Troubleshooting hangfire in Knight Disc??

Shop deals on ebay
L&R
Advertise with us
Modern Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Modern Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
W

wolfer

Well-Known Member
*
Joined
Jul 11, 2013
Messages
413
Reaction score
20
Well it's that time of year and the calls are coming in about "my rifle @&%(^$##*" !!!. Handle most pretty easily. I'm not a real gunsmith just a troubleshooter and experienced and regular ML shooter, both SML and smokers. This will be my 1st time dealing with a Knight disc rifle or any Knight that hasn't been "put up wet". Guy has a disc rifle and gets hangfires after 1st shot after cleaning the plug. 1st shot always goes PDQ. I know he is cleaning the plug out and is pretty meticulous, he's an engineer. He is trying to shoot BH209 and said the discs fit tight, load fits 2 hands tight, and is using 209M primers. I am not familiar with the disc plug and will get the gun in hand sunday October 11th.

Any insights into the probable cause of followup shot hangfires in a disc rifle shooting BH209. Thanks, W
 
wolfer said:
Well it's that time of year and the calls are coming in about "my rifle @&%(^$##*" !!!. Handle most pretty easily. I'm not a real gunsmith just a troubleshooter and experienced and regular ML shooter, both SML and smokers. This will be my 1st time dealing with a Knight disc rifle or any Knight that hasn't been "put up wet". Guy has a disc rifle and gets hangfires after 1st shot after cleaning the plug. 1st shot always goes PDQ. I know he is cleaning the plug out and is pretty meticulous, he's an engineer. He is trying to shoot BH209 and said the discs fit tight, load fits 2 hands tight, and is using 209M primers. I am not familiar with the disc plug and will get the gun in hand sunday October 11th.

Any insights into the probable cause of followup shot hangfires in a disc rifle shooting BH209. Thanks, W
Click to expand...
Does his cleaning the plug include using a drill bit to remove the carbon buildup in the plug left by blackhorn . Thats the first thing i would check
 
wolfer said:
Well it's that time of year and the calls are coming in about "my rifle @&%(^$##*" !!!. Handle most pretty easily. I'm not a real gunsmith just a troubleshooter and experienced and regular ML shooter, both SML and smokers. This will be my 1st time dealing with a Knight disc rifle or any Knight that hasn't been "put up wet". Guy has a disc rifle and gets hangfires after 1st shot after cleaning the plug. 1st shot always goes PDQ. I know he is cleaning the plug out and is pretty meticulous, he's an engineer. He is trying to shoot BH209 and said the discs fit tight, load fits 2 hands tight, and is using 209M primers. I am not familiar with the disc plug and will get the gun in hand sunday October 11th.

Any insights into the probable cause of followup shot hangfires in a disc rifle shooting BH209. Thanks, W
Click to expand...

I would like to know which plug and which ignition system? Knight did make some plugs that really were not that compatible with BH. This is a bare 209 primer system or is it the FPJ (Red Plastic Jacket) system.

And then as SShooter indicated is he cleaning the Flash Channel right under the primer with a drill bit to remove the carbon?
 
Besides the good tips already mentioned, tell your friend not to load powder with either the spent 209 primer (or new 209 primer) installed on the end of the breechplug. Having a new primer on is considered dangerous and having an old, spent one on, could create a tiny air pocket that possibly results in a hang-fire.

To be more technical, if you load powder and bullet with spent primer on, then position your ML horizontal when removing and replacing that primer, an air pocket could remain in that powder-portion / flash-hole area of the breechplug.

If you load powder and bullet with spent primer on and keep the ML vertical when removing / replacing the spent primer, the new powder granules may move and entirely cover the flash-hole, forcing that air pocket out of the powder-portion of the breechplug. These occurrences are rare, but they do / can occur, depending on loading habits, force and design of plug.

It's a rule-of-thumb to have NO primer installed (new or spent), when loading the powder and bullet. Sorry if this post is so long. But unless I get technical, the technical ML geniuses on this board start asking more questions about my reply, turning this thread into a finger-pointing at me, instead of continuing to help you.

Actually I am going to bow-out of this thread right now. If the repliers have questions for me, please private email me. I prefer having this thread topic remain as a helping tool for the thread-starter in-concern.
 
He is trying to shoot BH209 and said the discs fit tight
Click to expand...

Which DISCs, original or the newer red DISCs? Either are problematic with BH209 vs the new bare primer system. The newest "vented" style red DISC breach plug is supposed to be better but i have never used one.

Ive only used the old style red DISC system and it seemed like mag primers caused more problems than they solved. Carbon built up very fast in that tiny flash channel. A drill bit was a must after just a few shots. Blowby was also increased with mag primers.

My best advice is switch to the current bare primer system offered by Knight and use a standard Win209. The old bare primer plug is also problematic and should be avoided with BH209.
 
I would concur with that my Disc Extreme hates BH209 with the FPJ. I picked up a bottle of Pyrodex, and I have had no problems. While I may have more to clean, I know that it will fire when I pull the trigger.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk
 
I think Triplese7en is on to something. I was having hangfire problems in my Redemption and I started loading without spent primer in the primer pocket. Problem solved. Also you may want to try a different primer. For what it's worth Toby Bridges claims that Winchester 209m is not hot enough for bh.
 
I have shot plenty of BH with win209's in Knight rifles without a hitch. Its not the primer. My money is on a carbon buildup in the flash channel. it can get pretty hard and impossible to clean without a drill bit. The flash hole I rarely even touch, and on those occasions, I just poke it out with a piece of wire leader from an old shark rig.
 
I've shoot many many rounds of BH-209 with the ORANGE & RED Jacket PRIMER HOLDERS never had a problem. I would also think it's a plugged flash channel. When you get feed up with it take it off your hands. :lol:
 
I must just be unlucky. I took my brand new disc extreme and tried to shoot it with BH209 and Federal magnum primers. It would either misfire or hangfires. The flash channel was spotless, but I couldn't get reliable ignition. That's awesome that some can use the red jackets with BH, but I will just have to save up for the bare primer plug.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk
 
hunt_so_ill said:
I must just be unlucky. I took my brand new disc extreme and tried to shoot it with BH209 and Federal magnum primers. It would either misfire or hangfires. The flash channel was spotless, but I couldn't get reliable ignition. That's awesome that some can use the red jackets with BY, but I will just have to save up for the bare primer plug.

Sent from my SCH-I535 using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

One thing you might look at is a good seated bullet on top of the powder.
 
hunt_so_ill said:
I must just be unlucky. I took my brand new disc extreme and tried to shoot it with BH209 and Federal magnum primers. It would either misfire or hangfires. The flash channel was spotless, but I couldn't get reliable ignition. That's awesome that some can use the red jackets with BH, but I will just have to save up for the bare primer plug.

For one thing a magnum primer in the red disc makes to much presser and will just blow out the sides of the disc try W209 primers if this is the new system from knight not saying this will work for you but you can try.
Click to expand...
 
never had any trouble with mine shooting BH209 and the FPJ.. I used fed 209A primer.. bad batch of primers?? the bare primer is 100x better . no blow back .. how old is the powder???
 
Yes to the above. The 'first shot after cleaning'? Is it wet in there?

I have shot B209 reliably in the original Disc rifles, then the red discs, and now bare. If the components are fine I'd go back to the basics, clear, clean, and dry flash channel. Proper primer, firmly seated charge. Check the breech plug is compatible.

I assume his same loading/gun worked reliably in the past? If so, something is not the same as it once was.
 
rangerod said:
I think Triplese7en is on to something. I was having hangfire problems in my Redemption and I started loading without spent primer in the primer pocket. Problem solved. Also you may want to try a different primer. For what it's worth Toby Bridges claims that Winchester 209m is not hot enough for bh.
Click to expand...

Toby can claim whatever he wishes but i got 12+ bottle of BH209 burnt without a single hickup in my Knights with bare primer plugs. I use them in my Savage also with powder harder to ignite. My last few Knight range sessions were with fairly loose conicals and sabotless jacketed bullets. Not a single hangfire. These loaded with 2 fingers.
 
When I had my Knight Original Orange Jacket Disc rifle, 24 inch barrel, 1-28 twist... I wanted to shoot Black Horn 209. I got set up with a Disc Extreme bolt and breech plug made by Lehigh. I was all set. And like you, I had problems. And as was my case, I see all the Black Horn 209 fanatics are giving out all their sound advise as to why it can't be the powder's fault but the rifle.

Here is how they eventually solved my problem.

1. I was not cleaning out the fire channel and preparing the rifle properly. Well I new that was bull as I have been shooting for years. I know how to set up a rifle. I know how to get the oil out of the bore. And dry the bore. So I knew that was not it.
2. I was not clearing the fire channel. So I began picking the fire channel between shots. And taking the drill bit and twisting it to get the carbon out of it. That did not solve the problem.
3. Finally they blamed the primers. It was the Winchester W209 primers were the fault... I was told to get CCI Magnum or Remington STS primers. I did that. And low and behold the problem was solved. Even though I continued to do all the other stuff they suggested.

The reality of it all is, I sold the rifle. I ran out of BlackHorn 209 and the rifle was boring to shoot. It always hit the same hole. Its favorite powder by the way was 777 2f. Man that thing would shoot with 110 grains of that. And yes I had to swab between shots. But you know what ... it was worth it.

I have other rifles that shoot Black Horn 209. And I have just a little of the powder left. But once I run out, I will go back to Triple Seven and Pyrodex and black powder. It works just as good. And I don't have to worry about scraping breech plug flash channels on the range, or compacting with tight sabots consistently, and using only solvents to clean the rifle. You have a great rifle. It the primers are popping good, the fire channel clean, and the pyrodex pellets are NOT going off ... get new pellets or go to loose powder.
 
Cayuga,

I had similar issue with a Disk Elite I once owned. I lost all confidence in BH for hunting. Frankly the cleaning time vs. T7 was the same for me as I am very particular with my cleaning process. Since then I switched back to T7. Like Sabotloader notes, T7 just works fine for me.
 

Similar threads

M
Knight Muzzle Loader Load Issues
2
Replies
24
Views
3K
bronko220002
bronko220002
C
Knight disc or disc extreme 45
Replies
12
Views
990
GM54-120
GM54-120
ronlaughlin
Primers, and Breech Plugs -- Random Thoughts
Replies
19
Views
2K
ronlaughlin
ronlaughlin
D
Advice about a Remington 700ml
2
Replies
24
Views
2K
sheriffjohn
S
K
Knight Disc Extreme BP Breech Plug
2
Replies
21
Views
3K
Keystone
K

Latest posts

Back
Top