[Jeff Higgins]

O.k., that said, I got out to the range with the new rifle today. In summary, it's going to need some work...

The front sight was over twice as tall as needed. I did a lot of filing... Getting it on paper at 100 yards, it was shooting 6-8" "groups", if you can call them that. On the plus side, it kept loading quite easily, with no need to wipe between shots. Which was likely part of the problem.

I was using .530" diameter round balls and .015" thick patches. Patches were lubed with the old T/C Maxi lube for some of them, and with the Natural Lube 1000+ for the other batch. Lube didn't seem to make any difference.

I was only using 80 grains of FFg at first, stepping up to 90 grains when it was clear it wasn't grouping with 80. That helped a lot. I ran out of daylight, but next time I'll go up to 100, or even 110 grains. The problem is, I don't want to turn this into some roaring, bucking monster - I already have plenty of those. It's really pleasant to shoot right now with the lighter charges.

The ease of loading points to another potential area for improvement; I might have to try a tighter ball and patch combination. Maybe a .535" ball with the same patch, or a thicker patch, or both. I just hate to do that and wind up with a rifle that needs to be wiped between every shot.

Ideally, I could wind up with a lighter charge behind a loose fitting, easy to load ball and patch. Unfortunately, it seldom seems to work out that way. Tighter ball and patch combinations, with charges heavy enough to obturate the ball, are what seems to make most muzzle loaders really go. Maybe I'll get lucky... we'll see...