First of all i gotta thank Chap here for the link to that article wtitten by Randy Wakeman....i wrote the guy an email telling him i enjoyed his article and asked him his opinion on a few things.....not only did the guy wtite me back quickly, he called me on the phone yesterday afternoon....i'll bet we spent a good 45 minutes on the phone too...this guy was knowlegable, very opinionated on certain things, and had a bit of an attitude going regarding some of the crap they sell folks out there today...it was a great conversation and i think i found the missing link in my inconsistancytrying to get some decent groups going. or at least one of them...

although most of Randy Wakemans experience was leaning heavily towards the newer inline guns, he was helpful with sugestions for my side lock TC Hawken....he told me the 1:48 twist barrel was a compromise TC put out to be able to shoot both round ball, and conicles, but doubted that it would ever be a real tack driver...

my biggest discovery was that i think i got funky powder going here...this bottle of pyrodex i've been shooting with, i opened up in the summer of 04....yep....a 4 year old opened bottle, ANDliving in Oregon...this could very well be a big part of my problem.....needless to say i picked up some fresh stuff and a couple boxes of 385 Honady's to try.....i'm not giving up on the 410's quite yet though...i did find about 6 more boxes available locally.... I too hate those TC Maxi balls.... what a pain in the arse to deal with....that damn lube is either dry and falling off, or turns to snot....i couldn't get them going at all on paper either, but then again i was using funky powder....

i'll let you know how this all pans out this weekend. My wifes out of town and i'm obsessing this weekend on my hunting gear....Kirk