New to muzzleoading, have a couple of questions

[rbstern]

First time I'm poking my head in this part of the forum. Please pardon my obvious ignorance with these questions.

Decided to take advantage of the black powder deer season this year. I have a Remington Genesis on order. 50 cal, 209 ignition, 28" barrel, 1/28 twist. I know these barrels are optimized for sabot rounds. For deer season, I'm fine on buying commercial sabot rounds. But if I enjoy plinking with this thing, what would you recommend in the spirit of Cast Boolit cheapness for the range? I see I can buy the plastic sabots without projectiles. Should I cast pistol bullets for those? Should I cast a 50 cal conical? I also happen to have a lot of cast .490 round ball that came with a batch of reloading gear I bought a couple of years ago. Should I even try it with the fast twist barrel?

Thanks for whatever insights you can provide.

[ktw]

You can shoot roundballs in it, you just can't push them as fast as you can through the slower twist, deeper rifling barrels set up for roundball. They should work fine for plinking loads.

The Lee REALS are also an inexpensive way to go if you are already set up for casting.

-ktw

[Kuato]

I cast .50 cal R.E.A.L. bullets for my T/C Black Mountain Magnum & they shoot great to say the least. You have so slow em down to get good accuracy from a fast twist bore. I'm not into sabots or stuffing 150gr of black under a 410 gr slug, so the lighter loads work pretty well for me with conicals.

You have to find the "sweet spot" for your gun given what boolit you're gonna use, be it sabot, patch & ball, or conical..
The way I do it is I start at around 60 gr of powder & fire 3 shots. Then i go up in 5gr increments shooting 3 rounds at each new charge. Once i get a really tight group, i go up 5 gr & shoot 3 more. If my group opens up, i back off to the previous charge & thats my sweet spot.

Really east to do, but really time consuming. But what the heck, thats what Black Powder is all about!

[rbstern]

Thanks, fellas.

Do you pan lube the REAL bullets? And, paper patching a round ball...anything I need to know about that? Do I lube the round ball?

[Old Ironsights]

The patch is the lube carrier for round ball. Lube can be spit or somthing else saturated into the patch.

REALs can be pan lubed, tumble lubed or just smeared with any good non-solvent-based lube (like bore butter or lanolin gojo) just before stuffing it down the bore.

Some people like to put a bore diameter over-powder card-wad behind the REAL. If it closes up your groups, go for it. Generally not necessary though.

[corey012778]

alot great advice, already.

I have tried round balls out of a knight with 55grs. they shot pretty good.

I have shoot alot a saboted rounds. not that many with cast thou. many jacketed rounds. look into your owners manual. see what they suggest. see what you may have that is close in weight. does not group like you want try another.

the deer I got last year (first year hunting with black powder), 240gr xtp .430 with 85grs of pyro p. green mmp sabots.

[Beerd]

and you mostly use a cloth patch on a roundball, pillow ticking or some such.

[Kuato]

For REAL bullets I just smear the sides with bore butter, load & shoot. For round ball I use patches lubed with bore butter also. That stuff has worked really well for me in all my rifles & cap-n-ball revolvers. It helps keep the fouling soft for cleanup. I use straight Black not Pyrodex. Black shoots more consistently & has a lower flash point so I don't get hangfires anymore.

As far as patch material goes, you can buy prelubed patches or not prelubed & lube em yourself as needed. I use cotton cloth & cut the patches as I'm loading.

[rbstern]

Thanks for all the useful info. Have done a bunch of reading since your posts, and feel a bit more comfortable with all this.

[Odinbreaker]

I cast a Lee .430 in 300 gr use in green harvest rib sabot very accurate out of my 1x28 guns and and very in expensive. I usually cast from wheel weight lead.

[Vintage BPCS]

rbstern:
For a BP rifle with that fast a twist I suggest you try some solid base conicals cast in soft lead or Pb/Sb alloy of say 40:1. Be sure to have a bullet with several deep grease grooves say 5 or 6 and thrown at bore diameter so the bullet touches rifling as you push it down. This is for hunting now and not really for plinking, as the fouling will make loading difficult after several shots, unless you swab the barrel after shots. I've been shooting BP since 1976 and found that todays modern BP rifle is being made for easy and no mess shooting. You will find that for really good accuracy and consistency you should use regular 2f BP or Pyrodex equivalent, and work your load up to optimum. Most likely you will find this gun to shoot best around 72 gr powder out to 100 yds. Don't fall for the wives tail that more powder means more velocity. BP burns at a fixed rate and you want to find the point at which all the powder chrg you put down the barrel burn in the barrel and none is blown out. Often this is denoted by the presence of small deep red cherries forming on the inside of the barrel near the end of the muzzle. You have reach optimum powder charge when these cherries just disappear. If you don't believe me get out the chronograph. If you want more velocity for a given charge change granulation. Since you are going to shot a greased conical (this is to reduce BP fouling) I suggest a soft mix as would be used by todays BPCS. SPG is one that seems to be popular. Also Bullshop has a good one (Bullshop appears on other threads).

[Dirty30]

You can shoot all day for cheap with patched round balls. .490 on a greased pillow ticking patch will do you just fine. Pillow ticking can be hard to ram in 50 cal depending on the actual diameter of your barrel, if that don't work try some of the square 223 military style cleaning patches. They work great when greased up good. 50 grains of FFg will be plenty and makes a pound of GOEX last a long time. You want really soft lead for those balls because you're counting on obturation for accuracy. 100% lead will do you best. Don't count out balls for knocking down deer either. They'll mash their way through a muley and spread out good.

[Boerrancher]

You can also use your 50 cal with patched round balls and a very light charge to hunt tree rats. using a large pistol case some where between a 357 mag and 45LC you will find a load that shoots good at 25 yards, and it won't shoot through a squirrel. I have always had a great time when I take a muzzle loader out hunting tree rats. It will really improve your shooting skills when you start blasting at tree rats with a front stuffer.

Best wishes,

Joe