These are sold mainly as filler items for cased revolvers. They are copies of one common type of period mould and the bullets look the same as some seen in photographs of original cased guns. Both Dixie and Pedersoli are real up front that the bullets and balls cast from these are not match quality. Nevertheless, the moulds are quality items and can turn out a meager supply of projectiles if you wear a good pair of heat resistent gloves while casting. A recurrent difficulty is keeping the sprue plate down to get the bases flat.
I have had pretty good luck shooting the 60 grain .31 bullets- possibly because it's hard to shoot the pocket pistols well enough to appreciate the accuracy deficit. When I tried the .36 bullets in a Pietta Navy, results were as generally predicted in the literature- not very accurate. A good bit less accurate than the Lee conicals in available calibers and a whole lot less accurate than ball.
My 61 Uberti Navy has good chamber alignment and a loading ram that fits the noses of these bullets pretty well. I cast the bullets of wheelweights (this has worked out very well for me since Gatofeo told me it was alright) and loaded them over 15 pyrodex. I sat on the ground with the shoulder stocked Navy and shot over the chronograph at a 50 Yard target.
At this point, I began to get pretty excited. A six-inch group centered and just a bit low seem to be giving the lie to the conventional wisdom about these moulds/bullets. Then I shot a couple of rested groups at 50 feet and punctured that balloon. I got at least one flier per 6 round target with one diverging from the main group by six inches. I saved the better target:
So, compared to round ball, this bullet{which could not have a worse design for a front loader) is pretty inaccurate. Nevertheless,I suspect the casual pistol shooting yahoo of the 19th century would not notice the difference.
The balls thrown from this mould were well formed and a bit larger than the .375" available from the major sources. I shot a couple of cylinders into a 25 yard target-Standing off-hand and found them to be perfectly fine. I gestimate an NRA slow fire score in the low to mid 90s had I been using a standard center.
p://www.gunpix.com/gallery/Muzzleloaders_and_Blackpowder/36bullet50.jpg
I have had pretty good luck shooting the 60 grain .31 bullets- possibly because it's hard to shoot the pocket pistols well enough to appreciate the accuracy deficit. When I tried the .36 bullets in a Pietta Navy, results were as generally predicted in the literature- not very accurate. A good bit less accurate than the Lee conicals in available calibers and a whole lot less accurate than ball.
My 61 Uberti Navy has good chamber alignment and a loading ram that fits the noses of these bullets pretty well. I cast the bullets of wheelweights (this has worked out very well for me since Gatofeo told me it was alright) and loaded them over 15 pyrodex. I sat on the ground with the shoulder stocked Navy and shot over the chronograph at a 50 Yard target.
At this point, I began to get pretty excited. A six-inch group centered and just a bit low seem to be giving the lie to the conventional wisdom about these moulds/bullets. Then I shot a couple of rested groups at 50 feet and punctured that balloon. I got at least one flier per 6 round target with one diverging from the main group by six inches. I saved the better target:
So, compared to round ball, this bullet{which could not have a worse design for a front loader) is pretty inaccurate. Nevertheless,I suspect the casual pistol shooting yahoo of the 19th century would not notice the difference.
The balls thrown from this mould were well formed and a bit larger than the .375" available from the major sources. I shot a couple of cylinders into a 25 yard target-Standing off-hand and found them to be perfectly fine. I gestimate an NRA slow fire score in the low to mid 90s had I been using a standard center.
p://www.gunpix.com/gallery/Muzzleloaders_and_Blackpowder/36bullet50.jpg
