Musketoon!

[Cosmoline]

My PFD gun this year is an oddball Musketoon "boar gun." It's the brain child of Jackie Brown, and was well constructed by Greg Christian. I just took it out for a spin today.

The barrel is very stout and seems to be about an 11 bore, but I'm not positive about the dimensions. The .69 caliber roundballs were the only big ones I had on hand. They worked OK, but were very loose and consequently inaccurate. One fell out of the bore while I was aiming! So I've got to get an order in for bigger roundballs.

Loading roundballs in the belled mouth is both easy and tricky. Easy because you can hand-push them into place, but hard because the patches want to slip out. I will need to practice more.

Recoil is surprisingly light, though the piece is short barreled and only weighs about 5 1/2 lbs. I was sticking with a starter charge of 75 grains FFG and felt only a slight push.

Aiming with no front sight or rear sight and a belled mouth is a real challenge. I'm probably going to use the old trick of filing a "V" notch into the top of the bell for reference, then putting an ornamentation on the back to act as a counterpoint.

 

[Gord]

Question from the BP uninitiated: you referenced "short-barreled," are BP arms exempt from barrel-length laws? One of those questions I'd never have thought of unless prompted...

 

[nalioth]

you referenced "short-barreled," are BP arms exempt from barrel-length laws?

Non-cartridge antiques (and copies thereof) are exempt from NFA.

This is why you can have a shoulder stock on your 1851 Navy repros and a BP shotgun with > 18" barrel(s).

Another thing for you to think about: When considering antique BP long guns, 36" barrels can be considered "short".

 

[BHP FAN]

the ''belled mouth'' is MUCH faster for paper cartridges, not so much, for patched round ball.

 

[Foto Joe]

Question from the BP uninitiated: you referenced "short-barreled," are BP arms exempt from barrel-length laws? One of those questions I'd never have thought of unless prompted...

We are sometimes thankful that the average politictian is ignorant of history.

BP guns still allow us at least some of the freedoms which our forefathers fought for. Isn't it ironic that those same freedoms were won with those very weapons??

Never fear though, eventually they will get around to us.

 

[Cosmoline]

Here it is firing a light 75 FFG load

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4m5ZgNj7OGY

 

[1KPerDay]

Great stuff!

 

[Cosmoline]

The one thing I'm not too thrilled about is the walnut stock. The workmanship is top notch, but like every other recent production walnut stock I've seen lately it's pretty poor grade, oily wood that's prone to crumbling. I'm not sure how long it will last with regular use. I've had much better luck with high end curly maple.

Not that walnut is per se bad. I've seen 100+ year old walnut stocks that are absolutely iron hard and without warping. I suspect the quality of our walnut trees may be diminished of late. Anyone else notice this?

 

[mykeal]

Huh. I have two fine walnut stocks that show none of that. Both are contemporary, that is, less than 10 years old.

 

[Cosmoline]

I did some more work with this beast yesterday. I increased ball size to .720" with a .018" pillow ticking. Lube was 50/50 beeswax and virgin olive oil. This leaves the strips with plenty of lube on them and gives the bore a good coat. Wouldn't try that heavy a blend with rifled bores though.

I kept charges around 80 grains 2F but accuracy was pretty bad. I got a scattered group of 6 in a 6" pieplate at 25 yards even rested. I increased the charge and noticed improved accuracy. At 110 2F it was giving me a nice 2" centered group.

Recoil at that level is quite a bit stouter! It yanks the foreend out of my hand and sends out a very impressive flame. But reading up on the breed it turns out this high level charge is what they were made for. That's why they have massive thick barrels. I've even read that the F&I rangers would load with two full cartridges from a Brown Bess plus the two roundballs and some shot for good measure, then rake the enemy in ambuscade! I won't push this one that far, of course.

I did try a buck and ball load with an unpatched ball and 5 rounds of buckshot sandwiched between shotgun wads and backed with 110 2F. At 15 yards the roundball is in the middle with the buck scattered around 5" or so. Though illegal for hunting, it would make a decent bear defense load in a pinch.