How many grains?

[yeoman]

A buddy of mine has an ancient CVA sidelock. He's been shooting 240 grain Hornady's/sabots with 70 grains with good accuracy at 50 yds. open sights. Do you guys think 70 grains behind that round is adequate for deer to 50 yards? From any angle? He's using Pyroex RS loose powder.

[sabotloader]

yeoman

Just my opinion but if you are Limiting yourself to 50 yards - that should do just fine Cayugad and Lee will have a more definitive answer when they pick up on this....

[lemoyne]

Assuming a jacketed bullet and a lung shot he will do ok,I have taken a number of deer with a 44 mag and no problems and thats what that load is comparable to. Full lenght body shots should be avoided,but most of us do that anyhow.If he is shooting a slow twist barrel he might try the 200 gr bullet with a little more powder , he should check his operators manual for max load and since a 50cal. ball is 180 a 180 or 200 gr bullet might give good results.Lee

[yeoman]

I'm pretty sure it would be a 1:48 twist and I know he doesn't have a manual for it.I suspect max load is 110 grains. It's a 30-40 year old Hawken.

[yeoman]

Cayugad, I'd be interested in your input on this. Triple7 too, but I guess he's no longer with us.

[cayugad]

Yes that would be a deer hunting load in my opinion.

I shoot 80 grains and that same bullet of out one of my inline rifles and would shoot out to 125 yards in the blink of an eye. Its all shot placement. With 70 grains you might not get complete pass through, but you have slowed down and bullet made to fly slower. 1633 fps using Triple Se7en powder. That is not as slow as you mgiht think (infor from Hodgdon's Data Book).You will get max expansion and organ damage when that thing hits. Just put that in the heart and lung area and avoid major bone structure and you should be fine.

I know a person that hunted for years with a roundball and 50 grains of powder. He shot them all close, never had a pass through, and simply put that ball in the heart of a deer and waited for them to lay down. It ususally did not take them too long.

[UncleNorby]

Heck, try increasing the load in 10 gr increments until accuracy falls off, or you get to 100 gr, whichever comes first.

I would shoot more than 70 if the gun would. No need for more than 100.

70 gr of powder will work as others have said.

[yeoman]

Good. I passed this along and he's excited about getting out to try and pop a doe New Years weekend. Thanks.