Round Ball Hunting Rifle

[Jeff Higgins]

We have seen a few of the latest and greatest in firearms displayed here in the past. I thought it might be fun to share with the gun nuts here just what I consider to be a proper hunting rifle. I had a chance to handle several of these at the NRA convention when they were in Seattle several years ago. I promissed myself I would place an order back then and never did get around to it. Pacific Rifle went out of business for awhile and I thought I had missed my chance, but they are now back and shipping rifles.

These are traditional round ball rifles of what Sir Samuel Baker, Fredrick Courtney Selous, and men of that generation considered to be of "small" or "medium" bore. They are of the Mowrey under hammer pattern, which is one of the simplest and most reliable of the old cap locks. Truely wonderfull rifles and extremely effective on game. Many today sell the round ball short as a serious hunting projectile. No one that I know that has actually killed much game with one will ever sell it short. I have killed my fair share of game over the years, with probably 3/4 of it killed with muzzle loaders and half of those with round ball, both .50 and .54 caliber. I have always wanted a well-made "punkin' thrower" of slightly larger bore, and this looks like just the ticket. I'll make sure I get one this time...

http://pacificrifle.com/

[Joeaksa]

I have had a hand made Sharon .54 cal blackpowder rifle for years. Love blackpowder and it has a feeling and character that other shooting just does not.

Not real excited with looks of the rifle, but then have always liked the "Hawken" style more.

JoeA

[skipdup]

I still want an Ultimate Hunting Picture Thread.

- Skip

[Drago]

I like it:

[BlueSkyJaunte]

Golly that shore is purty.

[Jeff Higgins]

Originally posted by Joeaksa
I have had a hand made Sharon .54 cal blackpowder rifle for years. Love blackpowder and it has a feeling and character that other shooting just does not.

Not real excited with looks of the rifle, but then have always liked the "Hawken" style more.

JoeA

October Country used to make a big bore plains rifle. I checked their web site and the site is rather incomplete, so I'm not sure if they still make it. I had a chance to handle and shoot one that a friend had a few years back. Like all "Hawken" pattern, or plains rifles in general, I found it kind of blocky and clumsy. Very high quality, and a good example of the pattern, just not for me. I do hunt with an old T/C "Hawken" .54 that I built when I was a kid. I used their "Maxi Ball" for years, and still use a Lymann "Plains Bullet" occasionally still, cast from pure lead or even sometimes 20:1 lead/tin. I have now pretty much gone entirely to the round ball after having first tried it some ten years or more ago. I like the idea of a round ball gun bigger than the .54's that are so common, and with a proper slow twist and shallow rifling to aid both in round ball accuracy and ease of cleaning. Handling the Zephyr is what really made me want one. I'm not that enamored by its looks either, but weight, balance, and ballistic performance all seem to be there.

[John Rogers]

Are there still kits available to make your own black powder pistol or rifle? I remember many years ago a friend of mine made a rifle while we were stationed in upstate NY and to test it he had to use a 200% powder load. At the time he lived in a mobile home way in the country and he stapped it to his porch railing. When he pulled the rope attached to the trigger it nearly blew his trailer off the stands! Sure was funny and load too!

[tabs]

I've had 3 rifles made by this guy..... www.muzzleloader-guns-glj.com including a swivel breech...as pictured in his custom gun section...

[tabs]

I've had an interest in MLR and BPC rifles going back more than 25 years....here is my latest addition to the collection

[Jeff Higgins]

Originally posted by tabs
I've had an interest in MLR and BPC rifles going back more than 25 years....here is my latest addition to the collection

I know how you feel. I have been actively competing with BPCR's since long before the big silhouette boom of the last ten years. Before that I shot a lot of muzzle loader matches, and have always hunted with them. It has been very difficult to find any "hunting grade" front stuffers in the larger bores with suitable round ball twists. While I dearly love the ornate Lancaster style rifles, I have found them to be better target and plinking than hunting arms. I have hunted extensively with a "poor boy" Southern Appalachian long rifle and have found it to be less than handy. The Western Plains rifles are too club-like for my taste. Too bad there really are no readily available rifles of a British pattern; they seemed to have the weight-to-caliber equation down better than our own, much better balance, and just better all-around usefulness. This Zephyr comes as close to that as I have seen lately.

[rcm]

A little self promo here. You guys should check out my website below to help keep those beauties that way.

[Joeaksa]

tabs,

Have a friend in Dallas who makes the same quality rifles. Absolute art and each one is hand made, the way YOU want it.

JoeA

[tabs]

You have come to the right place, because I have something for you...a 58 caliber round ball rifle on an English pattern, by Don Brown..This gun has now been blued with a case hardened lock plate...Custom rifle with Douglas Barrel, handmade lock etc by a perfectionist...price not replaceable at 5K. Brown built the rifle for a customer who got ill and resold the rifle back to Brown....

[tabs]

BTW...Brown is in your neck of the woods...Yakima, WA....I am having a Gibbs style Long Range Rifle built by him in .451. The price is going to be substantially North of the figure I quoted to you above...my rifle should be ready late this summer...

[Joeaksa]

Tabs,

Very nice style and finish. Thats more my type of rifle than the underhammer style. For that kind of bux it would not get a lot of use in the woods!

Joe A

[skipdup]

[ignorance flaunt]
How do the rifles ballistics compare to a regular centerfire?

I have just very recently become intrigued with how all the different rounds fly, and I'm wondering how the black powder guns compare.

Probably way too many variables I didn't specify to answer the question, huh?

- Skip
[/ignorance flaunt]

[tabs]

I'm sorry that my pictures don't have more detail. BTW I don't own the rifle in the pictures, but was offered it. I am having Mr. Brown build a Gibbs style half stock Long Range Target in .451 rifle with Douglas barrel for me, it should be ready this summer.

I have talked recently with a gunsmiith (a friend of a friend) who until recently ran Purdeys shop in the UK. He is going to get the address of a Austrian Gunsmith who builds flawless Whitworth rifles, his barrels are handforged and run 2K.

Joesph Whitworth in the 1850's designed a hexagon bore that in the hands of a competent shooter can keep up with modern 1000 yard target rifles...

www.lrml.org

I currently own a Parker Hale Whitworth Rifle and a Parker Hale Volunteer Rifle (Alexander Henry rifling) both are .451.
Both were made in the UK in the late 1970's or early 1980's using the orginal tooling, both are highly sought after today by shooters and CW renactors..(.the Whitworth rifles were used by the CSA as Sniper rifles...a verified CSA gun can sell for the same money a 73 RS can. )

Today Gibbs Rifle Co in Tennesse is having the Whitworth and Volunteer rifle made in Italy by Pedersoli using English Parker Hale Barrels...they run about $1300 each. I understand they shoot well...

[Jeff Higgins]

Beautiful rifle there Tabs. A little "North" of my price range, but one can dream. The .58, while a great caliber, isn't enough of a step above the .54 I have been using. I'm looking for a 20 bore minimum, and the Zephyr 12 bore looks even better. More in my range financially, too. I'll take a $1500 rifle out into our extremely wet Washington rainforests and have no qualms about parting the brush with them; I do it all the time with my C. Sharps '74 and '75.

I have always been taken by the Whitworth rifles. Alas, I missed out on the original tooling British made ones. I do understand the Pedersolis are fine rifles. I have competed for years against their products, and while ten years ago it was hard to find polite things to say about them, they are winning matches today. Mostly their new Rolling Blocks. There were a couple of guys out of Oregon that used the Whitworths in our mid and long range matches several years ago. Shooting a muzzle loader from prone in the time limits imposed by our breech loader oriented rules proved to be somewhat of an aerobic event for them, so they soon aquired their own breech loaders. Fantasically accurate rifles, though. It was just to much work to get through a match.

As far as ballistics, skipdup, on paper they are less than impressive. Especially the round ball rifles. The round ball has by far the lowest ballistic coefficeint of any projectile. A typical round ball loses two-thirds of its energy in only one hundred yards. While they are accurate beyond that, they lose so much punch so fast that they are pretty much a very short range proposition. Their mass goes up exponentially with bore size, as does the ability to consume more powder behind them. That's why you will see such seemingly large bores, like 20 (.62 caliber), 12 (.72 caliber) in use. The .50, .54, and .58 are refered to as "medium bores" or even "small bores" in some circles. A .50 round ball is generally considered barely adequate for small deer, a .54 barely adequate for elk. Initial velocities can run between 1800 and 2000 fps for a typical round ball rifle, dropping to under 1000 by 100 yards. That said, the effectiveness on game seems all out of proportion to their "paper ballistics". The pure lead ball is a rather tough, homogenous little critter that will almost never break up on impact, which is the bane of the modern high velocity jacketed bullet. Penetration is not their strong suit; they will rarely exit, and they should not be used for the shoulder shot into that heavy bone mass. Slip one into the lungs right behind the shoulder, though, and few rounds will drop game faster. So while they do not have the impressive velocities and energies of the modern magnums, they remain a very effective hunting tool. You just have to get a little closer...

[Joeaksa]

Originally posted by skipdup
[ignorance flaunt]
How do the rifles ballistics compare to a regular centerfire?

I have just very recently become intrigued with how all the different rounds fly, and I'm wondering how the black powder guns compare.

Probably way too many variables I didn't specify to answer the question, huh?

- Skip
[/ignorance flaunt]

Skip,

How does a brick with feathers compare with a paper airplane?

The blackpowder rounds are not real steamlined but if you put enough powder behind it you can make anything fly. The fun thing is that you shoot the weapon, clear out the smoke then you can usually hear the ball hit the target if its a bit downrange.

That said, if you are hit with a round ball from a blackpowder weapon it will hurt you! They are heavy and mass works very if you can connect it with a target.

There is also the case of flintlock vs caplock. The flintlock has a bit more of a delay in the ignition process versus the caplock. This is not just a "point and shoot" weapon and needs a bit of work to make it accurate. Gives you new respect for the men who went to war with them!

JoeA

[skipdup]

Jeff & Joe- Thank you sirs. Your answers are basically what I'd imagined, just wasn't sure.

To be honest, I have a hard enough time "connecting" with my 4 legged target with my .270 Rem M700. I'd better stick with that for a while before I broaden my horizons.

Shooting ain't easy, but man is it fun.

- Skip