, the minies on the market (like off the shelf garden variety molds) with a flat plug substituted aren't going to give you more bearing length... not unless you was to finagle the plug a bit to make the bullet longer.

What I said a couple of posts back was that minies most generally are not going to give you as much bearing length as maxis do.

BL in that chart above is bearing lengths. Minies mostly really do come up a little short.

[Buckshot]

http://www.fototime.com/C75E453AEFB1E35/standard.jpg

............One nice thing about the Lyman 575611 Minie' is it's design allows you to drop the HB pin to produce a heavier slug. Shoots smartly also!

................Buckshot

[longbow]

I guess I am still confused. Lee makes a large meplat Mine that appears to have much more bearing surface than traditional Minies:

http://leeprecision.com/mold-575-472-m.html

Their modern wadcutter Minie design is another option though Lee doesn't make it in .58 but you can get Accurate Molds to make about any shape you want though you would have to get the HB pin made by someone else if you can't make it... or use their .58 "Maxi":

http://www.accuratemolds.com/bullet_detail.php?bullet=58-545M-D.png

You won't get more bearing surface than that.

Longbow

[Good Cheer]

http://www.fototime.com/C75E453AEFB1E35/standard.jpg

............One nice thing about the Lyman 575611 Minie' is it's design allows you to drop the HB pin to produce a heavier slug. Shoots smartly also!

................Buckshot



That looks right fine.
I've been threatening to get an adjustable length plug made that will fit 575213, 575494, 577611, 57730 and 575602, with a couple of different interchangeable cavity styles.
For right now I've just been swapping out the plugs between molds to get different weights, lengths and skirt wall thicknesses.

[fgd135]

So how well do plugs from those different Lyman moulds interchange? Just wondering if you get slight off-center plug holes...if not, I might try that myself.
Btw, I get pretty good accuracy from both Lyman os and ns miniés, and a NOE .566" Pritchett, in all of my rifles, and especially good target accuracy from that Hodgdon target SWC minié. Never have tried a flat based projectile.

[Good Cheer]

Good results on swapping out. All have that varying degree of slop in the fit but Lyman made them pretty consistent, apparently wanting to use the same stock for plugs (a guess on my part).
Table blue table posted above shows the 575494 blocks having interference with the 57730 plug opening the blocks. That was the only diameter issue; the 575494 blocks are a tiny bit tighter in the plug passage than the others.

I haven't been able to try out the "ballets" made using the 585494 plug in the 575602 blocks in the musketoon yet.
Might be able to squeeze in some smoke making time Saturday but I'm not holding my breath.