Two New Additions, both patched round ball

[John Rogers]

The one with the scope has a home made stock with some moderately fancy walnut. Looks a little strange but when I put my cheek on the comb my eye lines up perfectly with the 8x scope. The other with the tang sight came yesterday from a shop in the south and seems to be pretty rare, made by Ethan Allen?

[id10t]

Nice wood. Patched round ball and scope though just doesn't seem "right" in my mind...

[varmint]

is that a unertl?

[John Rogers]

Yes the scope is a Unertl, 8x and was like the one originally mounted on the Douglas XX barrel. The original owner lived in Wisconsin and shot "chunk gun" matches and they went out to 300 yards! Pretty fair distance and the original builder never lost a match I was told and scopes were allowed if you were over 65 years old (I surely am)! Some of their target distances were 250 and 300 yards. The original builder died last year and another shooter talked his widow into selling the scope so I had to find another one. So far I am out to 100 yards and the gun can put 4 shots into one hole using cross sticks so next week we'll move out to 200 yards.

[sc_rufctr]

John

Any chance of posting a pic of a patched ball? Are they patched with cloth or paper?

[targa911S]

nice....

[John Rogers]

Great question about the patches. They can be either paper or cloth but there are certain ways to do either one. The paper is usually cut in strips and two or three are used with a false muzzle and also with an elongated bullet. The cloth is in many cases pillow ticking and is cut once the ball is started down the muzzle and cut off with a straight razor or skinning knife. They can also be cut to a size before loading (as I do) in an eight sided shape large enough to cover the ball well. All are usually lubed with spit, Bore Butter, Crisco or other lube to help the material slide easily in the barrel.

Generally the diameter of the ball is slightly smaller than the bore and the thickness of the patch snugs things up a bit although the resistance should be just enough to provide aa seal for the igniting black powder. I have a couple You Tube videos showing black powder loading and shooting (forget where they are) and there are others that explain patched round balls and such.

[tabs]

For the definitive tome on the subject of muzzle loading rifles...Ned Roberts (1866-1948) "The Muzzle Loading Cap Lock Rifle." it is not a very expensive book.

What is nice about the book is the first person narrative of his growing up and using those rifles when they were the state of the at in target shooting. The reader gets a real flavor of what it was like back in the day. Roberts was the developer of the 257 Roberts cartridge. The accuracy the shooters of the day got out of those rifles is amazing and is on par with today's best.

[sc_rufctr]

Originally Posted by john rogers

Great question about the patches. They can be either paper or cloth but there are certain ways to do either one. The paper is usually cut in strips and two or three are used with a false muzzle and also with an elongated bullet. The cloth is in many cases pillow ticking and is cut once the ball is started down the muzzle and cut off with a straight razor or skinning knife. They can also be cut to a size before loading (as I do) in an eight sided shape large enough to cover the ball well. All are usually lubed with spit, Bore Butter, Crisco or other lube to help the material slide easily in the barrel.

Generally the diameter of the ball is slightly smaller than the bore and the thickness of the patch snugs things up a bit although the resistance should be just enough to provide aa seal for the igniting black powder. I have a couple You Tube videos showing black powder loading and shooting (forget where they are) and there are others that explain patched round balls and such.

From memory, the movie "The Last of the Mohicans" the main character (Daniel Day Lewis - Natty Bumppo) preferred using silk for patches because it gave him some extra distance.
I'm guessing using pillow ticking is similar to silk.

[John Rogers]

There are several fabrics that can be used as pillow ticking or cloth patches. As I mentioned I use 100% cotton material and it usually has either blue or red stripes. Another is a course white linen which I have some but it is expensive and finally there is silk, pure and un bleached. The linen is about 0.015 thick (material that I have), pillow ticking is 0.010 thick and silk is 0.006 thick (may vary though). Many shooters I know use different fabric while trying to determine how to work up their load to make the gun shoot best.

I usually start with the same ball diameter, patch material, patch lube, powder load, percussion cap and amount of powder compression and vary things as necessary while getting the best accuracy. It is what makes the shooting of black powder a whole lot of fun!

[John Rogers]

Here is a picture of a recovered pillow ticking patch after a shot. There was no wad between the fabric and the powder.

[sc_rufctr]

Fascinating, Thanks John.

[Jeff Higgins]

Cool rifles, John. Any pics from further back that show the whole rifles?

Weren't most Ethan Allans made as underhammer actions?

My preferences for patch material have always been pillow ticking for my plinking and target loads, and Irish linen for the heavy hunting loads. Irish linen holds up much better with the heavier charges.

[John Rogers]

I plan to take some "full body" shots at the range this week when I finish my range officer duty time. I was going to do them on the bench but there is not quite enough room so I'll wait. The action body does look whole lot like the Hopkins and Allen under hammer 58 caliber muzzle loader I have except on this one the left side has a plate that comes off and all the bits and pieces are attached to the right side except for a hammer pivot. On the under hammer there are some through pins that come out and the trigger and hammer come out the bottom? Both rifles do not have any adjustment for trigger pull so I am stuck with about a 3# pull on both.

The Ethan Allen, the modern ones anyways were made by a company named Mowrey in Olney Texas and the model I ended up with was actually a kit as best I can find out. The kit came with the Schuetzen butt plate, tang sight and globe front sight. Mine also came with a steel ram rod which I was told was also in the kit? The trigger guard also has an unusual way to fasten the front to the receiver as you can see in the picture. Whoever assembled it did a great job fitting all the pieces together and bluing the barrel.