BPI buckshot in the 32 flintlock

I finally broke down and bought a 8 lb jar of BPI #1.5 buck for my 32 cal ball guns. I just finished shooting some out of the Dixie squirrel rifle this morning and it works great. I was worried that they would be too hard, but I can dent them easily with my fingernail and they load just fine. Accuracy was normal and there's no sprue to deal with. I'd say if you normally buy the Hornady balls, give these a try. They're quite a bit less expensive and seem to be better quality. Plus 8 lbs of them will give me rifle practice for quite a long time.

On a similar vein, 0000 buckshot shoots well in 36 cal cap & ball revolvers. I have a 0000 buckshot mold that cranks out .380 balls 10 at a time. BPI has 0000 buck but I don't know how hard it is.

I have a 34ish rifle that shoots 00 great. At one point I had purchased several hundred pounds of buck for a project that didn't materialize. Bullets forever for that rifle.

I also have used the #1.5 buck in my Cherokee and a 1860ish original muzzleloader, seems to work great, also in .30 cal. rifles with Bullseye powder for squirrel hunting. Works good and cheap[ish] shooting, Good Luck and Merry Christmas, Chris

So how much powder do you use NoBlade?

Nobade - How consistent are they for Diameter ? The reason I ask is that i've been thinking of buying some in .260 diameter and trying them in 25-20 wcf for plinking loads.

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Originally Posted by fiberoptik

So how much powder do you use NoBlade?

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The slow twist Dixie rifle likes 30 grains, the faster twist TC likes 15. I wish I could load the Dixie that light as it is excessively powerful for squirrels but then I can't hit them.

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Originally Posted by square butte

Nobade - How consistent are they for Diameter ? The reason I ask is that i've been thinking of buying some in .260 diameter and trying them in 25-20 wcf for plinking loads.

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They are very good. They're swaged and not cast so every one seems to be the same, at least in the sample I measured. They should be fun in the 25-20, I am planning on trying these in the 30 Badger at some point as well.

This was 45+ years ago, but a fella brought a rifle in one evening to Dad and Don’s shop, a 32 cal he had bought from Dixie. He brought everything with him that went with the gun. Don was the Muzzleloader builder and shooter of the two and the first thing he went to was the round balls. He dug out his mic and started measuring. These were everything but consistently round and the same size. He asked the fella where they came from and he said it was buckshot that a friend had given him, because the 32 cal balls Dixie was selling were too expensive and his friend had a 5 gallon bucket of this buckshot. Don being Don after showing the guy what was wrong and hearing the buckshot story shrugged and said, “Sorry, I can’t help you. There isn’t anything I can do. There’s nothing wrong with the gun.”

The guy said,”But you never looked at the gun. How do you know there’s nothing wrong with it?”

Don replied, “I showed you what was wrong, and since you won’t listen I don’t have time to explain it again.” And with that turned around and walked through the door and into the build room, leaving 7 year old me to deal with the aftermath, because no one in their right mind is going to yell at a kid just sitting there.

From the way the buckshot looked to me and thinking back, some of them had flat spots, not sprues, and some were egg shaped. Even I knew that wasn’t going to work. I don’t know what the deal was but this guy was not about to buy those expensive round balls from Dixie that probably cost $0.50 per hundred back then.

That's pretty funny but unfortunately all too typical. I can't count how many angry customers I have had to educate because their new custom rifle won't chamber the ammo they have been using in their old rifle and neck sized. Or other various reloading tricks.

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Originally Posted by Nobade

That's pretty funny but unfortunately all too typical. I can't count how many angry customers I have had to educate because their new custom rifle won't chamber the ammo they have been using in their old rifle and neck sized. Or other various reloading tricks.

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That is one of the main reasons I got out of the gun business. Too many people who aren’t smart enough to know what they don’t know.

The big volume of buckshot I bought was all hand cast in multi-cavity molds. I aggressively sort them by weight and diameter for use in the .34. I probably lose half in the sorting process. The remainder is still fine for loading buckshot or slingshot ammo. That 33 cal ball flattens rabbits in the slingshot!

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Originally Posted by Nobade

That's pretty funny but unfortunately all too typical. I can't count how many angry customers I have had to educate because their new custom rifle won't chamber the ammo they have been using in their old rifle and neck sized. Or other various reloading tricks.

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there is also an other side to this - plenty of gun experts in stores only know enough to stay a few lines ahead of their slower customers

local case in point (and this guy - if you want a 500yard fly gun built is top dog - the best around) shop he was working for at the time sent me down in the basement to confer with over something I dont remember
whatcha doin mate? -- ahh got this dang bolt gun (might have been a ruger ?) wont work properly ----whats wrong ? --drops the empty back on the carrier intstead of throwin it out ----show me ! --yep thats a pain ----can I try?

so thumbed his dummy round into the magazine, slammed the bolt shut, yanked it open - round landed at his feet - now gimme an empty - yank the bolt back quick - same deal - empty threw well clear

nothin wrong with the gun mate - I had a post 64 Winchester 70 used to do that - drive it like ya stole it never was a problem

Sounds just like Mausers work.
They were made to cycle the bolt quickly.
Not real slow and quiet.
But you are correct.
Lots of So Called Gunsmiths , try to make All rifles work exactly like the custom high dollar rifles.

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Originally Posted by LAGS

Sounds just like Mausers work.
They were made to cycle the bolt quickly.
Not real slow and quiet.
But you are correct.
Lots of So Called Gunsmiths , try to make All rifles work exactly like the custom high dollar rifles.

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The gunshop I worked in through College was about an hour North of the Bass Pro world headquarters, and they ad some high dollar gunsmiths working there and most folks assumed they were the best and could fix anything. What they didn’t know was that I fixed most of the guns they were not smart enough/too smart to fix. We did all of their polish and bluing, all of the stock repair, and fixed anything the experts couldn’t. Once a week the boss made the 2.5-3 hour round trip, taking back guns, and picking up more. I loved it when some of the Browning 22 rimfire designs sold to Remington and Winchester, would show up from them, in plastic baggies, and all wrapped in Cellophane, then sealed in a bigger plastic bag inside a box with a note that read, “Please try and reassemble.”