Bucket List Completed...and I lived through it.

[harringtondav]

Over the last few years I've been working to reload and fire my Dad's Sharps 45-110 BP paper patch.
Working with this forum and others I loaded 300 grain cast bullets with 37 gr Accurite.
My Dad never fired it, other than a few blanks. So I took extra caution. I borrowed my neighbor's lead sled, and cinched the whole works down to the table, attached a lanyard and we both stood back for the first round. Loud, but safe.
I fired the next round and my neighbor shown fired the last.
The Sharps is the last of four vintage/antique guns that I wanted to reload and fire. Success at last.
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[jakharath]

That is awesome!

[sharkey]

Were you able to hit anything with it?

[harringtondav]

Were you able to hit anything with it?

Better than I thought. Sight adjustments were very limited with the rifle tight strapped to the lead sled. B9 target at 40'. 8" group with adjustments.
Now that I'm not afraid of the gun I expect decent groups at decent ranges. Likely use the lead sled bench w/o all of the extra securing.
The Sharps is going to my kids. I hope they respect it.

[Hamish]

Good on you for working toward this, but I have a couple of questions.

What is “Accurite”? Is that an Accurate Arms smokeless powder? If that is an original Sharps, why wouldn’t you load it with black powder?

[45-110]

Why o Why would you approach loading the .45-110 in that manner? Black powder and a 540 gr. bullet which is a good match for your rifling will provide safe and accurate results. You are dealing with the unknown in a foolish manner.

[MichaelR]

That load could easily be damaging the chamber! The original load was 90 grains of BP with a 500 grain bullet. Later the load was increased to 100 grains of powder. Get the book Sharps Rifles the Gun That Shaped American Destiny for directions on how to load the proper ammunition. The original bullets were .451 at the base, tapering to about .441 at the top of the patch. You should be able to shoot 2” ground at 100 yards pretty easily. Please don’t destroy an irreplaceable rifle using nitro powder.