[Jeff Higgins]

Pure lead is the only way to go for these. There are a couple of problems if you try to use anything harder. One is that harder alloys will not bump upon firing to properly to fill the rifling, despite the huge hollow base on the Minie ball. This will make the ball skip and skid down the bore, leading it pretty bad in the process. That, and pure lead shrinks the most coming out of the mold; Minie molds are sized to allow for easy loading in a fouled bore with pure lead. Anything harder that shrinks less will kind of giving you a "double whammy" as far as loading ease - the bullet will be bigger and harder, both of which will make it harder to load.

The standard load for these is 60 grains of FFg. Make sure you fill the hollow base with lube in addition to filling the "lube grooves", such as they are. They are really more "scrapers", meant to help keep the bore cleaner for easier loading. Lot of guys don't put any lube in them, since it mostly comes off in handling anyway - they rely on the big blob in the hollow base.

I never have liked casting Minie balls. Monkeying with the base plug is an added step that just slows me down. Fortunately, being a muzzle loader, it's hard to go through too many of them, so that helps a bit.