Pass Through?

[PbHurler]

Ok, so I've only been hunting muzzeloader for about 3 years, never harvested a deer as of yet and have a question.

I've only been playing with 174.4 gr (pure lead) PRB's, over 80 gr. of 2F in a .50 cal TC Hawken (shoots well for me) never chronographed it though

At a distance of say, 30 yards, should / would I expect a pass through on whitetail (assuming a well placed broadside impact)?

Thank you for your incites / experiences

[brewer12345]

Yes. I made a 50 yard shot on a yearling doe last year with a 54 round ball and had a quartering pass through. This year I had a 60 yard shot on a 100 pound button buck the was a texas heart shot. Ball went through 3 feet of deer and only stopped under the shoulder blade on the opposite side. Broadside on a doe at 30 yards I would very much expect a pass through.

[rodwha]

Actually I doubt you’ll get a complete passthrough. Having talked with many, many people on the traditional muzzleloader forum back when I was getting interested seemed to show that a patched ball of average medium game caliber (.45-.54) would be shown to mushroom nasty and be found just under the hide out to about 75 yds, but after that point the ball has slowed enough (under 1100-1200 FPS) that the lead won’t expand unless it hits bone, and so it cuts a caliber sized hole and exits, and this all the way out to 125 yds at the least since not too many shoot beyond that with a patched ball.

I’ve yet to work on an accurate load now that the rifle has been broken in so I don’t have personal experience, and also understand that circumstances are all different, for one many of the people I spoke with likely shot bigger bodied northern bucks and even mulies as well in comparison. Not having experience myself but relying on the collective experience of others.

[Codger2]

I used same .45 cal flint lock rifle for thirty years or so....and only ball that did not pass through were found under the hide on the off side on a couple angling shots. This with 60gr. or 70gr. of 3fffg.. Can't comment on long shots as never took any. most of my deer hunting was in heavy wooded area and river bottoms. At 30-40 yards your load will do nicely.

[megasupermagnum]

My only experience is with 54 caliber. The only one caught so far was a really steep angle shot, that ended passing at least 24", through the offside front leg bone, and barely caught by the skin. Everything else has been a passthrough, with impressive expansion to boot. I would not expect less from 50 caliber.

[725]

I'm with megasupermagnum on this one. Have taken several deer with a .490 + .495 RB. Most pass through leaving a nasty exit wound. Physics would agree that a long shot (ie: slower impact speed) would have a lesser penetration.

[rodwha]

I'm with megasupermagnum on this one. Have taken several deer with a .490 + .495 RB. Most pass through leaving a nasty exit wound. Physics would agree that a long shot (ie: slower impact speed) would have a lesser penetration.

A ball traveling just under the speed needed for expansion of soft lead will penetrate further than the same ball traveling much, much faster and does expand quite well. The same goes for HPs compared to FMJ bullets.

[Lead pot]

Here is a ball that hit a Buffalo close to 100 yards that went through bone and the hide caught it on the far side.
A Bison is tougher than a Deer. I( mostly use a .54 and a .58 caliber and I have never recovered a ball and I had one go through both shoulder blades and spine on one very large 238# field dressed buck.
Do your job and they will go down using a round ball.
269736269735

[rking22]

Almost certainly with your load. I have only had 1 not exit out of 20 or more deer. Mostly I used 45 with 60 gr fffg for about 6, the rest were a 50 with 65 gr fffg, those all exited. 15 to 60 yard shots. The 1 that did not was a 90 gr load of fffg at 30 yards. Went thru the near shoulder blade, broke a couple ribs, found it looking like a half dollar amount the shattered ball joint on the far side. Went back to the 65 gr load, didn’t kill him any deader, and I had some bloodshot meat. All were swaged balls, the 50s from 31 to 38 inch barrels. The 45s from a Senaca, 28 I believe.

[Hogdaddy]

The last 3-4 deer I've shot had pass through with that exact load ; )
H/D

[megasupermagnum]

A ball traveling just under the speed needed for expansion of soft lead will penetrate further than the same ball traveling much, much faster and does expand quite well. The same goes for HPs compared to FMJ bullets.

I would tend to agree with you, however, I have not tested this myself. I would think an unexpanded ball at assumed 800-1000 fps would penetrate more than one that does expand, even at 1400+ fps. That's not the point though, the point is that just about everyone that has used these gets complete pass through shots on deer size animals, even when they expand. As Lead pot has shown, it takes a 2000 pound buffalo to stop one of these inside. A 250 pound whitetail is not a tough animal. On the high angle shots that can stop the ball, the deer is so disabled that it doesn't go far. In my case, it hobbled/rolled down a small hill about 30-40 yards, and that was it.

Now I do know what you are talking about on these traditional muzzleloader forums. There is this theory that rifles were sized so that the ball stayed in the animal, and could then be re melted and used again. This being an attempt to explain the rise of the 40 and 45 caliber rifles instead of the 62 and larger calibers, 50 and 54 were always common and historically correct. They might have a point in 40 and 45 caliber. They send a light ball (90 gr, and 128 grain) very fast, often 1800-2000 fps or faster at the muzzle. The smaller balls slow down faster too. My 54 caliber load leaves the muzzle about 1450 fps, and at 75 yards should be about 1000 fps. The 40 caliber, assuming 1900 fps MV, is about the same 1000 fps at 75 yards. 45 at the same 1900 fps MV is up to about 1080 fps at 75.

I don't know about the small calibers, but in actual practice, the 50/54 caliber range passes through deer on broadside shots most of the time.

[rodwha]

There have been plenty of ball found within deer. It doesn’t require a heavy animal to stop them.

[Lead pot]

Here is my Deer rifle. It's a Southern Mountain fur trait rifle it has a 44" .54 caliber swamped Rice barrel. I use a Ball cast at 1/30 T/L alloy and I never recovered a single ball in a deer yet. It's a fine and fast ignition that I seldom hear the cock hit the frizzen.
You don't need expansion of the ball with these large calibers. They ventilate the boiler room just fine and you can eat right to the hole. :)

269740

[John McCorkle]

Here is my Deer rifle. It's a Southern Mountain fur trait rifle it has a 44" .54 caliber swamped Rice barrel. I use a Ball cast at 1/30 T/L alloy and I never recovered a single ball in a deer yet. It's a fine and fast ignition that I seldom hear the cock hit the frizzen.
You don't need expansion of the ball with these large calibers. They ventilate the boiler room just fine and you can eat right to the hole. :)

26974044" barrel?! What is muzzle velocity on that guy? That's like carrying a flagpole through the woods

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[waksupi]

I like wheel weight balls for the extra penetration.

[Chemoman]

My gun that shot round balls got deer easily even to one hundred and fifty yards. When I started shooting slugs or lead bullets in my muzzleloader they would pass through with easy and tear up a hill behind the deer. Sorry for the grammar. Don’t know how to correct it on this new stupid computer. Wish it was alive so I could brain it a good one.

[Lead pot]

John,
Now that the wood is dried out this rifle only weighs 8 lbs 4.5 OZ and it holds very well and once you learn how to navigate in the bush with these long barreled front stuffers the barrel length is not a problem.

I have no idea what the muzzle velocity is, I never worry about the speed of the ball I pay attention what the results are with the load and I stick with it so I know where to hold to hit what I want no matter what the distance is.
I use 80 gr of 2F, Olde Eynsford mostly now that KIK is under and this load works very well in this rifle.
A friend send me some Teflon patch juice once to try (yup I know :) ) It was a cold and breezy day so I leaned on a post so that long barrel wouldn't act like a wind vain :) and held off to the right to taste the wind and put 5 in the V. I wanted to get closer to the Botton with out cutting the line but I held for a group.
269755
This rifle holds very well. Here is another 10 shot group at 50 yards shot on a better day.

269756

I wish I would have had this rifle back in the late 50's and early 60's when we had some fun over the log shoots driving spikes through boards and splitting balls on hawks busting the two clay birds on it's side and cutting strings stay close to the bottom of the V without cutting the lines. Man those were fun days where 30 plus would come to those turkey shoots this time of year.

[Lead pot]

I like wheel weight balls for the extra penetration.
I do too, but I mix it 50/50. but for the turkey shoots I use pure lead.

[Hanshi]

I've killed plenty of deer mostly with the .45 and the .50, but also the .54 and .62. Expansion and penetration, assuming soft lead, depends on velocity (hence distance from the deer) and where it is hit. I've killed deer at 100 yards (+ and -) and at just a few feet. The deer hit at those longer distances invariably were pass-throughs. Closer, say 60 yards and under, mostly were found flattened under the off-side skin. But the distance for these effects is not carved in stone. I've also had up-close-deer succumb to expanded prb passing completely through. I've recovered a few flattened ball; and bone hits can flatten low velocity prb. Penetration is not an issue for deer. Lead prb does what it's supposed to do; either expand and not exit or pass all the way through. This photo is of some .45 and .50 recovered ball.
https://i.postimg.cc/3rty6B3r/PICT0572.jpg (https://postimages.org/)

[Don McDowell]

I used a 50 cal round ball with 80 grs of goex 3f for many years back in the 70's and 80's. Shot a lot of mule deer and antelope at ranges out to 100 yards, never recovered a ball. Most of them either dropped at the shot or went 50 yards or less.

[Woodnbow]

John,
Now that the wood is dried out this rifle only weighs 8 lbs 4.5 OZ and it holds very well and once you learn how to navigate in the bush with these long barreled front stuffers the barrel length is not a problem.

I have no idea what the muzzle velocity is, I never worry about the speed of the ball I pay attention what the results are with the load and I stick with it so I know where to hold to hit what I want no matter what the distance is.
I use 80 gr of 2F, Olde Eynsford mostly now that KIK is under and this load works very well in this rifle.
A friend send me some Teflon patch juice once to try (yup I know :) ) It was a cold and breezy day so I leaned on a post so that long barrel wouldn't act like a wind vain :) and held off to the right to taste the wind and put 5 in the V. I wanted to get closer to the Botton with out cutting the line but I held for a group.
269755
This rifle holds very well. Here is another 10 shot group at 50 yards shot on a better day.

269756

I wish I would have had this rifle back in the late 50's and early 60's when we had some fun over the log shoots driving spikes through boards and splitting balls on hawks busting the two clay birds on it's side and cutting strings stay close to the bottom of the V without cutting the lines. Man those were fun days where 30 plus would come to those turkey shoots this time of year.
Very nice shooting... wrt the longer barrels, I am 6’2” and have never had difficulty going through rough terrain so a 6’ rifle shouldn’t pose much of a problem. My 6’ longbows never did either, although they are much lighter in hand of course. WRT the original question, it seems difficult to generalize about these things to me. I’ve had close range pass throughs with the .54 on elk and long range balls stop under the skin. I once shot a muley buck quartering towards, nearly straight on in fact and the .50 ball stopped under the skin of his off hind quarter. I hit him right in the pocket at the base of his neck and the range was about 30 yards. Bullets that hit ribs or other bones behave differently than those that don’t. A bit harder alloy throws other factors into the mix. Etc, etc... the one expectation that holds up is that a whitetail or muley well hit with a round ball of .45 caliber and up is probably not long for this world and will soon be providing a tenderloin feast...

[John McCorkle]

John,
Now that the wood is dried out this rifle only weighs 8 lbs 4.5 OZ and it holds very well and once you learn how to navigate in the bush with these long barreled front stuffers the barrel length is not a problem.

I have no idea what the muzzle velocity is, I never worry about the speed of the ball I pay attention what the results are with the load and I stick with it so I know where to hold to hit what I want no matter what the distance is.
I use 80 gr of 2F, Olde Eynsford mostly now that KIK is under and this load works very well in this rifle.
A friend send me some Teflon patch juice once to try (yup I know :) ) It was a cold and breezy day so I leaned on a post so that long barrel wouldn't act like a wind vain :) and held off to the right to taste the wind and put 5 in the V. I wanted to get closer to the Botton with out cutting the line but I held for a group.
269755
This rifle holds very well. Here is another 10 shot group at 50 yards shot on a better day.

269756

I wish I would have had this rifle back in the late 50's and early 60's when we had some fun over the log shoots driving spikes through boards and splitting balls on hawks busting the two clay birds on it's side and cutting strings stay close to the bottom of the V without cutting the lines. Man those were fun days where 30 plus would come to those turkey shoots this time of year.Can't argue with those results....I'd tote a long pole around the woods for results like that!!



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[Edward]

A ball traveling just under the speed needed for expansion of soft lead will penetrate further than the same ball traveling much, much faster and does expand quite well. The same goes for HPs compared to FMJ bullets.

Exactly what I have found ,short range up to 80 yds pure lead mushrooms and after that slows less expansion and more penetration in my 50 and 54 cal using 80 grains OE 2F the variable being position of the animal and the shooter. It is not just my opinion ,lots of folks have had similar experience /Ned Roberts mentioned it/Ed

[Lead pot]

Very nice shooting... wrt the longer barrels, I am 6’2” and have never had difficulty going through rough terrain so a 6’ rifle shouldn’t pose much of a problem. My 6’ longbows never did either, although they are much lighter in hand of course. WRT the original question, it seems difficult to generalize about these things to me. I’ve had close range pass throughs with the .54 on elk and long range balls stop under the skin. I once shot a muley buck quartering towards, nearly straight on in fact and the .50 ball stopped under the skin of his off hind quarter. I hit him right in the pocket at the base of his neck and the range was about 30 yards. Bullets that hit ribs or other bones behave differently than those that don’t. A bit harder alloy throws other factors into the mix. Etc, etc... the one expectation that holds up is that a whitetail or muley well hit with a round ball of .45 caliber and up is probably not long for this world and will soon be providing a tenderloin feast...

:) that rifle is almost taller than me :) I used to be 5'10" but I seemed to have shrunk an inch. Maybe to many hard landings hanging on under that T-10 parachute to often. :)
Yes that rifle is a fine shooter but I didn't shoot those holes off hand. I have to lean on a tree or post to be able to hold tight. I carry this fork in my belt hunting incase I don't have a tree of fencepost.
270060


Edward,

I think that's why the .45-70 will out penetrate a .458 Win Mag because the .45-70 is slower.

[PbHurler]

Another year skunked. Saw a few does trotting by, but no results, now I'm waiting for next season.

(major Ice storm here), I was outside the freezing line though, 5 solid days of a COLD! monsoon.

Still beat being at work. ;-)

Thanks guys,

[megasupermagnum]

Another year skunked. Saw a few does trotting by, but no results, now I'm waiting for next season.

(major Ice storm here), I was outside the freezing line though, 5 solid days of a COLD! monsoon.

Still beat being at work. ;-)

Thanks guys,

Send that weather up my way. I was far too adapted to the cool weather now. The 75 degree days we have had this week have not made work fun.

[Kylongrifle]

same 80g FF load in my .54 renegade(.530 PRB) passes through broadside out to 90 yards. I can say from exp. Not every time mind you according to shot angle etc but I have gotten pass throughs at various distances out to 90.

[Woodnbow]

I feel ya’. I was once 6’3”. I’m now just a bit shy of 6’2”. Darned gravity will win in the end...