Newbie question

[ImARugerFan]

Ok, I'm going to sight in my NEF sidekick today. I bought it off my brother in law. I cleaned it with hot water and dish soap. Dried it with a hair dryer. And then lubed it up with bore butter last night. I'll be shooting 777 pellets and powerbelts. Will I need to run a patch down the barrell in between shots since I'll probably be shooting several (10+?) times? If so, what do I put on the patch? Also, does anybody have a recommendation on grains of 777 to use? I'm shooting a 295g powerbelt and was thinking I'd shoot 2 50 grain pellets.

thanks!

 

[Pancho]

I own a couple of NEF's myself and find them to be the best inexpensive ML I've found. Although the handbook says you can shoot up to 150 gr. of powder I find it is unnecessary and wasteful.Make sure you snap a couple of primers with the muzzle pointed at the ground this does two thinks dries out the barrel and proves that the barrel and plug are clear. Go ahead and try 100grains your first time out and if it groups stick with it. If it doesn't group you may be overpowering the powerbelt, I'm told that you can blowout the skirt.
The best gauge for swabbing between shots is ease of loading.The powerbelts load so easily that the instructions tell you to foul the barrel before loading the first round I would say that swabbing after 3 shots would insure that you won't stick a round half way down the barrel. Target shooters swab between each round, hunters on the other hand know that this won't happen in the field.
Although the NEF is a nice gun it does have one problem that pisses me off and that is the collapsable ramrod. Just try a fast second shot with adrenaline flowing unscrewing the rod, stretching it, locking it. If that deer was shooting back I'd be dead as hell.
As for what to use as a swabbing solution. I make my own and forgive me if I don't have precise amounts to mix because it's not that important. In a squirt bottle I mix water and just a little dishsoap like Dawn. As an option I also add some rubbing alcohol.After swabbing snap a cap again to dry out the barrel. Good shooting

 

[ImARugerFan]

Sounds like a plan. Thanks!

 

[CoRoMo]

Pancho just about covered it, but my process has a couple different steps. I swab between each shot with a spit patch because it is quick and easy. Just lick one side of the patch and swab the barrel down to the breech plug and then flip the patch over to the dry side and repeat. Make sure that when you swab, you're 'stepping down' the barrel rather than just shoving the rod straight down to the breech.

One tip I found was when you reach the breech plug, there is a LOT of fouling there and the patch can get caught. If it does, let the wet patch and rod sit there for a bit, get your next load ready, and given a little time, the moisture from the patch will soak into the fouling just enough to free the thing. That will save you from having to take the gun apart and removing the plug. I shoot powerbelts and around 100gr of 777 in my Knight and it works great. Another tip was that I stopped buying the patches. I find an old T-shirt at a garage sale and cut it into a hundred or more hexagon patches. Works the same since it is all cotton material, and I save a buck or two.

 

[sundance44s]

I might add if you ever get a too dry patch with your rod stuck at the bottom of the breech , don`t get excited ..a little water poured down the muzzle along side the rod , will loosen it up quick ....but then you`ll have to dry things out ..but no tools needed . Just add water .

 

[Pancho]

Now that you mentioned it there is a strange catch at the base of the NEF barrel at or near the plug that likes to grab the patch.
You know I've always heard about but I've never used spit. Now that's something you don't run out of and if you run low all you've got to do is think about lemons

 

[CoRoMo]

When I started with muzzleloading, I lived on this website for a while, learning everything I could.
After that, I found THR and haven't really been back there in a long while.
Check it out, it does have some good articles.

 

[kartoffel]

The best gauge for swabbing between shots is ease of loading.The powerbelts load so easily that the instructions tell you to foul the barrel before loading the first round I would say that swabbing after 3 shots would insure that you won't stick a round half way down the barrel.

Taking fouling shots with Power Belts could get pretty expensive. Will the original poster be hunting with a pre-fouled barrel? Probably not.

I'd recommend sighting the gun in for a clean cold barrel. After every shot, run a good number of spit patches (or water patches if you get too dry), then grease as usual and let the barrel cool to ambient temperature. That way the point of impact will be as close as possible to a real hunting situation. This is muzzleloading. One shot, one kill. Hunters don't swab in the field because they're busy tracking and dressing game.

For stuck patches, just use a patch worm.

 

[Pancho]

Your right Kartoffel powerbelts are too expensive to waste. What I should have explained as a fouling shot was loading a small amount of powder and a dry cleaning patch with no bullet and firing it.

 

[Pancho]

In addition a fouling shot would only be needed when loading for a day of hunting. When you load that first powerbelt round in a clean barrel it slides in so easy you wonder if it will stay put while walking the woods.

 

[Pancho]

someone tried to send me a "personal note" from this thread and the website dumped it before I was able to even read who it was from. Don't know what happened.

 

[kartoffel]

"Foofing" the barrel with just powder and a patch doesn't build sufficient pressure to burn BP cleanly. There will be chunks left behind that are not the same thing as regular fouling.

If you must take a fouling shot, shoot a patched roundball. They're cheap.

 

[Pancho]

You're probably right Kartoffel but that's just more stuff you have to take to the range or the backyard,in my case. The powerbelts load so easily that I don't think the chunks will cause a problem.

 

[Wildfire]

Clean bore.

I agree with these guys. BUT,,,,, I do not like Power belts. Or tripple 7.
Here is why. "Wonder i fthat bullet will stay in place" I worked on a gun a while back that I was told was loaded. It was. It had two pellets under a green plastic ring. NO bullet. That power belt bullet was not there. When I asked about this the guy said he thought something was weird. He took a shot at a nice buck at about 30 yards and never hurt the deer. He later said he found a bullet laying in a creek he crossed on his way to his blind. No bullet was fired at the deer.
I tested the power belts for accuracy and could not get a group. As for that powder? I'm going to clean my gun anyway.
Cold barrel, clean barrel, and the proper fitting bullet. Some guns need that fouling shot to get the accuracy because the bullet does not correctly fit that barrel. I may be getting carried away with this, I am an accuracy nut. My Encore is extremely accurate, with a clean barrel. Holes touching ...