Question on bullet size for 1863 Sharps linen cartridge

[Painless]

I recently purchased some lead .52 caliber lead bullets to incorporate in paper bullets that I am making to shoot in my original 1863 Sharps carbine. These bullets are oversize from the breech end of the barrel by 8/1000 and by 11/1000 at the muzzel end. I am using Dixie Gun's nitrated paper and Mike Cumpston's (Guns Magazine) formula of 80 grains of FFg Goex behind that 395 grain Dixie bullet. I am using Dynamite Nobel percussion caps. Anyone see any problems?
Thanks. Painless.

 

[Eric F]

post this again in the black powder section for faster responce,

 

[redneck2]

post this again in the black powder section for faster response,

You can click on the little triangle sign to the left of your post, then ask a moderator to move it.

If you don't get a reply here you could try the BPCR website. They'll know.
http://www.bpcr.net/index-a.htm

 

[Painless]

To Redneck 2

Thanks for the info.

 

[scrat]

hahahaha MIke Cumpston hahahah. Thats MEC he is a regular hear. Without seeing you do it. The one thing i am going to add is that it is important to seat the bullet firmly against the powder. Which means if the bullet seats to far deep then you need to add more powder. If the bullet sticks out too much than you have too much powder. What ever the correct amount is then you need to do 2 more things. 1 measure the amount of powder in the cartridge.. 2 measure the length of that cartridge as this will be important later on if the cartridges are different in length the amount of powder will vary. Ok now the next important thing. On smokeless powder if you have a bullet that is loaded incorrectly you can use a kinetic bullet puller which uses force in the form of a hard hit to drive the bullet out of the case. I would strongly strongly strongly not recomend this with black powder.

 

[mec]

I was using a Pedersoli replica of the Confederate knock off of the Sharps. this one lacked the (problematic) chamber sleeve that was supposed to seal the breech and used, instead a couple of stainless steel washers mounted behind the chamber on the breach block. Whatever, it leaked a significant amount of gas and dirtied up fairly fast. Duplicating the rage of fire expected of "Sharp Shooters" was not in the picture as it was necessary to spit-clean the action after a couple of shots..
Instead of following the instructions with the Dixie ctg kit- cartridge consisting only of the powder charge -loaded behind the hand seated bullet, I made up cartridges with the bullet in place so as to imitate the original paper and linen Cartridges. I would suggest not doing this as the white glue I used kept some of the nitrated paper from fully combusting. In any case, it was no problem getting an 80 grain powder column just the right lenght for the breech to cut if off with just a few grains of powder wasted while closing the breech

I thought this was pretty good for 75 yards off-hand proving the gun will shoot a lot better from a rest or a better shooter.