Semisane

Saturday was flintlock day.

So far, the Great Plain's pet loads have been65 grains (light target load) or 95 grains (hunting load) of GOEX FFFg with a .535 Hornady ballin a .016 patch lubed with my bees wax/Crisco/olive oil mixture.

After using (and liking)straight olive oil for patch lube whenshooting the Zouave on Friday, I decided to try it with the flintlock. I also wanted to do a FFFg vs. FFg comparison because I'm getting ready to buy another case of GOEX and can't decide which granulation to get.

I hit a small stumbling block right off the bat. DANG!!! Iused up all of my .016 patches shooting the Zouave, andthe second pack of them I "thought" were in my shooting box must be at home on the shelf.Well, no matter. I have lots of .018 pillow tick patches and .020 denim patches in the box. I'll just use the pillow tick. So I counted out 25 PT patches and doused them liberally with olive oil. Thenput them in a stack, wrapped the stack in a couple of paper towels,and squeezed them as hard as I could to absorb anyexcess oil.

With atarget out at 50 yards I wiped the bore with one dry patch to take care of any oil andloaded up with 95 grains of FFg. Ifound thatthe short starter took a pretty good WACK to seat the .535 ball with that pillow tick patch. It went down fine after the initial startthough. I didn't wipe the bore at all between shots.

Here's the target.






Sure I was happy with that group. Thiscombination is looking good.Also pleased that shot #1 on the cold, clean barrel is right there with the fouled boregroup.

OK, wipe the bore with one very wet 91% alcohol patch and let's see what FFFg will do with the pillow tick/olive oil combination. (Big OOPS coming up!)

Here's the target.




See where shot #3 hit? Did you notice the velocity of #3 ? I knew something was wrong as soon as that shot went off. It sounded funny and there was no recoil to speak of. [:-]

The first thing I did was check the powder tube to see if I had somehow failed to dump the full load in the barrel. Nope, that wasn't it. Also, I've shot loads as low as 40 grains out of this gun andthat shot just didn't feel or soundlike a regular light load. Something else is going on.

Now there were three of us on the range at the time - two of us shooting muzzle loaders and one shooting a cartridge rifle. We were taking turns shooting off the bench. Of course, we were talking about guns, loads, targets, deer, politics, women and beer. I'll never know for sure, but I've concluded that I got distracted and seated the ball with the short starter but failed to ram it home.Checked the gun over real well and ran a tight patch down the bore. Everything felt good - no bulge or loose spot. Man, what a relief. Shots 4 & 5 loaded and shot normally - actually, real well.

Anyway the FFFg combination looks good too.

I put out another target and very very carefully loaded up again for another target with theFFg. Here it is.





Not as good a group as the earlier ones. I suspect I was tensing up my hold on the stock a little.

Time for one last round. Just for kicks I loaded up with 85 grains of the FFg instead of 95. Here's the results (with an interesting side note).






As you can see, I marked this as two groups. Here's why. Notice there are no chronograph readings.That's because the guy shooting his cartridge rifle had asked to usethe chrono while he wasshooting some 100yard targets. I was able to shoot shots#1, 2 and 3with the rifle rest positionedthe way I usually do. But after my third shot he repositioned the chronograph and it blocked my 50 yard target. As a result, I moved my shooting rest further toward the center line of the shooting bench and had to really lean into the bench to get behind my sights. I believe that change in position changed my hold enough to cause my last two shots to have a different POI. Maybe I'm kidding myself, but that's what I think.

Anyway, aside from the OOPS scare, it was a fun shoot. But I still don't know whether to order FFg or FFFg. Probably should just go ahead and get a mixed case with half of each.

dphobby

Sounds like you had fun semi and some good shooting, but I can't believe you would have been talking about BEER AND WOMEN

flounder33

I'm sure it was talking about women that caused the brain lapse. I am going to make myself a checklist to look at before I prime my smokepoles. It is way too easy to do that. It always seems to happen when you have other people around to take away your concentration. I'm glad it didn't end up wrecking anything .
Art

bronko22000

Semi - That group with the FFFg is by far better than of the others shot with the FFg. (that is of course throwing out #3). I know 54s are supposed to use FFg but you can't argue with the facts.
Excellent shooting though with both powders. As for the improper loading technique, you aren't as bad as a guy I know. He has a habit of leaving the ramrod in the barrel. Last I heard his count is up to 3 so far.

Rock Fish

Semi, That's great shooting with a flintlock. I'm flinching just thinking about it.

Old/New

I'm liking it.
I have about $110 saved up for a FL so far (my first).

Semisane

Honestly Rock Fish, I don't even notice the lock action. I was aware of it for myfirst couple of shots with the gun last year (flintlock virgin), but all awareness disappearedonce I became convinced that the lock was going to work every time and do me no harm. As Cayugad says "flintlocks are a lot simpler than people think".

Some after action notes:

(1) I really did like the pure olive oil lubed patches and plan to stick with those for now.
(2)I was using a flint from Richard Pierce, a flint knapper in St. Louis, MO.He uses a white native American stone and charged me $24 & $2 S&H for 24 flints. Whatever the rock is - it sparks really well and sure holds up well. This is the first one of his that I've used and I have thirty-something shots with it and it still looks good. I have not knapped the edge yet either.

cayugad

That white stone is called Chert. the distinction between "flint" and "chert" is often one of quality - chert being lower quality than flint. Flint is a member ofthe Chert family. Chert will spark well, but it breaks down faster then a good english flint. A lot of people shoot with Chert. And they call it Flint which as far as I am concerned is fine. But flints come in black (english), brown (germany), and (French) amber. Chert can be anything from white to black with a mix of colors in there... even green.

That is some good shooting there with the FFFg. All of them loads are deer killers with that kind of group. I wonder if your one squib load might have got an over saturated olive oil patch and you loaded hard, pushed oil out alone the touch hole, and it contaminated the load.

What I find most intesting is the velocity of the loads. I like to compare the loads you shoot and the loads Big6x6 shoots because he shoots Swiss. There is quite a difference.

Semisane

Yeah, I've been comparing those also Cayugad, and those Swiss velocities are impressive. I'dgive it a try even though it's pretty expensive compared to GOEX, butwould have to order it on-line and pay that dang hazmat fee too. I can get the GOEX from the Louisiana distributor for $11 a pound plus the 7.5% state tax.