Why I love shooting BP

[BCRider]

The pictures taken by our resident cowboy camera nut from the club meet a week and a day ago were just posted up and I found these gems among the collection.



To be fair I recall that I had to shoot the rifle first (.357Mag casings filled with Pyrodex and capped with 130gn LRNFP's). So the impressive tower of smoke isn't ALL from the handguns.

And here's a shot of me shooting one of the Uberti Remingtons I used that day;



It was one of those really heavy and "close" sort of days with zip all wind. I had to do some pretty serious bobbing and weaving and even wait for a moment here and there for the smoke to clear. I was accused of mistaking the event for a limbo contest at one point....

Sadly there isn't a lot of the guys in the group that shoot black powder. So that day it was me, myself and I in the category. Myself won first, I was second and me was in third. But I don't care. It is just a heap of fun to shoot this stuff.

A couple of weekends prior to this event I used the Remingtons at a big two day meet. Me and one other guy were in Frontiersman. I managed to beat him by a decent margin but he trumped my thunder by shooting a clean match. And to have that happen with black powder guns takes some serious cojones! ! ! ! At one point a cap popped but didn't set off the charge. It was late on the first day so he took the 30 seconds to re-cap and shoot it to keep his clean status. What a TROOPER! ! ! !

Folks that I shoot cowboy action with tell me that I'll get over this love of smoke and thunder and go smokeless in time. I do shoot smokeless about 2/3's of the time just because it's a lot less work or it's raining that day and the C&B guns get fussy to run in those conditions. But that just means that the other times when I shoot the "proper stuff" I just enjoy it all that much more.

BLACK POWDER POWER FOREVER ! ! ! ! !

 

[Driftwood Johnson]

Howdy

I never shoot anything but Black Powder in CAS. Haven't busted a cap on a Smokeless 45 Colt or 44-40 in years.



We have the Northeast Regional, The Great Nor'Easter coming up this weekend. I expect to be making smoke for two days with a bunch of other pards. I expect I will be doing plenty of bobbing and weaving.

http://www.thegreatnoreaster.com/index.html

 

[Crawdad1]

Now that looks like a lot of fun!!!! What is the most prevalent revolver used?? Colt SAA repros???

 

[BCRider]

DJ, I'm hoping to shift over to an 1866 in .44-40 for my black powder shooting along with a
"proper" hammer coach side by side to make my setup more period correct. I pickedup a used Uberti a few months back. But like most used guns offered at a price that seems too good it WAS too good and it came with a couple of issues that need fixing before I can shoot it. I'm just about caught up to where the '66 is next on the list. It needs a touch of TIG'ing and I just got the TIG torch and gas running this past week.

I clearly still won't be as period correct as you and that Henry you're cycling though ! ! ! !

It sure is fun though. Who else at these things is hoping for a good stiff breeze but us, eh?

Crawdad, I don't think there really is a standard or most used cap and ball gun unless it's the Ruger Old Army.

If you want to give it a try then the Remington clones are going to offer the easiest out of the box user gun. The open top colts are lovely and so different. But the Italians have simply never gotten the hang of correctly sizing the arbors and fitting them so that the wedge locks the tip of the arbor firmly into the blank end of the hole in the barrel and the cylinder gap is set correctly all at the same time. So there's the issue of doing up some form of fix to pack the end of the arbor. It can be as simple as a little drop in stack of proper thickness washers or the right size bearing ball. But it needs SOMETHING done to fix the issue. There's also the issue of the too short front sight on the 1860's that is apparently intended to lob the ball out and take down a rider on a horse at around 487 yards.... I jest, but it sure seems like that's the case when you shoot one and realize how high it prints on the target. With the classic Evil Roy targets used in cowboy you'd need to aim at the target's boots to put a hole in his hat.

The Remington clones don't come with these built in "features" so that puts them well out front in the running for user freindliness.

 

[stubbicatt]

Excuse my ignorance, but why bobbing and weaving? Are you required to pretend someone is shooting back?

 

[45 Dragoon]

Stubbi,
Probably to see the target.

Mike
www.goonsgunworks.com

 

[Offthehook]

I have always loved to shoot black powder. Started CAS 4 years ago and have started to transition to black powder by acquiring the knowledge and gear as I go along. Shot my first local match at Foster, RI this weekend with black powder. Got a pair of Ruger OMV in 44-40, my rifle in the mail on Monday they say, and the leather, who knows with these artistic types we deal with. I too am going to the Northeast Regionals this week, but will be shooting smokeless this year. Hope to make the full conversion soon.


Oh yea. The bobbing and weaving thing. I thought the Bp shooters were exaggerating, but when you are the shooter, seeing your target is a challenge. A few times just shot where the target should be and hoped to hear a hit.

 

[J-Bar]

I'm in.

 

[Stormin.40]

Thanks for posting the pictures, man that looks like fun. When my kids are older I will be able to get away and do some organized shoots, if I am lucky maybe my kids will join me. Until then keep the pictures coming I love seeing that smoke.

 

[BCRider]

Excuse my ignorance, but why bobbing and weaving? Are you required to pretend someone is shooting back?

Very much a case of bobbing and weaving around the cloud of smoke to see the targets. The pictures being from the side don't do justice to the total white out the shooter sees from right behind it and having to look through the 6 foot long by 18 inch round "smoke sausage" that comes out the barrel and hangs there for a few seconds on a zero wind day with a fair amount of humidity in the air that makes the smoke just hang there.

I've tossed in another picture at the end of this post taken from behind me while shooting the BP shotgun rounds that might help you understand the "white out"conditions a little more and why the bobbing and weaving.

The pictures and stories from the rest of you are great. Let's keep this going! Anyone else?


At a big shoot last year the shotgun targets for one stage were a trio of clay tossers. So it was six shots required. One each to activate the tossers and then hit the clay in mid air. what I didn't pay enough attention to was that two had the activator paddle up above the left edge and the other had it above the right edge. I shot the first one and busted the clay, reload and peer bleary eyed into the smoke and see a vague dark rectangle of the middle tosser and shot over the upper corner where the activator paddle SHOULD have been and raised up to catch the clay when it appeared out of the cloud... .but it didn't appear. I look back down through the slowly dissipating smoke and see that the activator is on the OTHER side... DOH! RELOAD! ! ! !

 

[RPRNY]

Always shoot Frotiersman or Frontier cartridge It's the only chance I have of winning a category. [emoji12]