It takes balls to shoot light loads

[DonQatU]

M67, I've tried unsized cases with the single ball loads and this is what happens:

I pushed the ball into the case and it shaved a little "ring" off the ball as I seated it to flush with the case mouth.

So far......so good. But at this point the ball is so loose in the case, it easily falls deeper into the case. You can pick up the case and easily shake the ball back and forth.

I had a brilliant idea (or so I thought). I decided to run a sizer die over the case once the ball was seated. It still would move back and forth in the case.

So I came upon a solution (maybe not the best). I use a sized and belled case. I then insert the ball to one half diameter into the case (no shaved lead). I then run a sizer die with the decap stem removed to hold the ball in place and put a slight roll crimp on the case holding the ball at its widest diameter.

Problem: Powder burn is not complete (even with fast powders) and wide variations in shot-to-shot velocity occur.

Advantage: A recovered ball showed that the full size (.360) ball engaged the riflings fully and provided fair accuracy.

Suggestions? TIA!

Don

 

[M67]

Don, I'm just experimenting myself. I haven't had the problem you describe. The difference can be that you load a single ball. I have only tried "double shotted" loads. With a single ball seated in the case mouth, you get a large case volume and a very light projectile. The combined effect of that is probably the reason for incomplete combustion and variation in velocity. What I think happens with two balls is that the bottom ball is pushed so far into the case that it is "wedged" in by the thicker case wall in the bottom part of the case, while the top ball is held in place by a light crimp. This stops the bottom ball from rattling around, and the combined weight of the two projectiles probably also helps in building pressure. It takes more time to get the double weight moving and that allowes the powder to burn more completely. Although I'm not sure how uniform my own loads are either, I hope to do some proper accuracy and velocity testing soon.

I don't really have a suggestion on how to solve your problem. It's something to think about.

Right now the time here is 2:15 am, and my employer stopped paying me 15 minutes ago. I'll think more tomorrow.

 

[DonQatU]

M67, I think I've come up with an improved single ball solution.

I use a sized and belled case. I seat the .360" ball a bit over half it's diameter from the case mouth and crimp (about 1.279" OAL). The ball can not be pushed further back into the case and the crimp provides for a more complete powder burn. No lead is shaved off the ball so the riflings get a full grip on the ball.

Still experimenting......... but getting closer to perfection!

Don

 

[DonQatU]

I push the balls in with a pin gauge locked in a bullet puller.

Clark, thanks for the suggestion. I have a bullet puller, but I got lazy.

I use an RCBS #10 case holder to seat the 000 Buck pellet in my .38 SPL loads. I hold the case holder over the ball and push it down with a properly adjusted crimping die. I then adjust the crimping die to put a final crimp on the round.

If you turn the case holder over, you'll see why it works so well. It pushes in the .360" ball in with no deformation.

I'm using MUCH less powder now that I'm seating deeper and putting a more aggressive crimp on the case. Still have some unburnt powder with W-231. Think I'll try Bullseye because it's a bit faster.

Don

 

[DonQatU]

I just tried out a two ball 000 Buck load in .38 SPL. Powered by 2.0 gr. of W-231.

At 10 ft. the two balls almost went into the same hole. I could see two separate smear marks on the back of my bullet trap. I'd estimate they were about 1/2"center to center at this range.

Powder burn was more complete with the heavier payload. The load was also louder than the same charge weight with single ball. No surprises there I guess.

Don

 

[Clark]

With the lead balls, I get allot more power if I put layers of polyporpalene between the balls and the powder.

To do that I put an "over powder" 28 ga wad over a case with powder that I have inside chamfered the case until sharp. I then put a board in the press and the case cookie cutters the wad. I put at least 2 wads in.

I then press the ball and wads down deep into the case until the ball is compressed into a wad cutter shape.

 

[M67]

I finally got around to shooting a few groups with the double ball load. Accuracy isn't all that great, but at least it's a starting point, and I don't know how much more one can expect from round balls. The attached picture is of a typical five round/ten ball group at 25 meters (S&W 686). As far as I can tell, the spread of each pair is about the same as from shot to shot, with a tendency for each pair of balls to print one high and one low. Whatever that means...

I also discovered that there is a huge difference between brands of brass. The first loads I tried were loaded in Winchester brass, chosen for the simple reason that they were in the box closest to the press. I found it quite easy to seat the balls, both single and double. I intended to try different brands just to see if there was any difference. This happened in a "scientific" way, I used some Speer cases - thinking they were the same as before. I ruined two or three cases and invented a couple of new words before I discovered the mistake. The brass alloy in these cases seem to be harder, it was much more difficult to seat the balls because I had to use more force. Accuracy and point of impact was pretty much the same, though.

Now I'm going to have to try some loads with wads and see if that will help in the consistency/accuracy dept. I have really done what I intended to do when I started this, just load up a few rounds to see if I could make it work. But this is more fun than I thought, I just have to see if there is more accuracy potential in this.

 

[Elkslayer]

Well you guys got my interest up in giving this a try. I went out and bought some Hornady .36 round lead balls for muzzle loading. Way more expensive that 000 buck but I wasn't eager to have a whole sack of 000 buck laying around.

I loaded 1 ball over 3.0 of Unique. I had trouble with keeping the ball from dropping into the case and resting on top of the powder. I finally got to the point where I could press the ball into the case just about to the center line of the ball. I then put a crimp on the case to hold the ball in place.

I found the accuracy of the loads where the ball fell into the case and the ball was resting on the powder to be better than the rounds where I had crimped the case mouth onto the center of the ball. I also had problems whith these loads not burning all of the powder where the loads where the ball was resting on the powder had complete burns.

As far as accuracy goes, the loads with the ball deeply "seated" were more accurate than the ones with the ball crimped at the case mouth.

My target was a 1 liter plastic pop bottle hanging from a string in the target stand at 25 feet. My first (and only) shot to hit it did not puncture the plastic!!! Just made the bottle swing like crazy and wrap the string around the target it was tied to.

 

[Clark]

Elkslayer,
Chamfer the inside of the mouth of the case until it is sharp.

Put some thick polypropalene over the sharp mouth and a piece of wood in the press for the poly to press against. This will cookie cutter a wad over the powder. Velocity and accuracy will increase when the wad stops the gas cutting. You may be able to then decrease the powder charge. Check velocity with penetration into wood.

 

[BigG]

How about Dacron pillow stuffing as a filler between powder and ball? Love those muzzle loading terms!

 

[M67]

I fired a few over the chronograph yesterday. Two balls over 2.4 grains of VV 310 gave an average of 690 fps, a single ball over the same charge averaged 835 ft. I also measured a five-shot group (ten balls) at 25 meters, shooting from a rest (rolled up jacket on the bench). It measured just under five inches. (4 and 27/32 if I managed to read those medieval measurements off the calipers - in the modern world we would have called it 123 mm ).