Moebedda

I was looking at buying a new muzzleloader this year. I aquired some new hunting property and my old flinter won't cut it. I have the ability to take some very long shots that I have never had before. It's rolling farm fields mixed up with some good wood lots, fence lines, a swamp, overgrown orchard, etc. It's a hunter's heaven, and I have a full square mile to hunt and all only 10 minutes from my house. In Michigan, that's pretty hard to do.

At any rate I am looking for a muzzleoader that will reach out, and have been doing a lot of reading and looking. I was kind of set on the Omega, but I didn't want a synthetic stock. I like my stuff to look good, and to me, synthetic looks cheap. I didn't care for the grey laminated thumbhole stock either. I liked the limited edition rose/black/tan stock they had, but can't find one anywhere.

I found the Lyman on accident while browsing Cabelas. It's a beautiful looking gun. The price seems very good, Lyman has been around for a while. I wanted to know if this was a shooter or not? I liked the fact that it seemed a little heavier than the rest as well.

Cabelas has it weighing 8 3/4 pounds but on Lymans website it shows 7.5 pounds. Can anyone confirm one of those numbers?

Is it capable of good groups @ 250 yards?

Anyone try it with a Nikon Omega scope? I was thinking of putting that scope on there.

I have shot all of my deer(21 bucks and 30+ does) within 80 yards. I have never shot over 80. Most of my deer are archery kills so I really would like to shoot a couple over 200 yards and finally have the opportunity to do it, but I'm not trying to break my wallet either.

Underclocked

I highly recommend you buy a nice rifle and do one heckuva lot of shooting at all distances up to 300 yards before even contemplating such shots.

Moebedda

I would never take such a shot without a lot of practicing.

And I can't hunt with a rifle where I am hunting. I have a .270 for some range shooting if I need it. We are in the southern part of michigan where it is a shotgun zone. We can also use muzzleloaders in this zone. I do have a Mossberg 500 rifle barrled shotgun that does pretty good with the Winchester Partition Golds, but I'm not sure that it is capable of 200+. Besides that, you want a longer heavier gun for longer range shooting, which is why the 8 3/4 pounds that I saw on Cabelas site appealed to me, although I just noticed it had a 26" barrel as opposed to a 28" on the Omega.

cayugad

I saw an add on that scope. It looked pretty cool. He was showing how he set it up with his Omega. And was shooting a 150 yard spinner target with ease. But with your archery skills, there will be no reason for the long shots. You know how to get close it sounds like.

As for the wallet.. you get into the inline part of this sport. Your wallet is going to hurt. There are lots of powders, primers, projectiles and what nots.. cleaning supplies, etc to test to find the best loads for some rifles. The rifle and scope is just the begining. Sorry if this is not what you wanted to hear, but the cost of the rifle is your least worry. That will last you for many years. It is the other stuff that really starts to add up. I placed a bullet order last week, and it came to over one hundered dollars in bullets. Since this is my hobby, I do not get too excited. But some people freak when I spend that kind of money on bullets.

That does sound like an excellent spot.

While the synthetic stocks might look cheap, or the thumbhole stock is not your style, you are wanting to shoot EXTREME distances. Sometimes the rifle design with the synthetic stocks will help you in accomplishing that. Wood stocks might be pretty, but they are not alway the best choice in the field. Believe me, the synthetic stocks grow on you. A favorite of mine is a stainless steel barrel with a good black or graylaminate stock. It is sharp looking and very functional.

I could not tell you the true weight of the rifle. Then add to that a scope. I never get to concerned about rifle weight. Most my shooting is done from stands where I am seated and have a good rest to shoot from. That makes the rifle weight not as an important matter.

Will the Lyman shoot 250 in good groups? All rifles will shoot that far, but the good group part depends on how good a load it works up and how good a shot you are. I think you might be expecting too much from these rifles. Granted they can do it ... BUT what if the rifle's pet load is 85 grains of powder and a sabot combination. Lets say at 100 yards it shoots a 2" group with that. While at 200 it might open that to 6" or more, you might run into other factors like penetration.. etc.

If I were going to be in a spot where I had to shoot 200 yards, I would be looking at a Savage ML10-II (if legal), a Thompson Center Pro Hunter, a Knight Long Range Hunter, a T/C Omega, or a Knight Disc Extreme. From all the posts I have read by shooters on these forums.. these seem to be the rifles able to shoot the extreme distances with consistancy. Put a good quality scope on them and I think you really have a nice system. Some of the Knight Rifles have out of the box accuracy guarantees that are really impressive... These are just my opinions. I mean no slam on any of the other rifles out there.

I own a Black Diamond XR and a Knight Disc which I feel if I practiced A LOT I might be able to do that kind of shooting you are talking. 200 yards is extreme. 250 to me is a pipe dream with a muzzleloader although I know it has been done. 150 would be the max distance with a good scoped muzzleloader I would ever attempt. But again, those are limits I set for myself.

Moebedda

Cayugad,

You made me think about a few things. Thanks for the post. I know I can get close to deer. 90% of the deer I have taken have been within 30 yards, and probably 90% of those have been within 20. The 7 point I shot with my .308 last year was 27 yards away, and was the same exact blind and shot I made with my bow a month earlier. So getting close for me is not a problem.

It's the challenge I think I am looking for. The 2 things I would like to do this year is shoot one at long range and succesfully stalk a deer with my bow. This property may be good for both of them.

I'll keep my eyes peeled on these forums and this post. I really like how that guns looks but obviously there are more factors to buying a gun than looks, and i'll obviously need to practice a lot.

I have been shooting black powder for many many years. I used to have an inline, but I use my smoothbore flinter come muzzleoading season for the challenge. I've never lost 1 deer with that gun.

cayugad

I've got a .62 caliber smoothbore and have deer hunted with it, but the deer never cooperated on days I was using that. I have close shots as well in the middle of the woods. Last year actually was a long shot for me at 52 yards. It was the first deer I took with my .54 caliber Lyman Flintlock Trade rifle. And that was a very exciting hunt for me.. even though it was the only deer I saw all season.

Best of luck with the rifle you select. There are some Mustang owners on the forum. I think Wabi has one and Semisane.

Underclocked

Moebedda, didn't mean to sound harsh but your post made it seem (at least to me) that you were green and over-ambitious. Nowthat you've shown me to be incorrect in that assumption ( yeah, I know... )I will only remind you 250 yards is a very long ways and beyond the reasonable capability of most muzzleloaders and/or their owners.

Your goal seems very deliberate though.Isuggest you look at meeting the problem with one of two approaches. The first would involve a rifle such as the Knight Long Range Hunter and a medium weight sabot round packing a high BC bullet. Such a load would represent a compromise between trajectory and energy retention. Most of the user reports I've seen regarding the Mustang report it to be a good, solid rifle but not an accuracy king. My guess is the trigger is no way on par with the Knight's. But I've not shot one - so take that info with a grain of salt.


Above is a recent group from Chuck Hill's new Knight LRH and a load that should hold together at extended range.

The other approach would be to use a rifle equally capable of accuracy downrange but firing a heavy weight conical with a snowball's trajectory. Theredeeming thing about such loads is the trajectory is VERY repeatable (and in my estimation actually less prone to upset and drift). I set about a few years back to make one clean kill at 200 yards using such a rifle and managed it - once and the only time I've tried such a shot at game.



The Knight's are often capable of handling both types of loads quite well and, IMHO,wear themost consistently accurate barrels available in the mainstream market. That's one reason a KnightKP1 may be in my future.

Moebedda

Maybe 250 is a bit to far. I just figured these new muzzleoaders were capable. But I don't have all of the answers. I guess that's why I'm here asking questions. Although I have shot a lot of blackpowder, I don't have a whole lot of experience with these newer guns. I've always been into more of the trade style guns because I used to do Rendevous and the era I portrayed was French and Indian war. I'll have to take a picture of my "Indianized" smoothbore for you guys. I made the gun about 10 years ago, but it looks like an antique. I used Aqua Fortis on the stock and the curley maple stock almost looks black. At any rate you'll probably enjoy it or get a kick out of it.

falcon

200 yards is really pushing the envelope. i have shot a couple of hogs nearly that far under ideal conditions from a good rest with my Encore-both were bang flops.You have toshoot often at 200 yards.When youcan consistently put your bullets in an 8 inch circle at 200 yards from a field rest-not a bench, youare ready to take a pop at a deer at that distance.Forget trying to shoot a deer or hog at 250 yards with a muzzleloader.

wabi

Having owned (note past tense ) a Lyman Mustang, and having had the chance to compare notes with a few other owners I would have to say the Mustang would not rank among the top rifles when it comes to accuracy.
I did finally find a load (Barnes 250 gr Expander behind 100 gr T-7 ffg) that would produce acceptable groups at 100 yards (3-4"), but certainly not a rifle/load combination I would use at 200 yards.
In all my years of shooting I have only owned a couple muzzleloaders I would be comfortable at making 200+ yard shots with, and then only if I had time to be 100% certain of the distance. A T/C Omega and a Rem. 700ML/SS. Both of those rifles would give close toMOA accuracy with careful loading. The Remington was the best for accuracy having produced a few 1/2 MOA groups with the best loads, and handled a wide variety of powders & bullets well.