Bob Hoyt's .54
 

I finally got to shoot the custom .54 today and I must say I am pretty pleased with it. My first shot hit the top of the black at 50 yards so I lowered the rear sight down a few clicks. The next three shots hit right on the left side of the 1 1/2" orange dot. The three lower bullets are from my friend's .243. My 3 shots #1 and #3 almost went in the same hole with #2 just above them. I still have a lot of work to do with it trying out different patches and charges but it looks promising.

That looks like a real good rifle. What is the twist rate in that barrel? The reason I ask is I looked up my .58 caliber that should be here shortly. It has a Colerain Barrel with a 1-56 twist. Same as my .54 caliber.

That rifle of yours, can you post a picture of it so I can drool better! :woot:

Dave - I ordered it with a 1:66 twist. I think the bore is a bit oversize though because even with the .535" ball and .018" patch, once I used the short starter the PRB went down the bore with moderate pressure. The rifling is cut nice and deep.

Sounds just about perfect to me. Good shooting there Bronko. Ya` gotta love a .54.

thats a dead deer great shooting

Dave look at my post "she'sfinally ready"

Well that is a real good shooter. I have a Traditions Woodsman Hawken with that same twist and its a great round ball shooter. If it can group like that it will only get better as you work more and more with it.

Here you go Dave. I have to play with the ignition a bit. There seems to be some ample delay from the pan to the main charge. The flash hole is at a good height and I have a new RMC liner in it. I'm thinking I should open the flash hole up a touch.

one reason i threw out my rmc liner, they always slowed down my ignition! I dont know what it was, but it was a big problem on a lyman i had, and on my traditions.

My Lymans with RMC liners are fast and reliable. Is your liner the one that uses an Allen Wrench?

Yes mine used the allen wrench.

Yes mine is too. I have a bunch of them so opening one up a bit won't bother me too much if it doesn't work. But being a lefty I have to be careful not too much pressure, gas, or flame comes out of the flash hole directly at my right arm or face for that matter!

Wow that is a good looking rifle.

Did you try changing the area of the frizzen where you put the powder? Also did you try the fuzzy pipe clear in the touch hole trick? I have rifles that some like the pan powder right next to the touch hole while my Lyman's like it at the far edge of the pan for the best and fastest ignition.

I give all of them the fuzzy pipe cleaner when I load. Push that thing in the touch hole, then dump your powder and set your ball. Then, SLOWLY pull that pipe clean out of the touch hole. It will drag powder from the main charge right behind the touch hole, so any spark will set it off. And you know that the touch hole is wide open.

I'll give that a try Dave. But I did some work on it last night too. I noticed the flash hole was not in line with the center of the pan. It was a little to the rear. So I removed the tang and plugged the screw holes then put the tang back in place with the barrel and moved the whole works forward about 1/8" until it was centered. Then I center punched the stock for the new tang screw locations. I mixed some epoxy and filled the gap behind the tang both in the barrel channel and on top of the stock.
This morning I had to remove a tiny bit of epoxy so the hook could engage in the tang. I'll let the epoxy cure a couple days before shooting it.