Shot my new-to-me flintlock today. Question about ball size.

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goon

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So I picked up a really good condition Lyman Deerstalker flintlock .50 caliber for $150 about a week ago. My brother needed some cash, so I bought it from him with the understanding that I won't sell it for a year and if I do, he gets first chance at it. This isn't my first flintlock (and that experience came in handy today) so we grabbed the stuff and headed off to try it out.

I found that with the .490 balls he'd been using, the fit with a .010 patch was very tight and really hard to load after the first shot. So on a whim, I grabbed some .454 balls I had left over and tried shooting them. I used double patches at first, but then switched to single patches. I wasn't trying to win awards, but they were at least all hitting paper at our impromptu 35 yard range. I also screwed up and forgot the main charge once, but fixed it by pulling the vent liner and dribbling some powder in to blast the ball out.

Anyhow, the manual calls for a .490 ball but as I said, that's too tight. How loose of a ball/patch combo could I get away with?
 
My percussion deerstalker was my Xmas gift this past December, and I've been using .490" balls and 0.015" pre cut patches from Dixie (IIRC). I have 0.016" pillow ticking from ToTW that'll I'll be trying soon enough. It certainly requires my short starter and a little effort. Nothing extreme though (nothing to compare it to though).
 
I think the patches were lubed with a combination of mink oil and crisco. I'm not sure... they were in preloaded tubes that my dad had loaded for hunting season last year. Since there were a dozen of them all charged with 80 grains of FFg, grabbing them seemed the logical choice.

In all honesty, I'm kind of cheapskate. If I have Crisco and something to thicken it up with a little, that's probably going to be my lube. Flintlock rifles worked fine long before T/C started making lube for them... ;).
 
When in doubt, drop the ball size by a hundredth. .480 must appeal to somebody because Hornady makes them. You can get them at the usual places.

That being said, I might revisit the lube and use a short starter before going there.
 
I've got a starter... but it still feels like I'm trying to cram a gerbil through a garden hose with it.
 
goon said:
So I picked up a really good condition Lyman Deerstalker flintlock .50 caliber for $150 about a week ago. My brother needed some cash, so I bought it from him with the understanding that I won't sell it for a year and if I do, he gets first chance at it. This isn't my first flintlock (and that experience came in handy today) so we grabbed the stuff and headed off to try it out.

I found that with the .490 balls he'd been using, the fit with a .010 patch was very tight and really hard to load after the first shot. So on a whim, I grabbed some .454 balls I had left over and tried shooting them. I used double patches at first, but then switched to single patches. I wasn't trying to win awards, but they were at least all hitting paper at our impromptu 35 yard range. I also screwed up and forgot the main charge once, but fixed it by pulling the vent liner and dribbling some powder in to blast the ball out.

Anyhow, the manual calls for a .490 ball but as I said, that's too tight. How loose of a ball/patch combo could I get away with?
Click to expand...
First off, the ball fits without the patch right? If so, stick with the .490 patch and get thinner material. I use very thin materials with my round balls and I lube my patches with a mixture of ballistol and water. My last hunt was with an 8:1 water ballistol mixture... though any water soluble oil will work.

I load powder, an over powder felt wad or cardboard wad then patch and ball. Provides a very accurate process... though slow....

Good luck with your shooting !
 
I suspect there may be some residual fouling caked in the bore. Once the patched ball gets engaged by the rifling, it should slide down to the powder with moderate force applied. You might scrub the bore awhile and see if it makes a difference.
 
A simple solution is to purchase alcohol swabs (available at the drug store and used for insulin injections) and run one down the barrel after a couple of shots. The alcohol will clean out most of the fouling and it dries fast so the bore is dry. Run a couple of patches through before you leave the range and when you get back to clean the gun your job will be much easier.
 
J-Bar said:
I suspect there may be some residual fouling caked in the bore. Once the patched ball gets engaged by the rifling, it should slide down to the powder with moderate force applied. You might scrub the bore awhile and see if it makes a difference.
Click to expand...
Definitely should work with a 490 ball and patch. The bbl probably needs to be cleaned out clean.
 
The gun was spotlessly clean for my first shot yesterday. Dinner-table clean. It's been cleaned with the soap and water until the patch comes out clean method every time it was shot.

The first shot did load a little tight and the second one was just about impossible to load. I'm talking about two grown men struggling to ram it down.

He says it's been that way since he got it. His solution was to just scrub the bore every second shot.

Personally, I'm gonna go for a smaller ball. Maximum accuracy is a great thing to have but given my abilities with the rifle, I'm not going to be shooting more than 40 yards anyhow. And at about that distance yesterday, even with .454 balls sliding down the bore, it was still putting lead on a target the size of a clay pigeon shooting offhand. And I am no pro with a flintlock... ;)

I think I'll look around for some .480's or some thinner patches, or maybe both.
 
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I use raw beeswax melted over a double broiler I found at a garage sale and mixed with a percentage of olive oil depending on how thick I want the end result. Just be careful not to spill it on the hot burner.

You might also try pillow ticking instead of a double patch. I often get my best accuracy out of flinters using an undersized ball and pillow ticking.
 
I use .22 caliber cleaning patches for patch material in my 50 caliber muzzle stuffer and .490 diameter balls. They start a bit tight but bottom nicely. I do saturate the patch with bore butter although I have used mink oil in the past with equal success.
 
Cosmoline - how undersized do you go?
I have the .454's left over from a percussion revolver I used to have. I know they're undersized, but they're hitting paper and even a bullseye or two at 40 yards, offhand, with me trying to ignore the flash when I haven't shot a flintlock in years. So at the very least, they're going to get used up for practice. But I feel that they're definitely too small. I'll probably look locally for .480's to try. Do you go smaller than that?

Really, if I can get minute of deer's heart at 50 yards, that's entirely acceptable to me. I don't need to drive tacks, so the tightest fitting ball isn't necessary.
I'd prefer to be able to reload in the field without the assistance of another human being, just in case I need a coup de grace shot. ;)
 
how undersized do you go?
Click to expand...

Just enough so it takes a steady shove to get it started with the ball end of the short starter. If you want to keep rolling as the fouling gets worse, you can have smaller size balls to swap over to as well. If the ball is just going in easily you're really shooting a smoothbore, and there's nothing wrong with that. A good smoothbore can do groups like yours no problem. The difference really starts getting clear out at 75-125 yards.

Traditionally the rifles were patched tight and may have even needed a mallet to start. But the rifles were for precision shooting not for firepower. For that they used muskets.
 
The loading process described by Ned Roberts in his book was to slap the patched ball into the bore with the short starter, then push it all the way down to the powder with the ramrod with one continuous stroke. The old boys who shot for accuracy at 1000 yards (percussion, not flintlock) were of the opinion that repeated pounding deformed the ball and decreased accuracy.

I don't have the solution for your problem. But I hope you can find a projectile/patch/lube combination that does not require such extreme effort to seat the ball. You just should not have to pound the damn thing in there.
 
I know of a fellow who casts many different projectiles at a very reasonable cost. I've sent him a message asking if he sells anything between .480 and .490" for you, but he's taken the day off. He is figuring up a price for me tomorrow and so I expect him to respond to the projectile inquiry then.
 
J-bar said:
I don't have the solution for your problem. But I hope you can find a projectile/patch/lube combination that does not require such extreme effort to seat the ball. You just should not have to pound the damn thing in there.
Click to expand...

Thanks.
And I know! No way it should be as hard to load as it is.
I did check the fit just now though and a .490 ball will roll down the bore and roll back out, so that would suggest that some experimentation with patches might get me somewhere. At the very least, I've still got powder and some life left in my flint, and a spare one, and half a box of .490's... so there is nothing to lose by playing around with it.

But thank God I'm not a flintlock novice. If I were, I think I may have given up yesterday.
 
This is just for you information. I had three 50 calibers. Still have one. One
was a Thompson Center Hawklen, one a custom barrel, the other one a Douglas barrel. All three I measured at .500 from land to land. I used a .501
dia. ball in all three. The bare ball would not go into any of the three barrels
on it's own. I used .017 thick patches. After tapping the ball into the barrel
with a short starter with the same radius cut on it as the ball about a inch
down into the barrel. I could take my steel ramrod and push the ball down
onto the powder with my little finger on top of the ramrod. This is FACT!
This is just to show you that something with your setup is wrong. I wish I
could help you over the internet but without seeing your setup in person
I can't really help. I just wanted to show you what it should be. My lube
on the patches was a water soluable oil & water mix. I do wipe just one time
with a damp water wiping fannel patch. One time down then out. Wish I could
really help.
Phil
 
No dice on the odd size ball. Only casts .490" and the 320 grn REALs for .50 cal. Sorry.
 
I appreciate the help. I'm not too worried about it. I won't be winning any muzzleloading target competitions regardless of what I figure out... lol.

But given that a .490 will roll down the bore and back out, that suggests that experimentation with patches should help. I may try to get out again tomorrow and experiment some more if it doesn't rain. I'll report back if / when I have any progress.
 
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