Would someone with a 1:66 twist .50 caliber do me a favor? Try the load discussed in the original post . . . I'm very interested as to whether it was the twist or the extra heat/pressure on the sabot. I'm even willing to mail a tester some sabots and .440 round balls. I can't close the page on this one until I know which issue caused theaccuracy to go south. Thanks. Roscoe.

Roskoe....Its no problem to push a round ball up to 2000 fps....The problem is you don't have the correct barrel to do so...I used to load 100-140 gr loads of fff and ff Goex in my .45 and .54 flinters...but I had 1-66 and 1-72 barells with .012 rifling...and put hornets nesting between powder and ball to prevent patch burnout...These rifles also had 42 and 38 inch barrels....I'm assuming that you are using an inline with shallow (button rifling) and shorter barrels, with probably 1-28 rifling....these rifles prefer a conical or saboted bullet...

Yes - I have a 1:28 T/C barrel. So its all about the fast twist, and not about the sabot? My understanding was that the round ball was skidding down the rifling of guns like mine at anything above 50 grains of powder. The sabots don't skid in these guns - why would they do so with a round ball inside the sabot instead of a jacketed bullet?

Cayugad - You wrote, "I ordered some of those sub bases that Roskoe talked about..." Perhaps I missed it, but what sub bases are you referring to? Was this discussed in another thread? Please share if you have a moment....

Thank you.

Hold the fort, after doing a little Googling, I came across the following link for the MMP sub bases that Cayugad and Roskoe were discussing. Hasanyone had any positive experiences with these or is it just slick marketing?

http://www.gunweek.com/2004/feature0610.html

From above link:

" Finding a suitable sub-base for the popular .50 caliber is relatively easy. For the past couple of years, a number of Savage Model 10ML II shooters have simply been cutting the gas seal from the rear of a 28-gauge Winchester "AA" plastic shotgun wad, then loading just this cup over the powder charge. The sabot and bullet are then seated right down on top of this. The arrangement works very well, allowing these shooters to maintain great accuracy even when the weather turns hot."

Hmmmmm....wonder how well the home-made 28-gauge sub-base would perform when shooting conicals. Could this base replace using acouple of Wonder Wads? Is there a need to purchase the MMP sub-bases at all with this easy option available??

Time to pick up some AA 28-gauge wads and hit the range!!

I use em with sabots and love em with 150gr loads. Really makes a difference.

Hunter John - if you go back into the archives far enough, I think you will find that the MMP sub bases evolved from folks using 28 guage shotgun wads with the petals cut off.In the Winchester line, you want to use the pink ones, not the red ones. The MMP sub base is a better mousetrap, IMO.