777 or American Pioneer?

Modern Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Modern Muzzleloading Forum:

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

fishinfool17

New Member
Joined
Jul 1, 2006
Messages
4
Reaction score
0
I'm shooting 777 primers & powder pellets (3) in a Prohunter 50 cal pushing a 250grn Shockwave glide with great success. I'm getting a serious crud ring & it's a pain to clean after every shot. Has anyone used AP sticks or anything else that's clean & shoots great?
 
fishinfool17,

I'm currently shooting three (150 grains) of the Shockey's Gold Sticks and a 300 grain Nosler Partition bullet out of my Omega. With this load I'm getting two inch groups at 100 yards. Shooting the same load with the bonded 250 grain Shockwave I'm getting an 1 1/2 inch group. I like the big Nosler slug because I hunt some serious hogs from time to time... I don't take shots much over a 100 yards so a two inch group is just fine with me. I love the way the APP shoots, loads, and especially cleans... I don't see myself going back to 777. An interesting side note to the Shockwave groups is when the barrel was fouled the 100 yard groups shrank to under a 1/2 inch. Hope this helps! :D
 
I have spent allot of time trying to get consistency from the APP/Shockley powders and haven't had allot of luck. It seems to be very sensitive to humidity or being left loaded in the gun for any length of time (Im talking hours not days). Under these conditions the point of impact changes, sometime as much as 4 or 5 inches at 100 yards. At the range I can get great groups (3/4"-1-1/2" groups) but load the gun and come back to it later in the day and the point of impact is different. Its a shame because it does burn cleanly. 777 is much more consistent (3/4" groups), almost boring, cleaning between rounds is acceptable since in the field if you make the first shot you don?t need a second.
 
bsn, that sounds very strange to me... I have not tried it but I will leave my Omega loaded for a couple of days and see what happens.
 
I've found 2 situations where American pioneer works well-
1. On an inline where the sabots fit very tightly. (like my TC XR .45 Black Diamond) It fouls less, and you can load a second shot. Accuracy is comparable to 777 in this gun.
2. On guns that are NOT 209 primer capable. You can easily light AP with a #11 cap. Using AP in my old Marlin MLS .54, it was more accurate with #11 caps tashn with musket caps. The Marlin had trouble igniting 777 after the first shot.

In my Disc Elite .50, 777 is much better than AP.
 
Have you tried 777 powder and Winchester 777 primers? If not give it a try. This combo really worked well in my Encore and Omega much better than the 25 ACP breechplug. I can now load and shoot at least 3 rounds without running a patch between shots.
 
scratcherky - I had considered trying the small rifle primers/ACP.25 as a possible subsitute to the standard 777 primers to get rid of the crud ring. Can you elaborate more about why you switched to the Winchester 777 primers INSTEAD of the ACP.25? Just curious before I go and spend money I don't necessarily need to.

Thanks! :)
 
Wihill--I tried the 25 ACP plug with small rifle primers before I tried the Winchester 777 primers and it did very little to help with the crud ring problems in my 2 TC guns. I also tried a variety of other 209 primers without good results until I tried the 777 primers. With the 777 primers I can easily load and fire 3 rounds without running patches between shots. If you try the 777 primers be sure and get the ones with 777 on the package. By the way, I am shooting 777 powder, not pellets.
 
scratcherky - I'm shooting the 777 loose powder also, so for the moment I'll look into the Winchester primers. If for some reason things don't improve, I'll look at the variflame adapters. Eitherway it'll be a learning experience. :D
 
Wihill----Winchester makes 2 different 209 primers for muzzleloaders. As I stated in previous post you want the ones with 777 on the package. By the way I am shooting 240 gn TC Cheap Shots over 100 gn of 777 powder.
 
scratcherky said:
Wihill--I tried the 25 ACP plug with small rifle primers before I tried the Winchester 777 primers and it did very little to help with the crud ring problems in my 2 TC guns.

Scracherky: Which small rifle primers did you try? I tried Winchester small rifle with little improvement. I am now going to try some CCI small rifle primers. Hope they work as I have a bunch of them. I think I also tried Remington with little improvement. All the small rifle were better than the standard 209's but have not tried the Tripple Seven 209's yet. My Omega always has some crud ring ranging from terrible to just irritating. I have never been able to load a second shot without scrubbing the bore between.
 
I tried the CCI 400 small rifle primers. I still had a crud ring where I could not fully seat the second round and in a hunting situation that is not good. Before I tried the 777 primers I tried 5 or 6 other brands of 209 primers with unsatisfactory results. The 777 primers work for me and nothing else I tried did. Let us know your results.
 
Back
Top