About 1998 the N-SSA made a new team event for cartridge repeters.
ie Henry and Spencers.They had been shooting them in individuals[paper punching] for a few years. Anyway a few of the guys on my team started to play around with the Henry.I picked up one of the real early ones
with a 3xx serrial # in 44-40.Now this rifle shot great with condoms,
But our rools said we had to use real BP and no gas checks.Ah hell that ain no problem says I.
Well I started to use this new to me internet and went to all the BP
cartridge sites I could find.Man I got beat up bad.I got lots of reports that people trying had bad luck finding a load that would not
foul after a few rounds.I needed to be able to shoot rapid fire for
5 minutes in each event.And I only had enough time to run a brush or a few patches between events.
I was having a heck of a time with any black load I tried.I was getting BAD leading after 4 or 5 rounds.Come to find out that my henry had a wide middle 1/3 of the bore.The rounds were reengauging the last third and just leaving a lead smear for final 8" AHAaaaaaa
After I cooled off some months I decided to pull the barrel [another long story] and have it relined.In the meantime another shooter got hooked up with one of the top N-SSA henry shooters and got his loading info [Thanks Larry]So 8 month later I got my barrel back,replaced the extractor I blew off with a overstufed case that ruptured and started over.
Here is what I was told.
Use the RCBS .44s/.44m Silhouette [mould #429-240-sil]
size at .430 use SPG,or homemade equlvent musket lube
This is a gas check boolet,leave it off
Once fired brass,do not resize.Bell the mouth
Large pistol primers
22 gr fff goex
4-5 gr COW filler
Now this is heresy.No wads,grease cookie,filler case crimped on ogive,gas check left off,no drop tube,no blow tube,compressing load lightly with bullet.[Heck I use a tong tool to crimp]
This set up will let me shoot 50-75 rounds between cleaning.Barrel is clean in 4-5 patches.No leading,no blowback into action.I have never had to trim a case.And to top that I can shoot 3 moa on a good day with my old eyes and the open sights.I know 20+ shooters using this load.Now I know A better set up is out there,some day I should go look for it.
Now iffin I didnt know you fellas here I would not even repete this story