Its nice to hear you'll be introducing your nephew to muzzleloading.Has he been shooting high powered rifles already? Not knowing his age, be sure you teach him a safe loading regimen. Some tips.

1. Work out a load for him which has similar recoil to rifles/shotguns he is already shooting.

2. Wrap some masking tape on the ram rod and mark two witness marks on it with permanent ink. One where the ram rod is resting on the powder without the bullet, and one where the ram rod is resting on the seated projectile. (Use only one type of projectile and one charge volume while he is learning). Show him how to check to prevent double loading.

3. Don'tshoot the bull with him while he is loading. Let him concentrate on the procedure without having to carry on a conservation.

4. If you observehim make a mistake (load powder twice, load projectile without charge, load projectile twice, load powder over properly loadedprojectile),prevent him from priming the ML, discuss the danger of the mistake, have him use his witness marksto verify the loading mistakes, then walk him through thecharge removal method in the manual.

I do remember when you discharged the X150 with its ramrod in the bore. Since everything worked out OK, I found myself chuckling as you described the recoil. But it was a very dangerous situation, would have been much more dangerous with 150 grains of pellets. Hopefully, with concientious training, your nephew may never have to experience that.

Good luck, Phil