Load Development for my Caywood Northwest Trade Gun

A few years ago I bought this 20 gauge flintlock Caywood Northwest Trade Gun smoothbore. Because I want this primarily for shooting ball and don't care about NMLRA trade gun match rules, I dovetailed a rear sight into the barrel. (A lot of originals had them added, so it's historically correct anyway.)

Today I took it to my club with the intention of finding an accurate load that is powerful enough for deer hunting. It didn't take long, shooting at 50 yards from the bench.

My first target was using a .600" ball, .010" patch lubed with October Country Bumbing Bear Grease, 80 grains of Scheutzen FFg black powder. It's certainly minute-of-whitetail.

I then shot a group with .015" patches and couldn't believe my eyes. It put three shots into about 2", from a smoothbore. When I viewed it through my spotting scope I was wondering where 2 of the shots went because I was not expecting such a small group from what's basically a shotgun. I had to walk downrange to confirm it. (Luckily, I had the place to myself today.)

After this I used a Wyoming Sight Drifter* to move the rear sight over, and also took a finer bead with the front sight buried in the rear notch to drop the POI. After moving the rear sight I repeated the small group 2 or 3 more times.

My point of aim on both of the targets was at 6:00 to ensure I got as precise a sight picture as possible.

I made this gun holder several years ago for when I'm doing small home gunsmithing jobs. I brought it along today because it makes sight drifting or filing at the range a lot easier.

I'm very close to having this dialed in for deer out to 50 yards. I need to get some more offhand practice in but I'm looking forward to carrying it in the Fall.

* If you shoot a muzzleloader or lever action rifle with traditional drift-adjustable sights, buy a Wyoming Sight Drifter. It's been worth every penny, IMHO.

New .54 Caliber Barrel for my Cabela's Hawken Rifle

Two years ago I took a very large doe in Tioga County, PA with my left handed .50 Cabela's (Investarm) Hawken. The ball was loaded over 70g grains of 3Fg black powder and impacted at about 55 yards. It was a high chest cavity broadside shot with the ball impacting a few inches behind the right shoulder. It made a mess of the chest cavity but the deer ran, which is normal. What I wasn't happy with was the minimal blood trail, which was difficult to follow with the forest floor covered in leaves. A complete pass-through would've have let more blood out faster and made the blood trail easier to follow.

I thought about experimenting with conicals like a Hornady Great Plains or Lee REAL bullet, but then I saw that muzzle-loaders.com carries replacement barrels for this rifle in .54 caliber. They sell it as the Bridger Hawken. Since I like shooting patched round balls I decided to get the larger caliber barrel.

It came well packed and included a replacement tang, which I didn't use. The barrel came with sights and a nipple. The gun as it now looks:

Monday I took it to my club and zeroed the sights for 50 yards. Like my Investarm Gemmer Hawken, it likes a .530 patched ball on top of 80 grains of 2Fg Scheutzen black powder. I used CCI No.11 caps for ignition.

The first two shots were in one hole at the bottom right. After some sight adjustments I put 6 rounds into the group in the center. POA was 6:00 on the bullseye. This is an SR-1 target. The black is 8" in diameter. Of note is that the barrel doesn't seem sensitive to lube. Most of my shots were lubed with Mr. Flintlock, since that allows me to shoot many rounds without swabbing. However, I also shot some rounds lubed with Track of the Wolf's Mink Oil Tallow, which I'll use when hunting. The 6 shot group I circled was 3 shots with Mr. Flintlock and 3 with Mink Oil Tallow.

I recovered about half the patches I used. None showed signs of burnout or cuts. The edge fraying is normal for fired patches, IME.

I lost count of how many rounds I shot but it was around 25 - 30. I shot my last 5 offhand at 50 yards. By this time I was tired and the recoil was getting to me, but this would still put a deer in the freezer.

Speaking of deer, this fawn was hanging out at the range. I took this from about 100 yards with my iPhone 12 before I started shooting. He moved to another part of the property while I was shooting but I saw him nearby on my way out.

Hopefully I'll get to connect with a deer during the October anterless-only season. While I'm not expecting any deer I shoot to drop on the spot, I'm hopeful that the larger, heavier ball will create an exit wound that causes the animal to bleed out more and sooner, for a more humane kill and less tracking.

Investarm Gemmer Hawken Rifle

With Lyman getting out of the black powder business, Muzzle-loaders.com has taken over as an importer of Investarm guns. I had a 10% off coupon from them that expired at the end of last year, so on 12/26/23  I put it towards a left handed .54 flintlock Gemmer Hawken. It arrived this past Wednesday. The Gemmer Hawken is the current incarnation of the Lyman Great Plains Rifle, which for decades has been very highly regarded for a production muzzleloader.

Back in the 1990s I had a LH flint .54 Lyman GPR but sold it off after a few years. At the time I wasn't hunting and my shooting interests were more along the lines of milsurps and S&W revolvers. I wish that I had kept it. Let's just say that the Investarm rifles made today are not as nice as those made even 10 years ago, much less my old GPR. In particular, the triggers were horrendous. Rough, difficult to set, and so heavy when unset as to be unusable. So, I ordered a Davis Deerslayer from the Log Cabin Shop and it arrived today. The Deerslayer was originally designed for use in  the T/C Hawken and Renegade, rifles but it also works in similar guns like the GPR/GH.

Installation was painless and while the instructions mention removing wood, that wasn't required. (Doing so may be required on a T/C.) The rifle now has an easy to set trigger that would be usable even when unset. Dry firing it feels like I'm holding one of my custom muzzleloaders. In my opinion the Davis triggers are worth the $80 asking price (although it shouldn't be necessary to replace the triggers on a factory rifle to get something usable).

Pic before installing the new triggers:

Yesterday I added a couple coats of clear Watco Danish Oil to the stock, which is some unspecified European hardwood that was lightly finished. Older Investarm guns, including the Cabela's Hawken I took a big doe with in 2022, had walnut stocks. I also replaced the vent liner with an RMC unit that uses an Allen wrench for removal. It's coned internally as well on the outside so it should help ignition.

The lock sparks well even with the cut agate flint that it came with. L&R now makes left handed RPL replacement flintlocks to fit the GPR/GH but I'll give the factory lock a solid workout before thinking of replacing it.

The only other modification I have planned it to put slots in the barrel keys and install pins held in by the escutcheons so they can't fall out and get lost.

I may not be able to shoot it until next weekend, due to the weather. I'm hopeful that it will shoot well with 70 - 80 grains of 3Fg and a patched .530 ball. I'm also going to try some .526 balls which should make for easier loading in the field. My reason for getting a .54 is to improve my chances of a complete pass-through on the large whitetail deer up in Tioga County, compared with the .50s I've been using.

As an aside along those lines, I'm hoping to work up a good conical load for my percussion Cabela's Hawken .50 that I can use during the early antlerless season. I have some Hornady Great Plains bullets that should shoot well in the gun and be really effective on deer.

Aside from the larger ball, the Gemmer Hawken will give me a flintlock rifle that's easier to handle inside a deer blind, since it's significantly shorter than the longrifle I toted last week.

More to follow after I shoot it ...

Update on Percussion Cap Availability

Here's a video update on the availability of percussion caps, from the NRA convention.

Key points:

• Per Ethan, CCI produces caps in seasonal runs. Next run is in June, reaching shelves in July/August.
• No real updates on Remington or RWS caps.

My $0.02 is that I recommended stocking up after they become available this summer.

Shooting Pouch and Contents

I am planning to shoot in another woods walk tomorrow at Boyertown and in preparation went through my shooting pouch, so I thought it was a good opportunity to do a post on the contents. I will be shooting my .50 caliber George Dech flintlock longrifle, so the bag is setup to support it.

The bag itself was made by The Leatherman. I bought it many years ago at Dixon's. Although it was made to be worn on the right hip I wear it hanging on my left. If I can get motivated I may reverse the strap but that will require a lot of restitching.

I've previously posted about the horn, which came from October Country and then refinished by me.

The contents of the pouch are limited to support shooting and maintaining the rifle for a day or two of shooting. I could carry a few more things but then it would require fishing around in the bag too much.

First, note that I have a vent pick and pan brush hanging from the shoulder strap of the bag. I use the vent pick before priming the pan for each shot. This ensures that the vent is clear and allows me to confirm that I didn't dry ball.

On the top left is an Altoids tin containing cotton cleaning patches, some tow, a .50 caliber cleaning jag, and a US M1817-style worm to use with the tow. I also carry a small bottle of 70% rubbing alcohol in my jacket for use as a cleaning solvent. Running a damp patch down the bore between shots keeps loading easy and makes it so that my final cleaning isn't as difficult.

To the right of that is a tin with 30 0.018" shooting patches lubed with pure neatsfoot oil, and to the right of that is my powder measure, attached to the bag with a leather thong.

In the middle row is a leather bag containing 30 .490" round balls and next to that is my priming flask full of 3Fg powder. That will be carried in a jacket pocket during the shoot.

Below that is a flint/tool wallet and its contents: two lens wipes for my eyeglasses or the frizzen if it gets really dirty, ball pulling screw, patch pulling worm, three flints, and a piece of leather for holding the flint in the hammer.

This pic shows the back of the bag as well as the inside of the flint/tool wallet. It also shows the flint knapping hammer I carry in the bottom of the bag but forgot to take out for the first picture. I can use it to refresh the edge of a worn flint without removing it from the hammer.

I've previously used a small set of hand forged pliers for flint knapping, but Boyertown's rules require using a brass, non-sparking implement if knapping the flint when a charge is down the bore. I can't argue with that so I picked up the hammer shown since their last shoot.

New Video from the Folk Firearms Collective

My favorite black powder shooting videos on YouTube are from Denny and Alina at the Folk Firearms Collective. After a few years with no new videos, they have a new one up today.

Check it out.

 

Offhand Practice with my Cabela's Hawken

Last weekend I took my Cabela's Hawken to the range for some offhand practice on both Saturday and Sunday.

The rifle was built by Investarms in Italy and is very similar to the Lyman Trade Rifle, which was also built by Ivestarms. I'd wanted a LTR for years but it was never offered in a left handed version, so I got the Cabela's rifle instead. A very similar or identical rifle is also sold by Dixie Gun Works, as well as muzzle-loaders.com.

A few years ago I replaced the factory sights with a Lyman white bead front sight and a 57 SML aperture sight. I also replaced the factory nipple with a Hot Shot. I keep the original in the cap box as a spare.

Anyway, it's a caplock .50 caliber muzzleloader. The load I shot both days was:

• 70 grains of 3Fg Goex black powder
• 0.020" patch lubed with Bumblin' Bear Grease from October Country
• Hornady swaged 0.490" round ball
• CCI No.11 percussion cap

On Saturday, I shot with the peep sight's insert in place. This gives a smaller aperture which should allow better accuracy, at the expense of light transmission.

Decent, except for that one flyer above the bull.

When I went back on Sunday I removed the sight insert and used it as a ghost ring. This is what I'd do if hunting with the rifle.

Not quite as good but still minute of deer at the ranges I'd be shooting at. My final shot of the day was at a steel gong approximately six inches square, and I got a good solid hit.

My George L. Dech Flintlock Pennsylvania Rifle

I've had this rifle since 2008 but only just got around to taking some good detailed pictures.

It can be a challenge to get a good, full length shot when the gun is 57 to 58 inches long.

Closeup of the lock and patchbox:

Closeup of the cheek piece with a vent pick underneath, some incising on the butt, and the lock bolt and side plate:

The front sight, which is brazed or silver soldered to the barrel:

Rear sight and the barrel's transition from octagon to round:

The ramrod entry thimble:

The trigger guard and toe plate. The button to open the patch box is visible in the middle of the toe plate.

The rifle started out as a left handed .50 caliber Dixie Gunworks Tennessee Mountain Rifle. George L. Dech, who was a gunsmith near Allentown, PA restocked it into more of a Lancaster, PA styled rifle in curly maple with brass furniture. He retained the original lock, double set triggers, the .360" diameter ramrod, and barrel. I replaced the ramrod with one that's a bit longer and with a brass tip threaded 10-32 for cleaning jags or other accessories.

One of the more notable features is how the barrel was turned from a full, 15/16" octagon profile to a 1/3 octagon and 2/3 round profile. This makes the gun much less muzzle heavy, although it is far from a lightweight piece.

The lock sparks very well and ignition is quick. It's a good shooter that I've taken deer hunting several times (although I've yet to bag one).

Some Great Muzzleloader Videos on YouTube

I ran across Denny Ducet's YouTube Channel a few days ago. He's got a bunch of muzzleloader shooting videos that are really well done. These boys look like they are having a great time up near Kalispell, MT.

A sample: Flintlocks & Capotes Winter Shoot: