Duffman

Hey everyone, new guy here. I have been lurking ever since I found this website a couple months ago, and I am now in the market for a new muzzleloader.

First a little about me, I am 25, live in Wisconsin and have been shooting blackpowder for almost 10 years now. I just have one gun, a Traditions Hawken .50 cal. Its been a great gun, but I am yet to take a deer with it. I just love the old traditional rifles and don't care for inlines. Next year I plan on using my muzzleloader full time for deer during the rifle season and think its time for a new gun.

I have pretty much narrowed it down to the Lyman Great Plains Rifle Left handed, in a .54 caliber. What are your thoughts on this gun, good and bad? I am also still up for suggestions on a new muzzleloader, again looking for a traditional percussion for under $500 and left handed would be a plus, any info would be greatly appreceated.

Also where is the best (cheapest) place to order a rifle and blackpowder supplies online?

cayugad

The Lyman Great Plains rifle in .54 caliber is a good choice. With the 1-60 twist it will be an exceptional roundball shooter. This rifle will have no problem taking deer for you. Since Wisconsin does not allow scopes and you would not want to scope a traditional rifle anyway for the most part, limit your shots to 100 yards and place that ball and the rest should be easy.

If you would rather shoot conicals, then get the Lyman Great Plains Hunter with the 1-32 twist and you should be able to find a good shooting conical load for that. I shoot a flintlock in Lyman's Trade Rifle in .54 caliber and it is a real good shooter.

D&R Sports used to be a good place to get a Lyman rifle but I have not been able to bring up their site. Perhaps they updated something. That's where I bought my Trade Rifle and got a great deal.

Welcome to the forum. I hunt deer with a muzzleloader even in our modern season and have never seemed to have a problem as long as the deer show up for the day....

Triple Se7en

Everyone - I mean everyone ...ie... Graf & Sons, Ultout, MidSouth... etc... are all out of stock. That means a boatload is either at NY harbor (or) sitting in some port overseas waiting for Bush to decide who's running the port & who'sgoing to let the darn boat thru to America....lol [X(]

Why not wait 2-3 weeks & repost this thread. If you don't see the thread listed, click on page 2-3-4... etc until you find it. All you need to do to refresh it is to click "reply" to the last person that replied ... then type "bump" in the box ... then click "send". Your thread from today will then move to the top of the discusiion list three weeks from now.

Hopefully the stores will be stocked then. When that happens, you may have more options too... ie... Trade Rifle and Deerstalker.

Finaddict

Hey Duffman I purchased a GPR Right hand percussion last year and it is by far the most accurate roundball rifle I own. I carried it for 5 days last year on my deer hunt. I came up empty handed. Never saw any animals, but I was ready. I use open sights and it groups approx. 2 inches at 100 yds. for me. With more practice I'm sure it will be better. I think you have made an excellent choice. I'm using 75 -80 gr. of Pyrodex P with a .015 patch and a .530 roundball. This is one excellent rifle.

Midsouth has just a couple left at $360.33. Here's a link. http://www.midsouthshooterssupply.com/item.asp?sku=000156031126

Good luck on whatever you decide

chaz3815

The GPR is the one to get . I just picked up a GPR flinter with both barrels so this summer will be fun getting it on target . I have been using a tc inline during the deer gun season for the last 4 years.
Charlie