Muzzle loader help?

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SoonerMedic

SoonerMedic

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So, my bow is pretty much done for. I might be able to send it in to Matthews, but I'm not very hopeful that it'll be sent back in time for me to hunt this season. So....that kind of limits me to just a couple weeks of hunting this season since I dont have access to a crossbow or another compound that will fit me.
My father-in-law has told my wife that we could use one of his muzzle loaders so that we would be able to hunt for a little longer this year. My question is, what are key things I should know and look for to be safe and that will lead us to success? What should I expect out of it? Does it behave like a bolt gun? How accurate are they?

Thanks in advance!
 
Inline muzzle loaders have gotten pretty impressive. Pretty easily 200 yard guns for deer once you figure a load out. If that is what he has then it is just a matter of shooting it some and getting comfortable and then going hunting.

Traditional muzzle loaders also work very well, but can require a little more time developing a load and learning how to shoot them, and range can be more limited depending on the load. A patched round ball is not going to be good at 200 yards, but will kill a deer very dead inside 100.
 
Well, I have a back up crossbow. Maybe when you get that Mathews back, you should think about getting a back up? :D

Yeah, I'd take your FIL's advice on loading the ML. They all like something different. A lot depends on rifling, powder, and projectile. I know what my three like, but they're all three different.
 
Your father-law will most likely be your best help , especially with the load it likes if he has been shooting for awhile .

I mark my ramrod after I find what load works best . I can use it then to tell if it's loaded or if I have my bullet seated all the way . If you are using a BP substitute it can be hard to load after even one shot without using a wet patch and then a dry patch down the barrel .

Remove the primer before you transport it or climb down from a tree .

Clean the gun good when you get home after it has been fired to keep the bore from rusting and pitting .
 
You guys don't know my father-in-law LOL! People that have known him a long long time call him bulldog for a reason....he's really good with his hands but man, he can break anything lol. He also doesn't take the best care of his things because he has SO many things and makes decent money. We are about a hoarder when it comes to his stuff. Don't get me wrong, I like him well enough and he has always shown me respect, but I was just hoping for more opinions here.
I know that different powder and bullet combos will produce different results....but are there any combos that are just flat out dangerous?
 
As long as your projectile is seated (meaning it isn't an obstruction) on the powder, you can pretty much fill up the barrel with black powder and still be safe - you just make a huge fireball since the powder gets pushed out of the barrel. I don't know much about the artificial powders, but it is hard to make a big mess with traditional guns because of the way BP ignites and burns.
 
Most BP substitutes are 15% hotter than real BP , not that I think overcharging a modern muzzleloader by 15% would blow it up , but it is not a good practice . My nephew was going hunting with his dad , he still lives at home . He still had his gun loaded from the last time he hunted , well his dad loaded it again . It didn't hurt the gun , but my nephew said it kicked the heck out of him and was very loud . They were using a BP substitute , I don't know if it was T7 or what .

BP guns are rated by a volume amount and not by weighing your charge , the amounts are different .
 
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Dangerous?? Don't overload it. NEVER even THINK of using smokeless. I find no need to load more'n 90 grains of anything and I shoot 70 grains of 777 Pistol in my CVA Wolf which is rated for 150 grains of Black. It shoots a 385 grain Hornady Great Plains at 1800 fps. I think that's adequate. :D

I don't know what my Investarms produced Cabela's Hawken Hunter Carbine is rated for, but I load it with 90 grains (all these weights are not WEIGHTS, but are black powder volume equivalents) of Pyrodex RS behind the same projectile. It's got a 1:24 twist, the Wolf has a 1:32 twist, very tight for conicals and sabots. I've got a conversion on the Hawken to allow a 209 primer ignition. The Wolf is 209 primed being an inline. Shooting any substitute to BP in a sidelock can give iffy ignition, thus I just did away with the percussion caps. That 209 adapter on the Hawken sidelock will even reliably fire Buckhorn 209 sub which is notoriously iffy. It won't even fire in my Wolf, but CVA does make a BH209 breech plug which has a larger diameter hole for the primer to fire though and allows shooting BH209. BH209 is non-corrosive and that's the big attraction to me, plus I don't have to scrub the bore every shot or two to maintain accuracy when shooting paper. BH209 is expensive. I stick with 777 in the inline because I like the power of the stuff. :D I've yet to chronograph the BH209 in my Hawken. I've heard it's pretty powerful, too. Main thing, the stuff is ACCURATE in that rifle.

If you go to the BP forum with this question, you'll get all sorts of descention about using any subs, the "holy black" crowd. ME, though, I'm about shooting and hunting in a modern world. I really don't care what Davy or Daniel or even Jim Bridger used. I figure if they'd had inlines and BH209, they probably would have used THAT, let alone if they'd had .30-06s. :D I cannot just go to a gun shop and buy black powder. If I could, I might keep some around, but it doesn't exist at gun shops, too much government required BS involved for the amount of sales they'd get. You have to order it and then you pay a hasmat fee, might as well up the extra cost of BH209, works better anyway once your gun is set up for it. Of course, if you have a flinter or "rock ignition", you'll be forced to shoot BP. Good luck on that.
 
I’m just starting to get into inline muzzleloading. From what I’ve seen so far, almost everything is different from cartridge rifles. Even the cleaning is totally different. First time I ever heard of something called bore butter.

Anyway I’m not at my desk today so I’ll share my research tomorrow.
 
I'm assuming it will be a modern style in-line with a .50 bore. Once you get your hands on it, google the manual, most are online. This should give you safe load levels. The easiest option would be a pellet/saboted bullet load. I believe the whole works is sold as blister pack kits these days. Most inlines use 2 or 3 pellets of 50 grain equivalent powder. If you're not trying to stretch to extreme range, keeping it 100ish or less, pretty much any of the sabot/bullet combinations in the 240-300gr weight will serve you well for whitetail. The .44 240gr JSP pistol bullet is a proven deer killer to this range, the ML specific bullets available are slight improvements on these. If it is a traditional "Hawken" style rifle, post again, entirely different loads, projectiles and powders for those.
 
I got hooked on muzzle loading a couple years back, and have a system of quickloaders, weighed charges, prelub d bullets etc. that I use.

But for simplicity sake (and this is assuming it's a modern inline), I would recommend using any of the available peletized propellents (I mostly used 777).
I'd also recommend saboted bullets for the time being, again mostly for simplicity sake.

After you get used to the process of loading, and shooting (and in the case of my rifle, cleaning between shots). Then diversifying your powders and bullets to find the best combination can be a lot of fun.

When I'm rushed to go shoot, I'll buy a box of 777 50/50 pellets, and a blister pack of saboted Hornadys. That and my tube of bore butter are all that's really needed to get into the field.

I usually carry a bag of cleaning patches, and some DI water in my truck. I'll clean my rifle as soon as I'm done hunting.

I also would suggest sticking to the 2 pellet load for the most part. 3 pellets gets you some extra velocity but not enough to really matter.
 
I've been shooting muzzleloaders of one sort or another for 45 years. I started out getting hooked on cap an ball revolvers. This wasn't for hunting, just shooting pleasure. When I was in college, I found the price of black powder and ball and cap appealing since I was broke. I got my first rifle in the early 90s with an eye on black powder season in New Mexico which I never did. I was going to head out there one year with a friend and a big pacific hurricane moved into SE NM, so I stayed home. My buddy went with some other folks and they spent the whole time in Carlsbad in a motel and touring the caverns again. LOL! He said it rained HARD for a whole week and they couldn't even get into the mountains. I made the right decision. :D

Some states require a traditional sidelock, some require percussion cap or flint ignition. This varies from state to state, but it's why I got a Hawken first. I bought the CVA inline when my first wife was in the hospital on her death bed. I bought several guns at that time just to get my mind off my problems (or try to) at the time. I caught it on sale at Gander Mountain. It's a heck of a shooter and I've taken one deer with it, but I couldn't use it in New Mexico, at least if the laws still require side locks. The thing shoots 2 MOA with the 385 grain Great Plains minies. I've heard it's even more accurate with powerbelts, but I've never tried them. 100 yards is all I need from it. I shoot 777 in it and think of it as a .50/90 sharps without the brass. :D I still like my Hawken, but for hunting, it is not the gun that CVA is. What I like about it beyond the obvious is it's oblivious to wet weather, it's easy to clean, and it's easy to unload without having to fire it. Just pull the breech plug and knock the load out of the chamber with the ram rod and brush out the loose powder from the threads. Easy. :D I'll leave it loaded for a few days while I hunt, just remove the primer when I come in. But, I won't leave it loaded for extended periods.

So, if rules don't require sidelocks in your state, I'd recommend the modern inline 209 primed percussion.
 
Like I said earlier, I'm just starting to get into inline muzzleloader. Some instructionals appear to be complicated and to me are discouraging.

The videos from Gregg Ritz on the other hand seem simple. They cover loading, cleaning, propellants and more.

Here's a link to his videos:
 
Muzzle loading is just like cartridge rifles in the sense that you can get as detailed and OCD as you want, or you can just do the basics and get along just fine. There is also a never ending line of people wanting to sell you accessories and stuff. Some make life easier, but most aren't necessary. Seasoning barrels and having 7 different kinds of lube aren't necessary for someone that just wants to go shoot a deer. Cleaners and gadgets are nice, but warm soapy water and patches still gets the job done.
For the average hunter the biggest thing is just to shoot the gun and get comfortable with it. If you are using loose powder start at a medium load, and work your way up in 5 grain increments and see what your accuracy looks like. Don't obsess over brands or type, just buy a can of a name brand powder, and one type of bullet and find out how they get along with each other. You will more than likely find a satisfactory load with any name brand propellant and bullet as long as you take the time to shoot them some. If you are shooting a patch and ball you can also play with the patch thickness, but most of the time just tailoring your powder level can get you hunting accuracy.
Be sure to bring a jag and some patches with you to the range. Most powders leave enough fouling you will need to run a damp patch inbetween shots. This does not mean scrubbing the bore clean, it means keeping the dirt down enough you can load another round. One pass is every couple shots is enough.
With an inline you can shoot loose powder or pellets. The pellets are a convenience but you are pretty much stuck shooting either 100 grain or 150 grain loads. I would probably stick with 100 grain loads and possibly try 2 or 3 types of sabots and see what shoots best. As long as you are shooting a .50 or bigger, you have no reason to worry about power, just try to find a load that shoots consistently and keep ranges reasonable.
Keep the experimentation to a minimum, and just focus on getting comfortable with the rifle and you will be fine. Some people get hung up on having every piece of gear and trying every possible combination and they never actually make it to the range to shoot the gun.
 
Accuracy can be excellent depending upon the rifle and load. I like to check my Rifle (CVA) each season with a couple of shots at 100 yds. just to be sure it is still 'on'.

By changing 'sabots' I can use either .452 or .458 bullets which gives me a huge selection to choose from with regards to bullet type and weight.

I have several loads that will shoot 1 MOA or better (3 shot groups). You can't ask for more than that.
 

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