My Renegade, which is nothing but a dressed down Hawkins, shoots roundballs with 80 grains of Pyrodex Select, a .015 cotton pillow tick patch (which I cut.. no pre cut for me) and a .530 (.54 caliber) speer roundball.

When I shoot the 300 grain conicals or the 430 grain T/C Maxi balls. I load 90 grains of Pyrodex Select, a wonderwad, and then the conical.

When you say, " groups at fifty yards were pretty much nonexistant, they were all over the place." do you mean it is spraying all over the target? Sometimes all you need do is increase or decrease the powder charge as little as 5 grains and it will pull them together. Also are you swabbing between shots? You have a great gun there. They usually shoot excellent. Maybe it was just a bad day at the range. God knows I have had my share of them... Good luck with the rifle.