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Powder Charges & Round Balls

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Powder Charges & Round Balls

Old 10-19-2015, 05:56 PM
  #21  
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One thing funny about round balls, due to their shape, the faster you push them, the faster they slow down...Add to that the inefficiency of black powder where it reaches a place where more powder simply doesn't give much more velocity and you find that a charge of 70-80 grs of powder is fine for a .45-.54 round ball...

And, let's not even get into burning patches, which more powder will do...

And more powder also leaves more crud in the barrel...

When I finished my .54 I started with 120grs FF, after a few years I went to 100grs FFF and then down to 80grs FFF...I suspect that 70grs would be plenty but with a 9 pound rifle and a 38 inch barrel there just isn't any real felt recoil so I figure I'll leave it alone...

Another thought as well, a pure lead ball sure flattens pretty easily even at slower velocities...I've seen them flatten to about the thickness of a nickel...This retards penetration...So it's really not what you want to see...
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Old 10-20-2015, 03:45 PM
  #22  
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Default Need a recipe

Originally Posted by rafsob
I also have the T/C Renegade in .58 cal. and love e it. It seems to shoot the PRB better then conicals. This is what I ended up with when trying to come up with a good load:



Seems like the gun likes PRB. I'm good with that and expect to nail a nice juicy doe this year with it.
Rafsob,
I'm at a disadvantage here. I don't have any recipes for "paper target". Kidding, but I never said RBs couldn't be accurate, and a properly expanded bullet begins to resemble a RB, once in the target. It's mostly the ballistic compromises that the sherical shape has that makes it such a poor choice, when better is available. A member here posted an account of shooting a deer, and watching it flop around for maybe a full minute, without even the mercy of a humane finishing shot. So all these folks are congratulating him. If I had had such an experience, I would certainly be looking for answers on how to avoid a repeat performance. I'm sure my Dad would have been disgusted with me.

Terminal effect is maybe more important than accuracy, so said Randy Brooks in the Rifleman article on his company. I agree, obviously. "Bang, flop" is the expected performance, not a happy accident.
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Old 10-20-2015, 04:09 PM
  #23  
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Default Lead alloy?

Originally Posted by nchawkeye
One thing funny about round balls, due to their shape, the faster you push them, the faster they slow down...Add to that the inefficiency of black powder where it reaches a place where more powder simply doesn't give much more velocity and you find that a charge of 70-80 grs of powder is fine for a .45-.54 round ball...

And, let's not even get into burning patches, which more powder will do...

And more powder also leaves more crud in the barrel...

When I finished my .54 I started with 120grs FF, after a few years I went to 100grs FFF and then down to 80grs FFF...I suspect that 70grs would be plenty but with a 9 pound rifle and a 38 inch barrel there just isn't any real felt recoil so I figure I'll leave it alone...

Another thought as well, a pure lead ball sure flattens pretty easily even at slower velocities...I've seen them flatten to about the thickness of a nickel...This retards penetration...So it's really not what you want to see...
nchawkeye,
I came to question the idea of pure lead quite a few years ago. I was casting round balls for use in shotguns, mostly using Lyman recipes. I began to get what looked like pressure problems in the 20 (never used pure lead in the 12s). While checking wound
channels with newspapers, I noticed that the bases of the projectiles were flattened. That had to be happening inside the barrel! So I tried wheelweights, and the pressure indications
disappeared.
Now, throwing a .600 or .720 WW ball through a deer will likely be effective, but maybe not with a .54, So, what about running a different bullet alloy, maybe 25%ww/75% pure lead? Fiddle with the mix until there is no sign of Base deformation. You would have to test this at different velocities, simulating different ranges. It would be more work that I would want to do, so I would take the lazy way out and use a 250 Barnes in one of Del Ramsey's "patches".
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Old 10-20-2015, 05:17 PM
  #24  
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Well, I started hunting deer with a flintlock in 1977, not planning on changing now...I've rolled my own for 35+ years or so, get the lead from different sources...I think I probably have enough to last me the rest of my life...
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Old 10-20-2015, 05:44 PM
  #25  
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OldBob, there's no way the base of a ball can be flattened inside the barrel, unless perhaps there's a wad between the powder and ball, or the ball was pounded mighty hard against the powder charge in the loading process. With nothing between the ball and the powder pressure is equal on all parts of the sphere exposed to the charge.

I've recover numerous pure soft lead balls in .50, .54 and .58 caliber from the sandy loam behind the 50 yard target frame on our rifle range. Unless they struck another bullet in the soil upon impact they remain almost perfectly round.

I've only recovered one ball from a deer (all others were pass throughs). It was a .535 ball shot into the chest of a 155 lb buck on a head on shot. The ball stopped against the inside of the rib cage, stuck between two ribs. It remained round and you can see where it impacted the side of a rib.

Here's that ball.

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Old 10-20-2015, 05:49 PM
  #26  
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Using other than pure lead for a full bore conical or PRB is setting yourself up for problems. I recently discovered this personally. You can alloy the lead if you are going to use a sabot or, as at least one of our forum members uses, a paper patched bullet with good results. The problem with using too hard a bullet is that the lack of expansion at the lower velocities. This is one of the reasons why saboted pistol bullets are used a lot. Because they are designed for similar velocities.
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Old 10-24-2015, 01:05 PM
  #27  
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Default Shotgun

Originally Posted by Semisane
OldBob, there's no way the base of a ball can be flattened inside the barrel, unless perhaps there's a wad between the powder and ball, or the ball was pounded mighty hard against the powder charge in the loading process. With nothing between the ball and the powder pressure is equal on all parts of the sphere exposed to the charge.
Semisane,
You hit the nail on the head. I should have been more explicit. I was working with cartridge shotguns, and I was using a wad, and a hard one at that. Accuracy was all about wad selection. Softer wads, like the Winchesters, deformed, and the accuracy was erratic. At one point I contemplated using a .135 card wad to support the wad floor, but I never did. Lazy slug that I am, I just went to using the harder Federal wads. I was getting 2-2 1/2 inch groups at 50 yards out of a smoothbore, so I stopped there. Intended use would be similar to crossbow range, 50 yards max.

Interestingly, I had the same experience out of a TC Black Diamond with Buffalo Bullets sabots. The bullet was pure lead, and had a nice boattail shape. Accuracy was decent, bullet expansion in newspapers looked good, but the nice boattail turned into a bevel base. The only place that could have happened was while it was inside the barrel. The loads weren't heavy, either, since the plunger-style bolt would blow back and crup up the underside of the scope.

My guess is that pressure IS equal on all parts of the base, but that the pressure cause the bullet to compress lengthwise, increasing pressure. I think the best solution is to use a flat-based bullet of stronger construction, and alter the nose to cause expansion.
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Old 10-24-2015, 01:24 PM
  #28  
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Default False tradionalism

Originally Posted by bronko22000
Using other than pure lead for a full bore conical or PRB is setting yourself up for problems. I recently discovered this personally. You can alloy the lead if you are going to use a sabot or, as at least one of our forum members uses, a paper patched bullet with good results. The problem with using too hard a bullet is that the lack of expansion at the lower velocities. This is one of the reasons why saboted pistol bullets are used a lot. Because they are designed for similar velocities.
Bronko22000,
And the use of modern pistol bullets to replace the roundball is exactly what I am suggesting, for improved terminal performance. I don't know where this roundball thing came from. The first standardized US military rifle was the 1803 Harper's Ferry rifle, and it had a 1-49 twist. Obviously it was intended to be used with conicals. Running a conical, just below the speed of sound, decreases wind drift. You want to avoid the sonic barrier for best accuracy. If you can't keep your speed above the speed of sound all the way to your target, then you start your bullet below the speed of sound. They knew all of this well over 200 years ago. This is why I asked the question of why anyone is still using a roundball. Other than in a smoothbore of, say, .600 or above, it makes no sense. Most of the subsequent posts offer no reasoning other than, "That's the way we've always done it."
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Old 10-24-2015, 01:42 PM
  #29  
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This is why I asked the question of why anyone is still using a roundball.
Perhaps because round balls kill deer just fine when used at appropriate ranges.

The primary advantage of a conical is you can get a heavier projectile into any given bore size, resulting in a projectile with a higher ballistic coefficient and thus a flatter trajectory.
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Old 10-24-2015, 02:55 PM
  #30  
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go out and get some in the field experience with a 54cal round ball and report back.
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