jamesb
Member
I hunt with an inline and shoot BP shot shells in SASS but this is my first time out with cap and ball. I decided this year at one of the clubs I shoot at I wanted to shoot Frontiersman. The quest started last October and ended today on my first range trip. I acquired a Spencer Carbine in 45 schofield, an 1851 navy and a 1861 navy. This goes along with my theme of a late civil war/early indian wars cavalry captain.
The spencer is slower than my 1873 Winchester but has more cool points and at this particular club we only shoot 4 stages and only load our rifles to 8, which is what the spencer holds. My spencer is a Taylors (Armi Sport) and required a bit of work to get it running right. I removed the sharp edges and burs in the action, rounded the leading edges of the breech block, smoothed and polished the breech blocks, re-formed the groove on the upper breech block and reformed the trigger plate. I also opened up the rear sight, as it came you couldn't even see the front sight in it. My load is a 200gr LRNFP over an almost full case of APP. It group well and made lots of smoke.
The 51 navy is a cabela's pietta. This gun seems to work right out of the box. The load I used was a .380 LRB over 20gr of FFFG GEOX and a #10 rem cap. I used TC Bore Butter as lube over the balls. This load was not to stiff and produced a lot of smoke. The only issue is that it shoots low at 12 yards so I may need to adjust the sights. I shot the same amount of shots I would shoot in a match and had no issues.
The 61 navy is an uberti. I used the same load in this gun and it shoot POA at 12 yards. With this one I did have issues with the cylinder binding and caps coming off and getting stuck in the recoil shield. This happened at least once every time a went through a sting of 6 shots. This one also will need to have the cylinder face wiped down and a shot of moose milk between each stage.
I was not happy with my capper, I have a TCB snail type and it seemed to drop caps or turn them sideways as much as put them on the nipple.
All-in-all I am happy with my first outing and if I can get the 61 to work better I should have no problem becoming a Soot Lord by the end of this season.
The spencer is slower than my 1873 Winchester but has more cool points and at this particular club we only shoot 4 stages and only load our rifles to 8, which is what the spencer holds. My spencer is a Taylors (Armi Sport) and required a bit of work to get it running right. I removed the sharp edges and burs in the action, rounded the leading edges of the breech block, smoothed and polished the breech blocks, re-formed the groove on the upper breech block and reformed the trigger plate. I also opened up the rear sight, as it came you couldn't even see the front sight in it. My load is a 200gr LRNFP over an almost full case of APP. It group well and made lots of smoke.
The 51 navy is a cabela's pietta. This gun seems to work right out of the box. The load I used was a .380 LRB over 20gr of FFFG GEOX and a #10 rem cap. I used TC Bore Butter as lube over the balls. This load was not to stiff and produced a lot of smoke. The only issue is that it shoots low at 12 yards so I may need to adjust the sights. I shot the same amount of shots I would shoot in a match and had no issues.
The 61 navy is an uberti. I used the same load in this gun and it shoot POA at 12 yards. With this one I did have issues with the cylinder binding and caps coming off and getting stuck in the recoil shield. This happened at least once every time a went through a sting of 6 shots. This one also will need to have the cylinder face wiped down and a shot of moose milk between each stage.
I was not happy with my capper, I have a TCB snail type and it seemed to drop caps or turn them sideways as much as put them on the nipple.
All-in-all I am happy with my first outing and if I can get the 61 to work better I should have no problem becoming a Soot Lord by the end of this season.
