1-38. Pretty versatile twist

[Confederate rifleman]

Been having an unreasonable amount of fun with my new ( to me) .50 caliber Thunder Hawk.
ACCURATE little booger! But I was a little concerned if I was losing anything to my Black Diamond with its 1-28 twist. The 2 bullets I shoot most often are the 250 and 300 grain XTP's. According to Greenhill, the 250s need a 1-49 to stabilize and the 300s a 1-39.
So, I'm good. This twist might do better with full calibers too. This barrel doesn't have the QLA.
Recoil with the heavier bullets may prove interesting. Even with the walnut stock, she's barely 6 1/4 pounds. But the stock design really helps control things.
Good rifle.

 

[Pymahunter1]

I’d definitely like to hear how things go with the 300 grain xtp’s. When I was working up a load for my Thunderhawk, I put a few of those down range and found they didn’t group as well as lighter bullets. But they didn’t keyhole.

And yes, recoil was lively

 

[Harleysboss]

My son used to have a ss Thunder Hawk. It shot the Hornady 300 sst really well. He took a nice WTDoe as his first muzzleloader deer.80 grains of FFG Goex.

 

[Pymahunter1]

Truth be told, I didn’t give the 300 grain XTP much of a chance. At the time, I was using 777 pellets. I was just looking for the best accuracy I could get with 2 of those. I use 777 2f now and would be willing to try the xtp’s again. It’s good to hear they might be an option. I do like the Lehigh cf’s I’m using, but $1 a bullet is steep if your just doing some target shooting!

 

[PA RIDGE RUNNER]

I shoot the 300 gr XTPs with good success in a Knight Big Horn inline 1 - 28 twist with the Harvester black sabots. I also get good results with the same bullet/sabot combo in my flintlock with a 1 - 28 twist. I once picked up a box of 300 gr XTP mags and when I shot them they grouped the same as regular XTPs BUT failed to expand on deer. The deer required 3 shots. I shoot goex 2 and 3 f in 80 to 90 gr and determined it was not enough speed to have expansion.

 

[toytruck]

I really liked my FireHawk in 1:38 twist, using Great Plains conicals and Knight saboted lead bullets. Killed alot of deer with those bullets! I sold the FireHawk for a Encore, big mistake....

 

[SuperKirby]

I'm of the opinion that twist rates aren't a hard rule. I agree that certain twist rates work better for certain bullets, or perhaps better said is that there's an optimal twist rate for a given bullet, but that same bullet will work well outside of that twist, often times a lot farther outside of that twist than the twist calculators would have you think.